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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of White Lies, by Charles Reade
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: White Lies
+
+Author: Charles Reade
+
+Release Date: May 16, 2006 [EBook #2472]
+Last Updated: September 27, 2016
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: UTF-8
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WHITE LIES ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Donald Lainson
+
+
+
+
+
+WHITE LIES
+
+By Charles Reade
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+
+Towards the close of the last century the Baron de Beaurepaire lived
+in the chateau of that name in Brittany. His family was of prodigious
+antiquity; seven successive barons had already flourished on this spot
+when a younger son of the house accompanied his neighbor the Duke of
+Normandy in his descent on England, and was rewarded by a grant of
+English land, on which he dug a mote and built a chateau, and called it
+Beaurepaire (the worthy Saxons turned this into Borreper without delay).
+Since that day more than twenty gentlemen of the same lineage had held
+in turn the original chateau and lands, and handed them down to their
+present lord.
+
+Thus rooted in his native Brittany, Henri Lionel Marie St. Quentin de
+Beaurepaire was as fortunate as any man can be pronounced before he
+dies. He had health, rank, a good income, a fair domain, a goodly
+house, a loving wife, and two lovely young daughters, all veneration and
+affection. Two months every year he visited the Faubourg St. Germain and
+the Court. At both every gentleman and every lacquey knew his name, and
+his face: his return to Brittany after this short absence was celebrated
+by a rustic fete.
+
+Above all, Monsieur de Beaurepaire possessed that treasure of treasures,
+content. He hunted no heart-burns. Ambition did not tempt him; why
+should he listen to long speeches, and court the unworthy, and descend
+to intrigue, for so precarious and equivocal a prize as a place in the
+Government, when he could be De Beaurepaire without trouble or loss of
+self-respect? Social ambition could get little hold of him; let parvenus
+give balls half in doors, half out, and light two thousand lamps,
+and waste their substance battling and manoeuvring for fashionable
+distinction; he had nothing to gain by such foolery, nothing to lose by
+modest living; he was the twenty-ninth Baron of Beaurepaire. So wise,
+so proud, so little vain, so strong in health and wealth and honor,
+one would have said nothing less than an earthquake could shake
+this gentleman and his house. Yet both were shaken, though rooted by
+centuries to the soil; and by no vulgar earthquake.
+
+For years France had bowed in silence beneath two galling burdens--a
+selfish and corrupt monarchy, and a multitudinous, privileged, lazy, and
+oppressive aristocracy, by whom the peasant was handled like a Russian
+serf. [Said peasant is now the principal proprietor of the soil.]
+
+The lower orders rose upon their oppressors, and soon showed themselves
+far blacker specimens of the same breed. Law, religion, humanity, and
+common sense, hid their faces; innocent blood flowed in a stream, and
+terror reigned. To Monsieur de Beaurepaire these republicans--murderers
+of women, children, and kings--seemed the most horrible monsters nature
+had ever produced; he put on black, and retired from society; he felled
+timber, and raised large sums of money upon his estate. And one day he
+mounted his charger, and disappeared from the chateau.
+
+Three months after this, a cavalier, dusty and pale, rode into the
+courtyard of Beaurepaire, and asked to see the baroness. She came to
+him; he hung his head and held her out a letter.
+
+It contained a few sad words from Monsieur de Laroche-jaquelin. The
+baron had just fallen in La Vendee, fighting for the Crown.
+
+From that hour till her death the baroness wore black.
+
+The mourner would have been arrested, and perhaps beheaded, but for a
+friend, the last in the world on whom the family reckoned for any solid
+aid. Dr. Aubertin had lived in the chateau twenty years. He was a man of
+science, and did not care a button for money; so he had retired from
+the practice of medicine, and pursued his researches at ease under
+the baron’s roof. They all loved him, and laughed at his occasional
+reveries, in the days of prosperity; and now, in one great crisis, the
+protege became the protector, to their astonishment and his own. But it
+was an age of ups and downs. This amiable theorist was one of the oldest
+verbal republicans in Europe. And why not? In theory a republic is
+the perfect form of government: it is merely in practice that it is
+impossible; it is only upon going off paper into reality, and trying
+actually to self-govern limited nations, after heating them white hot
+with the fire of politics and the bellows of bombast--that the thing
+resolves itself into bloodshed silvered with moonshine.
+
+Dr. Aubertin had for years talked and written speculative republicanism.
+So they applied to him whether the baroness shared her husband’s
+opinions, and he boldly assured them she did not; he added, “She is a
+pupil of mine.” On this audacious statement they contented themselves
+with laying a heavy fine on the lands of Beaurepaire.
+
+Assignats were abundant, but good mercantile paper, a notorious coward,
+had made itself wings and fled, and specie was creeping into strong
+boxes like a startled rabbit into its hole. The fine was paid; but
+Beaurepaire had to be heavily mortgaged, and the loan bore a high rate
+of interest. This, with the baron’s previous mortgages, swamped the
+estate.
+
+The baroness sold her carriage and horses, and she and her daughters
+prepared to deny themselves all but the bare necessaries of life, and
+pay off their debts if possible. On this their dependants fell away from
+them; their fair-weather friends came no longer near them; and many a
+flush of indignation crossed their brows, and many an aching pang their
+hearts, as adversity revealed the baseness and inconstancy of common
+people high or low.
+
+When the other servants had retired with their wages, one Jacintha
+remained behind, and begged permission to speak to the baroness.
+
+“What would you with me, my child?” asked that lady, with an accent in
+which a shade of surprise mingled with great politeness.
+
+“Forgive me, madame,” began Jacintha, with a formal courtesy; “but how
+can I leave you, and Mademoiselle Josephine, and Mademoiselle Rose? I
+was born at Beaurepaire; my mother died in the chateau: my father died
+in the village; but he had meat every day from the baron’s own
+table, and fuel from the baron’s wood, and died blessing the house of
+Beaurepaire. I CANNOT go. The others are gone because prosperity is here
+no longer. Let it be so; I will stay till the sun shines again upon the
+chateau, and then you shall send me away if you are bent on it; but
+not now, my ladies--oh, not now! Oh! oh! oh!” And the warm-hearted girl
+burst out sobbing ungracefully.
+
+“My child,” said the baroness, “these sentiments touch me, and honor
+you. But retire, if you please, while I consult my daughters.”
+
+Jacintha cut her sobs dead short, and retreated with a formal reverence.
+
+The consultation consisted of the baroness opening her arms, and both
+her daughters embracing her at once. Proud as they were, they wept
+with joy at having made one friend amongst all their servants. Jacintha
+stayed.
+
+As months rolled on, Rose de Beaurepaire recovered her natural gayety in
+spite of bereavement and poverty; so strong are youth, and health,
+and temperament. But her elder sister had a grief all her own: Captain
+Dujardin, a gallant young officer, well-born, and his own master, had
+courted her with her parents’ consent; and, even when the baron began to
+look coldly on the soldier of the Republic, young Dujardin, though too
+proud to encounter the baron’s irony and looks of scorn, would not yield
+love to pique. He came no more to the chateau, but he would wait hours
+and hours on the path to the little oratory in the park, on the bare
+chance of a passing word or even a kind look from Josephine. So much
+devotion gradually won a heart which in happier times she had been half
+encouraged to give him; and, when he left her on a military service
+of uncommon danger, the woman’s reserve melted, and, in that moment of
+mutual grief and passion, she vowed she loved him better than all the
+world.
+
+Letters from the camp breathing a devotion little short of worship
+fed her attachment; and more than one public mention of his name and
+services made her proud as well as fond of the fiery young soldier.
+
+Still she did not open her heart to her parents. The baron, alive at
+that time, was exasperated against the Republic, and all who served it;
+and, as for the baroness, she was of the old school: a passionate
+love in a lady’s heart before marriage was contrary to her notions of
+etiquette. Josephine loved Rose very tenderly; but shrank with modest
+delicacy from making her a confidante of feelings, the bare relation of
+which leaves the female hearer a child no longer.
+
+So she hid her heart, and delicious first love nestled deep in her
+nature, and thrilled in every secret vein and fibre.
+
+They had parted two years, and he had joined the army of the Pyrenees
+about one month, when suddenly all correspondence ceased on his part.
+
+Restless anxiety rose into terror as this silence continued; and
+starting and trembling at every sound, and edging to the window at every
+footstep, Josephine expected hourly the tidings of her lover’s death.
+
+Months rolled on in silence.
+
+Then a new torture came. He must not be dead but unfaithful. At this all
+the pride of her race was fired in her.
+
+The struggle between love and ire was almost too much for nature:
+violently gay and moody by turns she alarmed both her mother and the
+good Dr. Aubertin. The latter was not, I think, quite without suspicion
+of the truth; however, he simply prescribed change of air and place;
+she must go to Frejus, a watering-place distant about five leagues.
+Mademoiselle de Beaurepaire yielded a languid assent. To her all places
+were alike.
+
+But when they returned from Frejus a change had taken place. Rose had
+extracted her sister’s secret, and was a changed girl. Pity, and the
+keen sense of Josephine’s wrong, had raised her sisterly love to a
+passion. The great-hearted girl hovered about her lovely, suffering
+sister like an angel, and paid her the tender attentions of a devoted
+lover, and hated Camille Dujardin with all her heart: hated him all the
+more that she saw Josephine shrink even from her whenever she inveighed
+against him.
+
+At last Rose heard some news of the truant lover. The fact is, this
+young lady was as intelligent as she was inexperienced; and she had
+asked Jacintha to tell Dard to talk to every soldier that passed through
+the village, and ask him if he knew anything about Captain Dujardin
+of the 17th regiment. Dard cross-examined about a hundred invalided
+warriors, who did not even recognize the captain’s name; but at last,
+by extraordinary luck, he actually did fall in with two, who told him
+strange news about Captain Dujardin. And so then Dard told Jacintha; and
+Jacintha soon had the men into the kitchen and told Rose. Rose ran to
+tell Josephine; but stopped in the passage, and turned suddenly very
+cold. Her courage failed her; she feared Josephine would not take the
+news as she ought; and perhaps would not love her so well if SHE told
+her; so she thought to herself she would let the soldiers tell their own
+tale. She went into the room where Josephine was reading to the baroness
+and Dr. Aubertin; she sat quietly down; but at the first opportunity
+made Josephine one of those imperceptible signals which women, and above
+all, sisters, have reduced to so subtle a system. This done, she went
+carelessly out: and Josephine in due course followed her, and found her
+at the door.
+
+“What is it?” said Josephine, earnestly.
+
+“Have you courage?” was Rose’s reply.
+
+“He is dead?” said Josephine, turning pale as ashes.
+
+“No, no;” said Rose hastily; “he is alive. But you will need all your
+courage.”
+
+“Since he lives I fear nothing,” said Josephine; and stood there and
+quivered from head to foot. Rose, with pitying looks, took her by the
+hand and drew her in silence towards the kitchen.
+
+Josephine yielded a mute submission at first; but at the very door hung
+back and faltered, “He loves another; he is married: let me go.” Rose
+made no reply, but left her there and went into the kitchen and found
+two dragoons seated round a bottle of wine. They rose and saluted her.
+
+“Be seated, my brave men,” said she; “only please tell me what you told
+Jacintha about Captain Dujardin.”
+
+“Don’t stain your mouth with the captain, my little lady. He is a
+traitor.”
+
+“How do you know?”
+
+“Marcellus! mademoiselle asks us how we know Captain Dujardin to be a
+traitor. Speak.”
+
+Marcellus, thus appealed to, told Rose after his own fashion that he
+knew the captain well: that one day the captain rode out of the camp and
+never returned: that at first great anxiety was felt on his behalf, for
+the captain was a great favorite, and passed for the smartest soldier in
+the division: that after awhile anxiety gave place to some very awkward
+suspicions, and these suspicions it was his lot and his comrade’s here
+to confirm. About a month later he and the said comrade and two more
+were sent, well mounted, to reconnoitre a Spanish village. At the door
+of a little inn they caught sight of a French uniform. This so excited
+their curiosity that he went forward nearer than prudent, and distinctly
+recognized Captain Dujardin seated at a table drinking between two
+guerillas; then he rode back and told the others, who then came up and
+satisfied themselves it was so: that if any of the party had entertained
+a doubt, it was removed in an unpleasant way; he, Marcellus, disgusted
+at the sight of a French uniform drinking among Spaniards, took down his
+carabine and fired at the group as carefully as a somewhat restive horse
+permitted: at this, as if by magic, a score or so of guerillas poured
+out from Heaven knows where, musket in hand, and delivered a volley;
+the officer in command of the party fell dead, Jean Jacques here got a
+broken arm, and his own horse was wounded in two places, and fell from
+loss of blood a few furlongs from the French camp, to the neighborhood
+of which the vagabonds pursued them, hallooing and shouting and firing
+like barbarous banditti as they were.
+
+“However, here I am,” concluded Marcellus, “invalided for awhile, my
+lady, but not expended yet: we will soon dash in among them again for
+death or glory. Meantime,” concluded he, filling both glasses, “let
+us drink to the eyes of beauty (military salute); and to the renown
+of France; and double damnation to all her traitors, like that Captain
+Dujardin; whose neck may the devil twist.”
+
+Ere they could drink to this energetic toast, a low wail at the door,
+like a dying hare’s, arrested the glasses on their road, and the rough
+soldiers stood transfixed, and looked at one another in some dismay.
+Rose flew to the door with a face full of concern.
+
+Josephine was gone.
+
+Then Rose had the tact and resolution to say a few kind, encouraging
+words to the soldiers, and bid Jacintha be hospitable to them. This done
+she darted up-stairs after Josephine; she reached the main corridor just
+in time to see her creep along it with the air and carriage of a woman
+of fifty, and enter her own room.
+
+Rose followed softly with wet eyes, and turned the handle gently. But
+the door was locked.
+
+“Josephine! Josephine!”
+
+No answer.
+
+“I want to speak to you. I am frightened. Oh, do not be alone.”
+
+A choking voice answered, “Give me a little while to draw my breath.”
+ Rose sank down at the door, and sat close to it, with her head against
+it, sobbing bitterly. She was hurt at not being let in; such a friend as
+she had proved herself. But this personal feeling was only a fraction of
+her grief and anxiety.
+
+A good half hour elapsed ere Josephine, pale and stern as no one had
+ever seen her till that hour, suddenly opened the door. She started at
+sight of Rose couched sorrowful on the threshold; her stern look relaxed
+into tender love and pity; she sank, blushing, on her knees, and took
+her sister’s head quickly to her bosom. “Oh, my little love, have you
+been here all this time?”--“Oh! oh! oh!” was all the little love could
+reply. Then the deserted one, still kneeling, took Rose in her lap, and
+caressed and comforted her, and poured words of gratitude and affection
+over her like a warm shower.
+
+They rose hand in hand.
+
+Then Rose suddenly seized Josephine, and looked long and anxiously down
+into her eyes. They flashed fire under the scrutiny. “Yes, it is all
+over; I could not despise and love. I am dead to him, as he is dead to
+France.”
+
+This was joyful news to Rose. “I hoped it would be so,” said she; “but
+you frightened me. My noble sister, were I ever to lose your esteem, I
+should die. Oh, how awful yet how beautiful is your scorn. For worlds
+I would not be that Cam”--Josephine laid her hand imperiously on Rose’s
+mouth. “To mention his name to me will be to insult me; De Beaurepaire
+I am, and a Frenchwoman. Come, dear, let us go down and comfort our
+mother.”
+
+They went down; and this patient sufferer, and high minded conqueror, of
+her own accord took up a commonplace book, and read aloud for two mortal
+hours to her mother and Aubertin. Her voice only wavered twice.
+
+To feel that life is ended; to wish existence, too, had ceased; and so
+to sit down, an aching hollow, and take a part and sham an interest in
+twaddle to please others; such are woman’s feats. How like nothing at
+all they look!
+
+A man would rather sit on the buffer of a steam-engine and ride at the
+Great Redan.
+
+Rose sat at her elbow, a little behind her, and turned the leaves, and
+on one pretence or other held Josephine’s hand nearly all the rest of
+the day. Its delicate fibres remained tense, like a greyhound’s sinews
+after a race, and the blue veins rose to sight in it, though her voice
+and eyes were mastered.
+
+So keen was the strife, so matched the antagonists, so hard the victory.
+
+For ire and scorn are mighty. And noble blood in a noble heart is
+heroic. And Love is a giant.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+
+The French provinces were now organized upon a half military plan, by
+which all the local authorities radiated towards a centre of government.
+By-the-by, this feature has survived subsequent revolutions and
+political changes.
+
+In days of change, youth is at a premium; because, though experience is
+valuable, the experience of one order of things unfits ordinary men for
+another order of things. So a good many old fogies in office were shown
+the door, and a good deal of youth and energy infused into the veins of
+provincial government. For instance, Edouard Riviere, who had but just
+completed his education with singular eclat at a military school, was
+one fine day ordered into Brittany to fill a responsible post under
+Commandant Raynal, a blunt, rough soldier, that had risen from the
+ranks, and bore a much higher character for zeal and moral integrity
+than for affability.
+
+This officer was the son of a widow that kept a grocer’s shop in Paris.
+She intended him for spice, but he thirsted for glory, and vexed her. So
+she yielded, as mothers will.
+
+In the armies of the republic a good soldier rose with unparalleled
+certainty, and rapidity, too; for when soldiers are being mowed down
+like oats, it is a glorious time for such of them as keep their feet.
+Raynal mounted fast, and used to write to his mother, and joke her about
+the army being such a bad profession; and, as he was all for glory, not
+money, he lived with Spartan frugality, and saved half his pay and all
+his prize money for the old lady in Paris.
+
+But this prosperous man had to endure a deep disappointment; on the very
+day he was made commandant and one of the general’s aides-de-camp, came
+a letter into the camp. His mother was dead after a short illness. This
+was a terrible blow to the simple, rugged soldier, who had never had
+much time nor inclination to flirt with a lot of girls, and toughen his
+heart. He came back to Paris honored and rich, but downcast. The old
+home, empty of his mother, seemed to him not to have the old look.
+It made him sadder. To cheer him up they brought him much money. The
+widow’s trade had taken a wonderful start the last few years, and she
+had been playing the same game as he had, living on ten-pence a day, and
+saving all for him. This made him sadder, if anything.
+
+“What,” said he, “have we both been scraping all this dross together
+for? I would give it all to sit one hour by the fire, with her hand in
+mine, and hear her say, ‘Scamp, you made me unhappy when you were young,
+but I have lived to be proud of you.’”
+
+He applied for active service, no matter what: obtained at once this
+post in Brittany, and threw himself into it with that honest zeal and
+activity, which are the best earthly medicine for all our griefs. He was
+busy writing, when young Riviere first presented himself. He looked up
+for a moment, and eyed him, to take his measure; then put into his
+hand a report by young Nicole, a subordinate filling a post of the same
+nature as Riviere’s; and bade him analyze that report on the spot: with
+this he instantly resumed his own work.
+
+Edouard Riviere was an adept at this sort of task, and soon handed him
+a neat analysis. Raynal ran his eye over it, nodded cold approval, and
+told him to take this for the present as a guide as to his own duties.
+He then pointed to a map on which Riviere’s district was marked in
+blue ink, and bade him find the centre of it. Edouard took a pair
+of compasses off the table, and soon discovered that the village of
+Beaurepaire was his centre. “Then quarter yourself at Beaurepaire; and
+good-day,” said Raynal.
+
+The chateau was in sight from Riviere’s quarters, and he soon learned
+that it belonged to a royalist widow and her daughters, who all three
+held themselves quite aloof from the rest of the world. “Ah,” said the
+young citizen, “I see. If these rococo citizens play that game with me,
+I shall have to take them down.” Thus a fresh peril menaced this family,
+on whose hearts and fortunes such heavy blows had fallen.
+
+One evening our young official, after a day spent in the service of
+the country, deigned to take a little stroll to relieve the cares of
+administration. He imprinted on his beardless face the expression of
+a wearied statesman, and strolled through an admiring village. The men
+pretended veneration from policy; the women, whose views of this great
+man were shallower but more sincere, smiled approval of his airs; and
+the young puppy affected to take no notice of either sex.
+
+Outside the village, Publicola suddenly encountered two young ladies,
+who resembled nothing he had hitherto met with in his district; they
+were dressed in black, and with extreme simplicity; but their easy grace
+and composure, and the refined sentiment of their gentle faces, told at
+a glance they belonged to the high nobility. Publicola divined them at
+once, and involuntarily raised his hat to so much beauty and dignity,
+instead of poking it with a finger as usual. On this the ladies
+instantly courtesied to him after the manner of their party, with a
+sweep and a majesty, and a precision of politeness, that the pup would
+have laughed at if he had heard of it; but seeing it done, and well
+done, and by lovely women of rank, he was taken aback by it, and lifted
+his hat again, and bowed again after he had gone by, and was generally
+flustered. In short, instead of a member of the Consular Government
+saluting private individuals of a decayed party that existed only
+by sufferance, a handsome, vain, good-natured boy had met two
+self-possessed young ladies of distinction and breeding, and had cut the
+usual figure.
+
+For the next hundred yards his cheeks burned and his vanity cooled. But
+bumptiousness is elastic in France, as in England, and doubtless among
+the Esquimaux. “Well, they are pretty girls,” says he to himself. “I
+never saw two such pretty girls together; they will do for me to flirt
+with while I am banished to this Arcadia.” Banished from school, I beg
+to observe.
+
+And “awful beauty” being no longer in sight, Mr. Edouard resolved he
+would flirt with them to their hearts’ content. But there are ladies
+with whom a certain preliminary is required before you can flirt with
+them. You must be on speaking terms. How was this to be managed?
+
+He used to watch at his window with a telescope, and whenever the
+sisters came out of their own grounds, which unfortunately was not
+above twice a week, he would throw himself in their way by the merest
+accident, and pay them a dignified and courteous salute, which he had
+carefully got up before a mirror in the privacy of his own chamber.
+
+One day, as he took off his hat to the young ladies, there broke from
+one of them a smile, so sudden, sweet, and vivid, that he seemed to feel
+it smite him first on the eyes then in the heart. He could not sleep for
+this smile.
+
+Yet he had seen many smilers; but to be sure most of them smiled without
+effect, because they smiled eternally; they seemed cast with their
+mouths open, and their pretty teeth forever in sight; and this has a
+saddening influence on a man of sense--when it has any. But here a fair,
+pensive face had brightened at sight of him; a lovely countenance, on
+which circumstances, not nature, had impressed gravity, had sprung back
+to its natural gayety for a moment, and had thrilled and bewitched the
+beholder.
+
+The next Sunday he went to church--and there worshipped--whom? Cupid.
+He smarted for his heathenism; for the young ladies went with higher
+motives, and took no notice of him. They lowered their long silken
+lashes over one breviary, and scarcely observed the handsome citizen.
+Meantime he, contemplating their pious beauty with earthly eyes, was
+drinking long draughts of intoxicating passion. And when after the
+service they each took an arm of Dr. Aubertin, and he with the air of an
+admiral convoying two ships choke-full of specie, conducted his precious
+charge away home, our young citizen felt jealous, and all but hated the
+worthy doctor.
+
+This went on till he became listless and dejected on the days he did not
+see them. Then he asked himself whether he was not a cowardly fool
+to keep at such a distance. After all he was a man in authority. His
+friendship was not to be despised, least of all by a family suspected of
+disaffection to the state.
+
+He put on his glossy beaver with enormous brim, high curved; his
+blue coat with brass buttons; his white waistcoat, gray breeches, and
+top-boots; and marched up to the chateau of Beaurepaire, and sent in his
+card with his name and office inscribed.
+
+Jacintha took it, bestowed a glance of undisguised admiration on
+the young Adonis, and carried it to the baroness. That lady sent her
+promptly down again with a black-edged note to this effect.
+
+
+Highly flattered by Monsieur de Riviere’s visit, the baroness must
+inform him that she receives none but old acquaintances, in the present
+grief of the family, and of the KINGDOM.
+
+
+Young Riviere was cruelly mortified by this rebuff. He went off
+hurriedly, grinding his teeth with rage.
+
+“Cursed aristocrats! We have done well to pull you down, and we will
+have you lower still. How I despise myself for giving any one the chance
+to affront me thus. The haughty old fool; if she had known her interest,
+she would have been too glad to make a powerful friend. These royalists
+are in a ticklish position; I can tell her that. She calls me De
+Riviere; that implies nobody without a ‘De’ to their name would have the
+presumption to visit her old tumble-down house. Well, it is a lesson; I
+am a republican, and the Commonwealth trusts and honors me; yet I am
+so ungrateful as to go out of the way to be civil to her enemies, to
+royalists; as if those worn-out creatures had hearts, as if they could
+comprehend the struggle that took place in my mind between duty, and
+generosity to the fallen, before I could make the first overture to
+their acquaintance; as if they could understand the politeness of
+the heart, or anything nobler than curving and ducking and heartless
+etiquette. This is the last notice I will ever take of that old woman,
+unless it is to denounce her.”
+
+He walked home to the town very fast, his heart boiling, and his lips
+compressed, and his brow knitted.
+
+To this mood succeeded a sullen and bitter one. He was generous, but
+vain, and his love had humiliated him so bitterly, he resolved to tear
+it out of his heart. He absented himself from church; he met the young
+ladies no more. He struggled fiercely with his passion; he went about
+dogged, silent, and sighing. Presently he devoted his leisure hours
+to shooting partridges instead of ladies. And he was right; partridges
+cannot shoot back; whereas beautiful women, like Cupid, are all archers
+more or less, and often with one arrow from eye or lip do more execution
+than they have suffered from several discharges of our small shot.
+
+In these excursions, Edouard was generally accompanied by a thick-set
+rustic called Dard, who, I believe, purposes to reveal his own character
+to you, and so save me that trouble.
+
+One fine afternoon, about four o’clock, this pair burst remorselessly
+through a fence, and landed in the road opposite Bigot’s Auberge; a long
+low house, with “ICI ON LOGE A PIED ET A CHEVAL,” written all across it
+in gigantic letters. Riviere was for moving homeward, but Dard halted
+and complained dismally of “the soldier’s gripes.” The statesman had
+never heard of that complaint, so Dard explained that the VULGAR name
+for it was hunger. “And only smell,” said he, “the soup is just fit to
+come off the fire.”
+
+Riviere smiled sadly, but consented to deign to eat a morsel in the
+porch. Thereat Dard dashed wildly into the kitchen.
+
+They dined at one little round table, each after his fashion. When Dard
+could eat no more, he proceeded to drink; and to talk in proportion.
+Riviere, lost in his own thoughts, attended to him as men of business do
+to a babbling brook; until suddenly from the mass of twaddle broke forth
+a magic word--Beaurepaire; then the languid lover pricked up his ears
+and found Mr. Dard was abusing that noble family right and left. Young
+Riviere inquired what ground of offence they had given HIM. “I’ll tell
+you,” said Dard; “they impose on Jacintha; and so she imposes on me.”
+ Then observing he had at last gained his employer’s ear, he became
+prodigiously loquacious, as such people generally are when once they get
+upon their own griefs.
+
+“These Beaurepaire aristocrats,” said he, with his hard peasant
+good-sense, “are neither the one thing nor the other; they cannot keep
+up nobility, they have not the means; they will not come down off their
+perch, they have not the sense. No, for as small as they are, they must
+look and talk as big as ever. They can only afford one servant, and
+I don’t believe they pay her; but they must be attended on just as
+obsequious as when they had a dozen. And this is fatal to all us little
+people that have the misfortune to be connected with them.”
+
+“Why, how are you connected with them?”
+
+“By the tie of affection.”
+
+“I thought you hated them.”
+
+“Of course I do; but I have the ill-luck to love Jacintha, and she loves
+these aristocrats, and makes me do little odd jobs for them.” And at
+this Dard’s eyes suddenly glared with horror.
+
+“Well, what of that?” asked Riviere.
+
+“What of it, citizen, what? you do not know the fatal meaning of those
+accursed words?”
+
+“Why, I never heard of a man’s back being broken by little odd jobs.”
+
+“Perhaps not his back, citizen, but his heart? if little odd jobs will
+not break that, why nothing will. Torn from place to place, and from
+trouble to trouble; as soon as one tiresome thing begins to go a bit
+smooth, off to a fresh plague, in-doors work when it is dry, out-a-doors
+when it snows; and then all bustle; no taking one’s work quietly, the
+only way it agrees with a fellow. ‘Milk the cow, Dard, but look sharp;
+the baroness’s chair wants mending. Take these slops to the pig, but you
+must not wait to see him enjoy them: you are wanted to chop billets.’
+Beat the mats, take down the curtains, walk to church (best part of
+a league), and heat the pew cushions; come back and cut the cabbages,
+paint the door, and wheel the old lady about the terrace, rub
+quicksilver on the little dog’s back,--mind he don’t bite you to make
+hisself sick,--repair the ottoman, roll the gravel, scour the kettles,
+carry half a ton of water up two purostairs, trim the turf, prune the
+vine, drag the fish-pond; and when you ARE there, go in and gather water
+lilies for Mademoiselle Josephine while you are drowning the puppies;
+that is little odd jobs: may Satan twist her neck who invented them!”
+
+“Very sad all this,” said young Riviere.
+
+Dard took the little sneer for sympathy, and proceeded to “the cruellest
+wrong of all.”
+
+“When I go into their kitchen to court Jacintha a bit, instead of
+finding a good supper there, which a man has a right to, courting a
+cook, if I don’t take one in my pocket, there is no supper, not to
+say supper, for either her or me. I don’t call a salad and a bit of
+cheese-rind--SUPPER. Beggars in silk and satin! Every sou they have goes
+on to their backs, instead of into their bellies.”
+
+“I have heard their income is much reduced,” said Edouard gently.
+
+“Income! I would not change with them if they’d throw me in half a
+pancake a day. I tell you they are the poorest family for leagues round;
+not that they need be quite so starved, if they could swallow a little
+of their pride. But no, they must have china and plate and fine linen
+at dinner; so their fine plates are always bare, and their silver
+trays empty. Ask the butcher, if you don’t believe ME. Just you ask him
+whether he does not go three times to the smallest shopkeeper, for once
+he goes to Beaurepaire. Their tenants send them a little meal and eggs,
+and now and then a hen; and their great garden is chock full of fruit
+and vegetables, and Jacintha makes me dig in it gratis; and so they
+muddle on. But, bless your heart, coffee! they can’t afford it; so they
+roast a lot of horse-beans that cost nothing, and grind them, and serve
+up the liquor in a silver coffee-pot, on a silver salver. Haw, haw,
+haw!”
+
+“Is it possible? reduced to this?” said Edouard gravely.
+
+“Don’t you be so weak as to pity them,” cried the remorseless plebeian.
+“Why don’t they melt their silver into soup, and cut down their plate
+into rashers of bacon? why not sell the superfluous, and buy the
+needful, which it is grub? And, above all, why don’t they let their old
+tumble-down palace to some rich grocer, and that accursed garden along
+with it, where I sweat gratis, and live small and comfortable, and pay
+honest men for their little odd jobs, and”--
+
+Here Riviere interrupted him, and asked if it was really true about the
+beans.
+
+“True?” said Dard, “why, I have seen Rose doing it for the old woman’s
+breakfast: it was Rose invented the move. A girl of nineteen beginning
+already to deceive the world! But they are all tarred with the same
+stick. Down with the aristocrats!”
+
+“Dard,” said Riviere, “you are a brute.”
+
+“Me, citizen?” inquired Dard with every appearance of genuine surprise.
+
+Edouard Riviere rose from his seat in great excitement. Dard’s abuse of
+the family he was lately so bitter against had turned him right round.
+He pitied the very baroness herself, and forgave her declining his
+visit.
+
+“Be silent,” said he, “for shame! There is such a thing as noble
+poverty; and you have described it. I might have disdained these people
+in their prosperity, but I revere them in their affliction. And I’ll
+tell you what, don’t you ever dare to speak slightly of them again in my
+presence, or”--
+
+He did not conclude his threat, for just then he observed that a
+strapping girl, with a basket at her feet, was standing against the
+corner of the Auberge, in a mighty careless attitude, but doing nothing,
+so most likely listening with all her ears and soul. Dard, however, did
+not see her, his back being turned to her as he sat; so he replied at
+his ease,--
+
+“I consent,” said he very coolly: “that is your affair; but permit me,”
+ and here he clenched his teeth at remembrance of his wrongs, “to say
+that I will no more be a scullery man without wages to these high-minded
+starvelings, these illustrious beggars.” Then he heated himself red-hot.
+“I will not even be their galley slave. Next, I have done my last little
+odd job in this world,” yelled the now infuriated factotum, bouncing
+up to his feet in brief fury. “Of two things one: either Jacintha quits
+those aristos, or I leave Jacin--eh?--ah!--oh!--ahem! How--‘ow d’ye do,
+Jacintha?” And his roar ended in a whine, as when a dog runs barking
+out, and receives in full career a cut from his master’s whip, his
+generous rage turns to whimper with ludicrous abruptness. “I was just
+talking of you, Jacintha,” quavered Dard in conclusion.
+
+“I heard you, Dard,” replied Jacintha slowly, softly, grimly.
+
+Dard withered.
+
+It was a lusty young woman, with a comely peasant face somewhat
+freckled, and a pair of large black eyes surmounted by coal-black brows.
+She stood in a bold attitude, her massive but well-formed arms folded so
+that the pressure of each against the other made them seem gigantic, and
+her cheek red with anger, and her eyes glistening like basilisks upon
+citizen Dard. She looked so grand, with her lowering black brows, that
+even Riviere felt a little uneasy. As for Jacintha, she was evidently
+brooding with more ire than she chose to utter before a stranger. She
+just slowly unclasped her arms, and, keeping her eye fixed on Dard,
+pointed with a domineering gesture towards Beaurepaire. Then the doughty
+Dard seemed no longer master of his limbs: he rose slowly, with his eyes
+fastened to hers, and was moving off like an ill-oiled automaton in the
+direction indicated; but at that a suppressed snigger began to shake
+Riviere’s whole body till it bobbed up and down on the seat. Dard turned
+to him for sympathy.
+
+“There, citizen,” he cried, “do you see that imperious gesture? That
+means you promised to dig in the aristocrat’s garden this afternoon,
+so march! Here, then, is one that has gained nothing by kings being put
+down, for I am ruled with a mopstick of iron. Thank your stars, citizen,
+that you are not in may place.”
+
+“Dard,” retorted Jacintha, “if you don’t like your place, I’d quit it.
+There are two or three young men down in the village will be glad to
+take it.”
+
+“I won’t give them the chance, the vile egotists!” cried Dard. And he
+returned to the chateau and little odd jobs.
+
+Jacintha hung behind, lowered her eyes, put on a very deferential
+manner, and thanked Edouard for the kind sentiments he had uttered; but
+at the same time she took the liberty to warn him against believing the
+extravagant stories Dard had been telling about her mistress’s poverty.
+She said the simple fact was that the baron had contracted debts, and
+the baroness, being the soul of honor, was living in great economy to
+pay them off. Then, as to Dard getting no supper up at Beaurepaire, a
+complaint that appeared to sting her particularly, she assured him she
+was alone to blame: the baroness would be very angry if she knew it.
+“But,” said she, “Dard is an egotist. Perhaps you may have noticed that
+trait in him.”
+
+“Glimpses of it,” replied Riviere, laughing.
+
+“Monsieur, he is so egotistic that he has not a friend in the world
+but me. I forgive him, because I know the reason; he has never had a
+headache or a heartache in his life.”
+
+Edouard, aged twenty, and a male, did not comprehend this piece of
+feminine logic one bit: and, while he puzzled over it in silence,
+Jacintha went on to say that if she were to fill her egotist’s paunch,
+she should never know whether he came to Beaurepaire for her, or
+himself. “Now, Dard,” she added, “is no beauty, monsieur; why, he is
+three inches shorter than I am.”
+
+“You are joking! he looks a foot,” said Edouard.
+
+“He is no scholar neither, and I have had to wipe up many a sneer and
+many a sarcasm on his account; but up to now I have always been able
+to reply that this five feet one of egotism loves me sincerely; and the
+moment I doubt this, I give him the sack,--poor little fellow!”
+
+“In a word,” said Riviere, a little impatiently, “the family at
+Beaurepaire are not in such straits as he pretends?”
+
+“Monsieur, do I look like one starved?”
+
+“By Jove, no! by Ceres, I mean.”
+
+“Are my young mistresses wan, and thin?”
+
+“Treason! blasphemy! ah, no! By Venus and Hebe, no!”
+
+Jacintha smiled at this enthusiastic denial, and also because her sex is
+apt to smile when words are used they do not understand.
+
+“Dard is a fool,” suggested Riviere, by way of general solution. He
+added, “And yet, do you know I wish every word he said had been true.”
+ (Jacintha’s eyes expressed some astonishment.) “Because then you and I
+would have concerted means to do them kindnesses, secretly; for I see
+you are no ordinary servant; you love your young mistresses. Do you
+not?”
+
+These simple words seemed to touch a grander chord in Jacintha’s nature.
+
+“Love them?” said she, clasping her hands; “ah, sir, do not be offended;
+but, believe me, it is no small thing to serve an old, old family. My
+grandfather lived and died with them; my father was their gamekeeper,
+and fed to his last from off the poor baron’s plate (and now they have
+killed him, poor man); my mother died in the house and was buried in
+the sacred ground near the family chapel. They put an inscription on her
+tomb praising her fidelity and probity. Do you think these things do not
+sink into the heart of the poor?--praise on her tomb, and not a word on
+their own, but just the name, and when each was born and died, you know.
+Ah! the pride of the mean is dirt; but the pride of the noble is gold.”
+
+“For, look you, among parvenues I should be a servant, and nothing more;
+in this proud family I am a humble friend; of course they are not always
+gossiping with me like vulgar masters and mistresses; if they did, I
+should neither respect nor love them; but they all smile on me whenever
+I come into the room, even the baroness herself. I belong to them, and
+they belong to me, by ties without number, by the many kind words in
+many troubles, by the one roof that sheltered us a hundred years, and
+the grave where our bones lie together till the day of judgment.” *
+
+     * The French peasant often thinks half a sentence, and
+     utters the other half aloud, and so breaks air in the middle
+     of a thought. Probably Jacintha’s whole thought, if we had
+     the means of knowing it, would have run like this--“Besides,
+     I have another reason: I could not be so comfortable myself
+     elsewhere--for, look you”--
+
+Jacintha clasped her hands, and her black eyes shone out warm through
+the dew. Riviere’s glistened too.
+
+“That is well said,” he cried; “it is nobly said: yet, after all, these
+are ties that owe their force to the souls they bind. How often have
+such bonds round human hearts proved ropes of sand! They grapple YOU
+like hooks of steel; because you are steel yourself to the backbone. I
+admire you, Jacintha. Such women as you have a great mission in France
+just now.”
+
+Jacintha shook her head incredulously. “What can we poor women do?”
+
+“Bring forth heroes,” cried Publicola with fervor. “Be the mothers of
+great men, the Catos and the Gracchi of the future!”
+
+Jacintha smiled. She did not know the Gracchi nor their politics; but
+the name rang well. “Gracchi!” Aristocrats, no doubt. “That would be too
+much honor,” replied she modestly. “At present, I must say adieu!” and
+she moved off an inch at a time, in an uncertain hesitating manner, not
+very difficult to read; but Riviere, you must know, had more than once
+during this interview begged her to sit down, and in vain; she had
+always thanked him, but said she had not a moment to stay. So he made no
+effort to detain her now. The consequence was--she came slowly back
+of her own accord, and sat down in a corner of the porch, where nobody
+could see her, and then she sighed deeply.
+
+“What is the matter now?” said Edouard, opening his eyes.
+
+She looked at him point-blank for one moment; and her scale turned.
+
+“Monsieur,” said she timidly, “you have a good face, and a good heart.
+All I told you was--give me your honor not to betray us.”
+
+“I swear it,” said Edouard, a little pompously.
+
+“Then--Dard was not so far from the truth; it was but a guess of his,
+for I never trusted my own sweetheart as I now trust a stranger. But to
+see what I see every day, and have no one I dare breathe a word to, oh,
+it is very hard! But on what a thread things turn! If any one had told
+me an hour ago it was you I should open my heart to! It’s not economy:
+it’s not stinginess; they are not paying off their debts. They never
+can. The baroness and the Demoiselles de Beaurepaire--are paupers.”
+
+“Paupers, Jacintha?”
+
+“Ay, paupers! their debts are greater than their means. They live here
+by sufferance. They have only their old clothes to wear. They have
+hardly enough to eat. Just now our cow is in full milk, you know; so
+that is a great help: but, when she goes dry, Heaven knows what we shall
+do; for I don’t. But that is not the worst; better a light meal than a
+broken heart. Your precious government offers the chateau for sale.
+They might as well send for the guillotine at once, and cut off all our
+heads. You don’t know my mistress as I do. Ah, butchers, you will drag
+nothing out of that but her corpse. And is it come to this? the great
+old family to be turned adrift like beggars. My poor mistress! my pretty
+demoiselles that I played with and nursed ever since I was a child! (I
+was just six when Josephine was born) and that I shall love with my last
+breath”--
+
+She could say no more, but choked by the strong feeling so long pent up
+in her own bosom, fell to sobbing hysterically, and trembling like one
+in an ague.
+
+The statesman, who had passed all his short life at school and college,
+was frightened, and took hold of her and pulled her, and cried,
+“Oh! don’t, Jacintha; you will kill yourself, you will die; this is
+frightful: help here! help!” Jacintha put her hand to his mouth, and,
+without leaving off her hysterics, gasped out, “Ah! don’t expose me.”
+ So then he didn’t know what to do; but he seized a tumbler and filled
+it with wine, and forced it between her lips. All she did was to bite a
+piece out of the glass as clean as if a diamond had cut it. This did
+her a world of good: destruction of sacred household property gave her
+another turn. “There, I’ve broke your glass now,” she cried, with a
+marvellous change of tone; and she came-to and cried quietly like a
+reasonable person, with her apron to her eyes.
+
+When Edouard saw she was better, he took her hand and said proudly,
+“Secret for secret. I choose this moment to confide to you that I love
+Mademoiselle Rose de Beaurepaire. Love her? I did love her; but now you
+tell me she is poor and in distress, I adore her.” The effect of this
+declaration on Jacintha was magical, comical. Her apron came down from
+one eye, and that eye dried itself and sparkled with curiosity: the
+whole countenance speedily followed suit and beamed with sacred joy.
+What! an interesting love affair confided to her all in a moment! She
+lowered her voice to a whisper directly. “Why, how did you manage? She
+never goes into company.”
+
+“No; but she goes to church. Besides, I have met her eleven times out
+walking with her sister, and twice out of the eleven she smiled on me.
+O Jacintha! a smile such as angels smile; a smile to warm the heart and
+purify the soul and last forever in the mind.”
+
+“Well, they say ‘man is fire and woman tow:’ but this beats all. Ha!
+ha!”
+
+“Oh! do not jest. I did not laugh at you. Jacintha, it is no laughing
+matter; I revere her as mortals revere the saints; I love her so that
+were I ever to lose all hope of her I would not live a day. And now that
+you have told me she is poor and in sorrow, and I think of her walking
+so calm and gentle--always in black, Jacintha,--and her low courtesy to
+me whenever we met, and her sweet smile to me though her heart must be
+sad, oh! my heart yearns for her. What can I do for her? How shall I
+surround her with myself unseen--make her feel that a man’s love waits
+upon her feet every step she takes--that a man’s love floats in the air
+round that lovely head?” Then descending to earth for a moment, “but I
+say, you promise not to betray me; come, secret for secret.”
+
+“I will not tell a soul; on the honor of a woman,” said Jacintha.
+
+The form of protestation was quite new to Edouard, and not exactly the
+one his study of the ancient writers would have led him to select. But
+the tone was convincing: he trusted her. They parted sworn allies; and,
+at the very moment of parting, Jacintha, who had cast many a furtive
+glance at the dead game, told Edouard demurely, Mademoiselle Rose was
+very fond of roast partridge. On this he made her take the whole bag;
+and went home on wings. Jacintha’s revelation roused all that was noble
+and forgiving in him. His understanding and his heart expanded from that
+hour, and his fancy spread its pinions to the sun of love. Ah! generous
+Youth, let who will betray thee; let who will sneer at thee; let me,
+though young no longer, smile on thee and joy in thee! She he loved was
+sad, was poor, was menaced by many ills; then she needed a champion. He
+would be her unseen friend, her guardian angel. A hundred wild schemes
+whirled in his beating heart and brain. He could not go in-doors,
+indeed, no room could contain him: he made for a green lane he knew at
+the back of the village, and there he walked up and down for hours.
+The sun set, and the night came, and the stars glittered; but still he
+walked alone, inspired, exalted, full of generous and loving schemes: of
+sweet and tender fancies: a heart on fire; and youth the fuel, and the
+flame vestal.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+
+This very day was the anniversary of the baron’s death.
+
+The baroness kept her room all the morning, and took no nourishment but
+one cup of spurious coffee Rose brought her. Towards evening she came
+down-stairs. In the hall she found two chaplets of flowers; they were
+always placed there for her on this sad day. She took them in her hand,
+and went into the little oratory that was in the park; there she found
+two wax candles burning, and two fresh chaplets hung up. Her daughters
+had been there before her.
+
+She knelt and prayed many hours for her husband’s soul; then she rose
+and hung up one chaplet and came slowly away with the other in her hand.
+At the gate of the park, Josephine met her with tender anxiety in her
+sapphire eyes, and wreathed her arms round her, and whispered, “But you
+have your children still.”
+
+The baroness kissed her and they came towards the house together, the
+baroness leaning gently on her daughter’s elbow.
+
+Between the park and the angle of the chateau was a small plot of turf
+called at Beaurepaire the Pleasance, a name that had descended
+along with other traditions; and in the centre of this Pleasance,
+or Pleasaunce, stood a wonderful oak-tree. Its circumference was
+thirty-four feet. The baroness came to this ancient tree, and hung her
+chaplet on a mutilated limb called the “knights’ bough.”
+
+The sun was setting tranquil and red; a broad ruby streak lingered on
+the deep green leaves of the prodigious oak. The baroness looked at it
+awhile in silence.
+
+Then she spoke slowly to it and said, “You were here before us: you will
+be here when we are gone.”
+
+A spasm crossed Josephine’s face, but she said nothing at the time. And
+so they went in together.
+
+Now as this tree was a feat of nature, and, above all, played a curious
+part in our story, I will ask you to stay a few minutes and look at it,
+while I say what was known about it; not the thousandth part of what it
+could have told, if trees could speak as well as breathe.
+
+The baroness did not exaggerate; the tree was far older than even this
+ancient family. They possessed among other archives a manuscript written
+by a monk, a son of the house, about four hundred years before our
+story, and containing many of the oral traditions about this tree that
+had come down to him from remote antiquity. According to this authority,
+the first Baron of Beaurepaire had pitched his tent under a fair
+oak-tree that stood prope rivum, near a brook. His grandson built a
+square tower hard by, and dug a moat that enclosed both tree and tower,
+and received the waters of the brook aforesaid.
+
+At this time the tree seems only to have been remarked for its height.
+But, a century and a half before the monk wrote, it had become famous in
+all the district for its girth, and in the monk’s own day had ceased
+to grow; but not begun to decay. The mutilated arm I have mentioned
+was once a long sturdy bough, worn smooth as velvet in one part from
+a curious cause: it ran about as high above the ground as a full-sized
+horse, and the knights and squires used to be forever vaulting upon
+it, the former in armor; the monk, when a boy, had seen them do it a
+thousand times. This bough broke in two, A.D. 1617: but the mutilated
+limb was still called the knights’ bough, nobody knew why. So do names
+survive their ideas.
+
+What had not this tree seen since first it came green and tender as
+a cabbage above the soil, and stood at the mercy of the first hare or
+rabbit that should choose to cut short its frail existence!
+
+Since then eagles had perched on its crown, and wild boars fed without
+fear of man upon its acorns. Troubadours had sung beneath it to lords
+and ladies seated round, or walking on the grass and commenting the
+minstrel’s tales of love by exchange of amorous glances. Mediaeval
+sculptors had taken its leaves, and wisely trusting to nature, had
+adorned churches with those leaves cut in stone.
+
+It had seen a Norman duke conquer England, and English kings invade
+France and be crowned at Paris. It had seen a girl put knights to the
+rout, and seen the warrior virgin burned by envious priests with common
+consent both of the curs she had defended and the curs she had defeated.
+
+Why, in its old age it had seen the rise of printing, and the first dawn
+of national civilization in Europe. It flourished and decayed in France;
+but it sprung in Gaul. And more remarkable still, though by all accounts
+it may see the world to an end, it was a tree in ancient history: its
+old age awaits the millennium; its first youth belonged to that great
+tract of time which includes the birth of Christ, the building of Rome,
+and the siege of Troy.
+
+The tree had, ere this, mingled in the fortunes of the family. It had
+saved their lives and taken their lives. One lord of Beaurepaire, hotly
+pursued by his feudal enemies, made for the tree, and hid himself partly
+by a great bough, partly by the thick screen of leaves. The foe darted
+in, made sure he had taken to the house, ransacked it, and got into the
+cellar, where by good-luck was a store of Malvoisie: and so the oak and
+the vine saved the quaking baron. Another lord of Beaurepaire, besieged
+in his castle, was shot dead on the ramparts by a cross-bowman who had
+secreted himself unobserved in this tree a little before the dawn.
+
+A young heir of Beaurepaire, climbing for a raven’s nest to the top
+of this tree, lost his footing and fell, and died at its foot: and his
+mother in her anguish bade them cut down the tree that had killed her
+boy. But the baron her husband refused, and spake in this wise: “ytte ys
+eneugh that I lose mine sonne, I will nat alsoe lose mine Tre.” In
+the male you see the sober sentiment of the proprietor outweighed the
+temporary irritation of the parent. Then the mother bought fifteen ells
+of black velvet, and stretched a pall from the knights’ bough across the
+west side to another branch, and cursed the hand that should remove it,
+and she herself “wolde never passe the Tre neither going nor coming, but
+went still about.” And when she died and should have been carried past
+the tree to the park, her dochter did cry from a window to the bearers,
+“Goe about! goe about!” and they went about, and all the company. And in
+time the velvet pall rotted, and was torn and driven away by the winds:
+and when the hand of Nature, and no human hand, had thus flouted and
+dispersed the trappings of the mother’s grief, two pieces were picked up
+and preserved among the family relics: but the black velvet had turned a
+rusty red.
+
+So the baroness did nothing new in this family when she hung her chaplet
+on the knights’ bough; and, in fact, on the west side, about
+eighteen feet from the ground, there still mouldered one corner of
+an Atchievement an heir of Beaurepaire had nailed there two centuries
+before, when his predecessor died: “For,” said he, “the chateau is of
+yesterday, but the tree has seen us all come and go.” The inside of the
+oak was hollow as a drum; and on its east side yawned a fissure as
+high as a man and as broad as a street-door. Dard used to wheel his
+wheelbarrow into the tree at a trot, and there leave it.
+
+Yet in spite of excavation and mutilation not life only but vigor
+dwelt in this wooden shell. The extreme ends of the longer boughs were
+firewood, touchwood, and the crown was gone this many a year: but narrow
+the circle a very little to where the indomitable trunk could still
+shoot sap from its cruse deep in earth, and there on every side burst
+the green foliage in its season countless as the sand. The leaves carved
+centuries ago from these very models, though cut in stone, were most of
+them mouldered, blunted, notched, deformed: but the delicate types came
+back with every summer, perfect and lovely as when the tree was but
+their elder brother: and greener than ever: for, from what cause nature
+only knows, the leaves were many shades richer than any other tree could
+show for a hundred miles round; a deep green, fiery, yet soft; and then
+their multitude--the staircases of foliage as you looked up the tree,
+and could scarce catch a glimpse of the sky. An inverted abyss of color,
+a mound, a dome, of flake emeralds that quivered in the golden air.
+
+And now the sun sets; the green leaves are black; the moon rises: her
+cold light shoots across one half that giant stem.
+
+How solemn and calm stands the great round tower of living wood, half
+ebony, half silver, with its mighty cloud above of flake jet leaves
+tipped with frosty fire!
+
+Now is the still hour to repeat in a whisper the words of the dame of
+Beaurepaire, “You were here before us: you will be here when we are
+gone.”
+
+We leave the hoary king of trees standing in the moonlight, calmly
+defying time, and follow the creatures of a day; for, what they were, we
+are.
+
+
+A spacious saloon panelled; dead but showy white picked out sparingly
+with gold. Festoons of fruits and flowers finely carved in wood on some
+of the panels. These also not smothered in gilding, but as it were gold
+speckled here and there, like tongues of flame winding among insoluble
+snow. Ranged against the walls were sofas and chairs covered with rich
+stuffs well worn. And in one little distant corner of the long room
+a gray-haired gentleman and two young ladies sat round a small plain
+table, on which burned a solitary candle; and a little way apart in
+this candle’s twilight an old lady sat in an easy-chair, thinking of
+the past, scarce daring to inquire the future. Josephine and Rose were
+working: not fancy-work but needle-work; Dr. Aubertin writing. Every
+now and then he put the one candle nearer the girls. They raised no
+objection: only a few minutes after a white hand would glide from one
+or other of them like a serpent, and smoothly convey the light nearer to
+the doctor’s manuscript.
+
+“Is it not supper-time?” he inquired. “I have an inward monitor; and I
+think our dinner was more ethereal than usual.”
+
+“Hush!” said Josephine, and looked uneasily towards her mother. “Wax is
+so dear.”
+
+“Wax?--ah!--pardon me:” and the doctor returned hastily to his work.
+But Rose looked up and said, “I wonder Jacintha does not come; it is
+certainly past the hour;” and she pried into the room as if she
+expected to see Jacintha on the road. But she saw in fact very little of
+anything, for the spacious room was impenetrable to her eye; midway from
+the candle to the distant door its twilight deepened, and all became
+shapeless and sombre. The prospect ended sharp and black, as in those
+out-o’-door closets imagined and painted by a certain great painter,
+whose Nature comes to a full stop as soon as he has no further
+commercial need of her, instead of melting by fine expanse and exquisite
+gradation into genuine distance, as nature does in Claude and in nature.
+To reverse the picture, if you stood at the door you looked across forty
+feet of black, and the little corner seemed on fire, and the fair heads
+about the candle shone like the St. Cecilias and Madonnas in an antique
+stained-glass window.
+
+At last the door opened, and another candle fired Jacintha’s comely
+peasant face in the doorway. She put down her candle outside the door,
+and started as crow flies for the other light. After glowing a moment in
+the doorway she dived into the shadow and emerged into light again
+close to the table with napkins on her arm. She removed the work-box
+reverentially, the doctor’s manuscript unceremoniously, and proceeded to
+lay a cloth: in which operation she looked at Rose a point-blank glance
+of admiration: then she placed the napkins; and in this process she
+again cast a strange look of interest upon Rose. The young lady noticed
+it this time, and looked inquiringly at her in return, half expecting
+some communication; but Jacintha lowered her eyes and bustled about the
+table. Then Rose spoke to her with a sort of instinct of curiosity, on
+the chance of drawing her out.
+
+“Supper is late to-night, is it not, Jacintha?”
+
+“Yes, mademoiselle; I have had more cooking than usual,” and with this
+she delivered another point-blank look as before, and dived into the
+palpable obscure, and came to light in the doorway.
+
+Her return was anxiously expected; for, if the truth must be told,
+they were very hungry. So rigorous was the economy in this decayed but
+honorable house that the wax candles burned to-day in the oratory had
+scrimped their dinner, unsubstantial as it was wont to be. Think of
+that, you in fustian jackets who grumble after meat. The door opened,
+Jacintha reappeared in the light of her candle a moment with a tray
+in both hands, and, approaching, was lost to view; but a strange and
+fragrant smell heralded her. All their eyes turned with curiosity
+towards the unwonted odor, and Jacintha dawned with three roast
+partridges on a dish.
+
+They were wonder-struck, and looked from the birds to her in mute
+surprise, that was not diminished by a certain cynical indifference
+she put on. She avoided their eyes, and forcibly excluded from her face
+everything that could imply she did not serve up partridges to this
+family every night of her life.
+
+“The supper is served, madame,” said she, with a respectful courtesy
+and a mechanical tone, and, plunging into the night, swam out at her own
+candle, shut the door, and, unlocking her face that moment, burst out
+radiant, and so to the kitchen, and, with a tear in her eye, set-to and
+polished all the copper stewpans with a vigor and expedition unknown to
+the new-fangled domestic.
+
+“Partridges, mamma! What next?”
+
+“Pheasants, I hope,” cried the doctor, gayly. “And after them hares; to
+conclude with royal venison. Permit me, ladies.” And he set himself to
+carve with zeal.
+
+Now nature is nature, and two pair of violet eyes brightened and dwelt
+on the fragrant and delicate food with demure desire; for all that,
+when Aubertin offered Josephine a wing, she declined it. “No partridge?”
+ cried the savant, in utter amazement.
+
+“Not to-day, dear friend; it is not a feast day to-day.”
+
+“Ah! no; what was I thinking of?”
+
+“But you are not to be deprived,” put in Josephine, anxiously. “We will
+not deny ourselves the pleasure of seeing you eat some.”
+
+“What!” remonstrated Aubertin, “am I not one of you?”
+
+The baroness had attended to every word of this. She rose from her
+chair, and said quietly, “Both you and he and Rose will be so good as to
+let me see you eat.”
+
+“But, mamma,” remonstrated Josephine and Rose in one breath.
+
+“Je le veux,” was the cold reply.
+
+These were words the baroness uttered so seldom that they were little
+likely to be disputed.
+
+The doctor carved and helped the young ladies and himself.
+
+When they had all eaten a little, a discussion was observed to be going
+on between Rose and her sister. At last Aubertin caught these words, “It
+will be in vain; even you have not influence enough for that, Rose.”
+
+“We shall see,” was the reply, and Rose put the wing of a partridge on a
+plate and rose calmly from her chair. She took the plate and put it on
+a little work-table by her mother’s side. The others pretended to be all
+mouths, but they were all ears. The baroness looked in Rose’s face
+with an air of wonder that was not very encouraging. Then, as Rose said
+nothing, she raised her aristocratic hand with a courteous but decided
+gesture of refusal.
+
+Undaunted Rose laid her palm softly on the baroness’s shoulder, and said
+to her as firmly as the baroness herself had just spoken,--
+
+“Il le veut.”
+
+The baroness was staggered. Then she looked with moist eyes at the fair
+young face, then she reflected. At last she said, with an exquisite
+mixture of politeness and affection, “It is his daughter who has told me
+‘Il le veut.’ I obey.”
+
+Rose returning like a victorious knight from the lists, saucily
+exultant, and with only one wet eyelash, was solemnly kissed and petted
+by Josephine and the doctor.
+
+Thus they loved one another in this great, old, falling house. Their
+familiarity had no coarse side; a form, not of custom but affection, it
+went hand-in-hand with courtesy by day and night.
+
+The love of the daughters for their mother had all the tenderness,
+subtlety, and unselfishness of womanly natures, together with a certain
+characteristic of the female character. And whither that one defect
+led them, and by what gradations, it may be worth the reader’s while to
+observe.
+
+The baroness retired to rest early; and she was no sooner gone than
+Josephine leaned over to Rose, and told her what their mother had
+said to the oak-tree. Rose heard this with anxiety; hitherto they had
+carefully concealed from their mother that the government claimed the
+right of selling the chateau to pay the creditors, etc.; and now both
+sisters feared the old lady had discovered it somehow, or why that
+strange thing she had said to the oak-tree? But Dr. Aubertin caught
+their remarks, and laid down his immortal MS. on French insects, to
+express his hope that they were putting a forced interpretation on the
+baroness’s words.
+
+“I think,” said he, “she merely meant how short-lived are we all
+compared with this ancient oak. I should be very sorry to adopt the
+other interpretation; for if she knows she can at any moment be expelled
+from Beaurepaire, it will be almost as bad for her as the calamity
+itself; THAT, I think, would kill her.”
+
+“Why so?” said Rose, eagerly. “What is this house or that? Mamma will
+still have her daughters’ love, go where she will.”
+
+Aubertin replied, “It is idle to deceive ourselves; at her age men and
+women hang to life by their habits; take her away from her chateau, from
+the little oratory where she prays every day for the departed, from her
+place in the sun on the south terrace, and from all the memories that
+surround her here; she would soon pine, and die.”
+
+Here the savant seeing a hobby-horse near, caught him and jumped on. He
+launched into a treatise upon the vitality of human beings, and proved
+that it is the mind which keeps the body of a man alive for so great a
+length of time as fourscore years; for that he had in the earlier part
+of his studies carefully dissected a multitude of animals,--frogs,
+rabbits, dogs, men, horses, sheep, squirrels, foxes, cats, etc.,--and
+discovered no peculiarity in man’s organs to account for his singular
+longevity, except in the brain or organ of mind. Thence he went to
+the longevity of men with contented minds, and the rapid decay of the
+careworn. Finally he succeeded in convincing them the baroness was so
+constituted, physically and mentally, that she would never move from
+Beaurepaire except into her grave. However, having thus terrified them,
+he proceeded to console them. “You have a friend,” said he, “a powerful
+friend; and here in my pocket--somewhere--is a letter that proves it.”
+
+The letter was from Mr. Perrin the notary. It appeared by it that Dr.
+Aubertin had reminded the said Perrin of his obligations to the late
+baron, and entreated him to use all his influence to keep the estate in
+this ancient family.
+
+Perrin had replied at first in a few civil lines; but his present letter
+was a long and friendly one. It made both the daughters of Beaurepaire
+shudder at the peril they had so narrowly escaped. For by it they now
+learned for the first time that one Jaques Bonard, a small farmer,
+to whom they owed but five thousand francs, had gone to the mayor and
+insisted, as he had a perfect right, on the estate being put up to
+public auction. This had come to Perrin’s ears just in time, and he had
+instantly bought Bonard’s debt, and stopped the auction; not, however,
+before the very bills were printed; for which he, Perrin, had paid, and
+now forwarded the receipt. He concluded by saying that the government
+agent was personally inert, and would never move a step in the matter
+unless driven by a creditor.
+
+“But we have so many,” said Rose in dismay. “We are not safe a day.”
+
+Aubertin assured her the danger was only in appearance. “Your large
+creditors are men of property, and such men let their funds lie unless
+compelled to move them. The small mortgagee, the petty miser, who has,
+perhaps, no investment to watch but one small loan, about which he is
+as anxious and as noisy as a hen with one chicken, he is the clamorous
+creditor, the harsh little egoist, who for fear of risking a crown piece
+would bring the Garden of Eden to the hammer. Now we are rid of
+that little wretch, Bonard, and have Perrin on our side; so there is
+literally nothing to fear.”
+
+The sisters thanked him warmly, and Rose shared his hopes; and said so;
+but Josephine was silent and thoughtful. Nothing more worth recording
+passed that night. But the next day was the first of May, Josephine’s
+birthday.
+
+Now they always celebrated this day as well as they could; and used to
+plant a tree, for one thing. Dard, well spurred by Jacintha, had got
+a little acacia; and they were all out in the Pleasaunce to plant it.
+Unhappily, they were a preposterous time making up their feminine minds
+where to have it set; so Dard turned rusty and said the park was the
+best place for it. There it could do no harm, stick it where you would.
+
+“And who told you to put in your word?” inquired Jacintha. “You’re here
+to dig the hole where mademoiselle chooses; not to argufy.”
+
+Josephine whispered Rose, “I admire the energy of her character. Could
+she be induced to order once for all where the poor thing is to be
+planted?”
+
+“Then where WILL you have it, mademoiselle?” asked Dard, sulkily.
+
+“Here, I think, Dard,” said Josephine sweetly.
+
+Dard grinned malignantly, and drove in his spade. “It will never be much
+bigger than a stinging nettle,” thought he, “for the roots of the oak
+have sucked every atom of heart out of this.” His black soul exulted
+secretly.
+
+Jacintha stood by Dard, inspecting his work; the sisters intertwined,
+a few feet from him. The baroness turned aside, and went to look for a
+moment at the chaplet she had placed yesterday on the oak-tree bough.
+Presently she uttered a slight ejaculation; and her daughters looked up
+directly.
+
+“Come here, children,” said she. They glided to her in a moment; and
+found her eyes fixed upon an object that lay on the knights’ bough.
+
+It was a sparkling purse.
+
+I dare say you have noticed that the bark on the boughs of these very
+ancient trees is as deeply furrowed as the very stem of an oak tree that
+boasts but a few centuries; and in one of these deep furrows lay a green
+silk purse with gold coins glittering through the glossy meshes.
+
+Josephine and Rose eyed it a moment like startled deer; then Rose
+pounced on it. “Oh, how heavy!” she cried. This brought up Dard and
+Jacintha, in time to see Rose pour ten shining gold pieces out of the
+purse into her pink-white palm, while her face flushed and her eyes
+glittered with excitement. Jacintha gave a scream of joy; “Our luck is
+turned,” she cried, superstitiously. Meanwhile, Josephine had found a
+slip of paper close to the purse. She opened it with nimble fingers;
+it contained one line in a hand like that of a copying clerk: FROM A
+FRIEND: IN PART PAYMENT OF A GREAT DEBT.
+
+Keen, piquant curiosity now took the place of surprise. Who could it
+be? The baroness’s suspicion fell at once on Dr. Aubertin. But Rose
+maintained he had not ten gold pieces in the world. The baroness
+appealed to Josephine. She only blushed in an extraordinary way, and
+said nothing. They puzzled, and puzzled, and were as much in the dark as
+ever, when lo! one of the suspected parties delivered himself into
+the hands of justice with ludicrous simplicity. It happened to be Dr.
+Aubertin’s hour of out-a-door study; and he came mooning along, buried
+in a book, and walked slowly into the group--started, made a slight
+apology, and was mooning off, lost in his book again. Then the
+baroness, who had eyed him with grim suspicion all the time, said with
+well-affected nonchalance, “Doctor, you dropped your purse; we have just
+picked it up.” And she handed it to him. “Thank you, madame,” said he,
+and took it quietly without looking at it, put it in his pocket,
+and retired, with his soul in his book. They stared comically at one
+another, and at this cool hand. “It’s no more his than it’s mine,” said
+Jacintha, bluntly. Rose darted after the absorbed student, and took
+him captive. “Now, doctor,” she cried, “be pleased to come out of the
+clouds.” And with the word she whipped the purse out of his coat pocket,
+and holding it right up before his eye, insisted on his telling her
+whether that was his purse or not, money and all. Thus adjured, he
+disowned the property mighty coolly, for a retired physician, who had
+just pocketed it.
+
+“No, my dear,” said he; “and, now I think of it, I have not carried a
+purse this twenty years.”
+
+The baroness, as a last resource, appealed to his honor whether he had
+not left a purse and paper on the knights’ bough. The question had to be
+explained by Josephine, and then the doctor surprised them all by being
+rather affronted--for once in his life.
+
+“Baroness,” said he, “I have been your friend and pensioner nearly
+twenty years; if by some strange chance money were to come into my
+hands, I should not play you a childish trick like this. What! have I
+not the right to come to you, and say, ‘My old friend, here I bring you
+back a very small part of all I owe you?’”
+
+“What geese we are,” remarked Rose. “Dear doctor, YOU tell us who it
+is.”
+
+Dr. Aubertin reflected a single moment; then said he could make a shrewd
+guess.
+
+“Who? who? who?” cried the whole party.
+
+“Perrin the notary.”
+
+It was the baroness’s turn to be surprised; for there was nothing
+romantic about Perrin the notary. Aubertin, however, let her know that
+he was in private communication with the said Perrin, and this was not
+the first friendly act the good notary had done her in secret.
+
+While he was converting the baroness to his view, Josephine and Rose
+exchanged a signal, and slipped away round an angle of the chateau.
+
+“Who is it?” said Rose.
+
+“It is some one who has a delicate mind.”
+
+“Clearly, and therefore not a notary.”
+
+“Rose, dear, might it not be some person who has done us some wrong, and
+is perhaps penitent?”
+
+“Certainly; one of our tenants, or creditors, you mean; but then, the
+paper says ‘a friend.’ Stay, it says a debtor. Why a debtor? Down with
+enigmas!”
+
+“Rose, love,” said Josephine, coaxingly, “think of some one that
+might--since it is not the doctor, nor Monsieur Perrin, might it not
+be--for after all, he would naturally be ashamed to appear before me.”
+
+“Before you? Who do you mean?” asked Rose nervously, catching a glimpse
+now.
+
+“He who once pretended to love me.”
+
+“Josephine, you love that man still.”
+
+“No, no. Spare me!”
+
+“You love him just the same as ever. Oh, it is wonderful; it is
+terrible; the power he has over you; over your judgment as well as your
+heart.”
+
+“No! for I believe he has forgotten my very name; don’t you think so?”
+
+“Dear Josephine, can you doubt it? Come, you do doubt it.”
+
+“Sometimes.”
+
+“But why? for what reason?”
+
+“Because of what he said to me as we parted at that gate; the words and
+the voice seem still to ring like truth across the weary years. He said,
+‘I am to join the army of the Pyrenees, so fatal to our troops; but say
+to me what you never yet have said, Camille, I love you: and I swear
+I will come back alive.’ So then I said to him, ‘I love you,’--and he
+never came back.”
+
+“How could he come here? a deserter, a traitor!”
+
+“It is not true; it is not in his nature; inconstancy may be. Tell me
+that he never really loved me, and I will believe you; but not that he
+is a traitor. Let me weep over my past love, not blush for it.”
+
+“Past? You love him to-day as you did three years ago.”
+
+“No,” said Josephine, “no; I love no one. I never shall love any one
+again.”
+
+“But him. It is that love which turns your heart against others.
+Oh, yes, you love him, dearest, or why should you fancy our secret
+benefactor COULD be that Camille?”
+
+“Why? Because I was mad: because it is impossible; but I see my folly. I
+am going in.”
+
+“What! don’t you care to know who I think it was, perhaps?”
+
+“No,” said Josephine sadly and doggedly; she added with cold
+nonchalance, “I dare say time will show.” And she went slowly in, her
+hand to her head.
+
+“Her birthday!” sighed Rose.
+
+The donor, whoever he was, little knew the pain he was inflicting on
+this distressed but proud family, or the hard battle that ensued
+between their necessities and their delicacy. The ten gold pieces were
+a perpetual temptation: a daily conflict. The words that accompanied the
+donation offered a bait. Their pride and dignity declined it; but these
+bright bits of gold cost them many a sharp pang. You must know that
+Josephine and Rose had worn out their mourning by this time; and were
+obliged to have recourse to gayer materials that lay in their great
+wardrobes, and were older, but less worn. A few of these gold pieces
+would have enabled the poor girls to be neat, and yet to mourn their
+father openly. And it went through and through those tender, simple
+hearts, to think that they must be disunited, even in so small a thing
+as dress; that while their mother remained in her weeds, they must seem
+no longer to share her woe.
+
+The baroness knew their feeling, and felt its piety, and yet could not
+bow her dignity to say, “Take five of these bits of gold, and let us
+all look what we are--one.” Yet in this, as in everything else, they
+supported each other. They resisted, they struggled, and with a wrench
+they conquered day by day. At last, by general consent, Josephine locked
+up the tempter, and they looked at it no more. But the little bit of
+paper met a kinder fate. Rose made a little frame for it, and it was
+kept in a drawer, in the salon: and often looked at and blessed. Just
+when they despaired of human friendship, this paper with the sacred
+word “friend” written on it, had fallen all in a moment on their aching
+hearts.
+
+They could not tell whence it came, this blessed word.
+
+But men dispute whence comes the dew?
+
+Then let us go with the poets, who say it comes from heaven.
+
+And even so that sweet word, friend, dropped like the dew from heaven on
+these afflicted ones.
+
+So they locked the potent gold away from themselves, and took the kind
+slip of paper to their hearts.
+
+The others left off guessing: Aubertin had it all his own way: he upheld
+Perrin as their silent benefactor, and bade them all observe that the
+worthy notary had never visited the chateau openly since the day the
+purse was left there. “Guilty conscience,” said Aubertin dryly.
+
+One day in his walks he met a gaunt figure ambling on a fat pony: he
+stopped him, and, holding up his finger, said abruptly, “We have found
+you out, Maitre Perrin.”
+
+The notary changed color.
+
+“Oh, never be ashamed,” said Aubertin; “a good action done slyly is none
+the less a good action.”
+
+The notary wore a puzzled air.
+
+Aubertin admired his histrionic powers in calling up this look.
+
+“Come, come, don’t overdo it,” said he. “Well, well; they cannot profit
+by your liberality; but you will be rewarded in a better world, take my
+word for that.”
+
+The notary muttered indistinctly. He was a man of moderate desires;
+would have been quite content if there had been no other world in
+perspective. He had studied this one, and made it pay: did not desire a
+better; sometimes feared a worse.
+
+“Ah!” said Aubertin, “I see how it is; we do not like to hear ourselves
+praised, do we? When shall we see you at the chateau?”
+
+“I propose to call on the baroness the moment I have good news to
+bring,” replied Perrin; and to avoid any more compliments spurred the
+dun pony suddenly; and he waddled away.
+
+Now this Perrin was at that moment on the way to dine with a character
+who plays a considerable part in the tale--Commandant Raynal. Perrin had
+made himself useful to the commandant, and had become his legal adviser.
+And, this very day after dinner, the commandant having done a good day’s
+work permitted himself a little sentiment over the bottle, and to a man
+he thought his friend. He let out that he had a heap of money he did not
+know what to do with, and almost hated it now his mother was gone and
+could not share it.
+
+The man of law consoled him with oleaginous phrases: told him he very
+much underrated the power of money. His hoard, directed by a judicious
+adviser, would make him a landed proprietor, and the husband of some
+young lady, all beauty, virtue, and accomplishment, whose soothing
+influence would soon heal the sorrow caused by an excess of filial
+sentiment.
+
+“Halt!” shouted Raynal: “say that again in half the words.”
+
+Perrin was nettled, for he prided himself on his colloquial style.
+
+“You can buy a fine estate and a chaste wife with the money,” snapped
+this smooth personage, substituting curt brutality for honeyed
+prolixity.
+
+The soldier was struck by the propositions the moment they flew at him
+small and solid, like bullets.
+
+“I’ve no time,” said he, “to be running after women. But the estate I’ll
+certainly have, because you can get that for me without my troubling my
+head.”
+
+“Is it a commission, then?” asked the other sharply.
+
+“Of course. Do you think I speak for the sake of talking?”
+
+And so Perrin received formal instructions to look out for a landed
+estate; and he was to receive a handsome commission as agent.
+
+Now to settle this affair, and pocket a handsome percentage for himself,
+he had only to say “Beaurepaire.”
+
+Well, he didn’t. Never mentioned the place; nor the fact that it was for
+sale.
+
+Such are all our agents, when rival speculators. Mind that. Still it
+is a terrible thing to be so completely in the power of any man of the
+world, as from this hour Beaurepaire was in the power of Perrin the
+notary.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+
+Edouard Riviere was unhappy. She never came out now. This alone made the
+days dark to him. And then he began to fear it was him she shunned. She
+must have seen him lie in wait for her; and so she would come out no
+more. He prowled about and contrived to fall in with Jacintha; he told
+her his grief. She assured him the simple fact was their mourning was
+worn out, and they were ashamed to go abroad in colors. This revelation
+made his heart yearn still more.
+
+“O Jacintha,” said he, “if I could only make a beginning; but here we
+might live a century in the same parish, and not one chance for a poor
+wretch to make acquaintance.”
+
+Jacintha admitted this, and said gentlefolks were to be pitied. “Why, if
+it was the likes of me, you and I should have made friends long before
+now.”
+
+Jacintha herself was puzzled what to do; she would have told Rose if she
+had felt sure it would be well received; but she could not find out that
+the young lady had even noticed the existence of Edouard. But her brain
+worked, and lay in wait for an opportunity.
+
+One came sooner than she expected. One morning at about six o’clock, as
+she came home from milking the cow, she caught sight of young Riviere
+trying to open the iron gate. “What is up now?” thought she; suddenly
+the truth flashed upon her, clear as day. She put her pail down and
+stole upon him. “You want to leave us another purse,” said she. He
+colored all over and panted.
+
+“How did you know? how could you know? you won’t betray me? you won’t be
+so cruel? you promised.”
+
+“Me betray you,” said Jacintha; “why, I’ll help you; and then they will
+be able to buy mourning, you know, and then they will come out, and give
+you a chance. You can’t open that gate, for it’s locked. But you come
+round to the lane, and I’ll get you the key; it is hanging up in the
+kitchen.”
+
+The key was in her pocket. But the sly jade wanted him away from that
+gate; it commanded a view of the Pleasaunce. He was no sooner safe in
+the lane, than she tore up-stairs to her young ladies, and asked them
+with affected calm whether they would like to know who left the purse.
+
+“Oh, yes, yes!” screamed Rose.
+
+“Then come with me. You ARE dressed; never mind your bonnets, or you
+will be too late.”
+
+Questions poured on her; but she waived all explanation, and did not
+give them time to think, or Josephine, for one, she knew would raise
+objections. She led the way to the Pleasaunce, and, when she got to the
+ancestral oak, she said hurriedly, “Now, mesdemoiselles, hide in there,
+and as still as mice. You’ll soon know who leaves the purses.”
+
+With this she scudded to the lane, and gave Edouard the key. “Look
+sharp,” said she, “before they get up; it’s almost their dressing time.”
+
+“YOU’LL SOON KNOW WHO LEAVES THE PURSES!”
+
+Curiosity, delicious curiosity, thrilled our two daughters of Eve.
+
+This soon began to alternate with chill misgivings at the novelty of the
+situation.
+
+“She is not coming back,” said Josephine ruefully.
+
+“No,” said Rose, “and suppose when we pounce out on him, it should be a
+stranger.”
+
+“Pounce on him? surely we are not to do that?”
+
+“Oh, y-yes; that is the p-p-programme,” quavered Rose.
+
+A key grated, and the iron gate creaked on its hinges. They ran together
+and pinched one another for mutual support, but did not dare to speak.
+
+Presently a man’s shadow came slap into the tree. They crouched and
+quivered, and expected to be caught instead of catching, and wished
+themselves safe back in bed, and all this a nightmare, and no worse.
+
+At last they recovered themselves enough to observe that this shadow,
+one half of which lay on the ground, while the head and shoulders went a
+little way up the wall of the tree, represented a man’s profile, not his
+front face. The figure, in short, was standing between them and the sun,
+and was contemplating the chateau, not the tree.
+
+The shadow took off its hat to Josephine, in the tree. Then would she
+have screamed if she had not bitten her white hand instead, and made a
+red mark thereon.
+
+It wiped its brow with a handkerchief; it had walked fast, poor thing!
+The next moment it was away.
+
+They looked at one another and panted. They scarcely dared do it before.
+Then Rose, with one hand on her heaving bosom, shook her little white
+fist viciously at where the figure must be, and perhaps a comical
+desire of vengeance stimulated her curiosity. She now glided through the
+fissure like a cautious panther from her den; and noiseless and supple
+as a serpent began to wind slowly round the tree. She soon came to a
+great protuberance in the tree, and twining and peering round it with
+diamond eye, she saw a very young, very handsome gentleman, stealing on
+tiptoe to the nearest flower-bed. Then she saw him take a purse out of
+his bosom, and drop it on the bed. This done, he came slowly past the
+tree again, and was even heard to vent a little innocent chuckle of
+intense satisfaction: but of brief duration; for, when Rose saw the
+purse leave his hand, she made a rapid signal to Josephine to wheel
+round the other side of the tree, and, starting together with admirable
+concert, both the daughters of Beaurepaire glided into sight with a vast
+appearance of composure.
+
+Two women together are really braver than fifteen separate; but still,
+most of this tranquillity was merely put on, but so admirably that
+Edouard Riviere had no chance with them. He knew nothing about their
+tremors; all he saw or heard was, a rustle, then a flap on each side of
+him as of great wings, and two lovely women were upon him with angelic
+swiftness. “Ah!” he cried out with a start, and glanced from the
+first-comer, Rose, to the gate. But Josephine was on that side by this
+time, and put up her hand, as much as to say, “You can’t pass here.” In
+such situations, the mind works quicker than lightning. He took off his
+hat, and stammered an excuse--“Come to look at the oak.” At this moment
+Rose pounced on the purse, and held it up to Josephine. He was caught.
+His only chance now was to bolt for the mark and run; but it was not
+the notary, it was a novice who lost his presence of mind, or perhaps
+thought it rude to run when a lady told him to stand still. All he did
+was to crush his face into his two hands, round which his cheeks and
+neck now blushed red as blood. Blush? they could both see the color rush
+like a wave to the very roots of his hair and the tips of his fingers.
+
+The moment our heroines, who, in that desperation which is one of
+the forms of cowardice, had hurled themselves on the foe, saw this,
+flash--the quick-witted poltroons exchanged purple lightning over
+Edouard’s drooping head, and enacted lionesses in a moment.
+
+It was with the quiet composure of lofty and powerful natures that
+Josephine opened on him. “Compose yourself, sir; and be so good as
+to tell us who you are.” Edouard must answer. Now he could not speak
+through his hands; and he could not face a brace of tranquil lionesses:
+so he took a middle course, removed one hand, and shading himself from
+Josephine with the other, he gasped out, “I am--my name is Riviere; and
+I--I--ladies!”
+
+“I am afraid we frighten you,” said Josephine, demurely.
+
+“Don’t be frightened,” said Rose, majestically; “we are not VERY angry,
+only a LITTLE curious to know why you water our flowers with gold.”
+
+At this point-blank thrust, and from her, Edouard was so confounded and
+distressed, they both began to pity him. He stammered out that he was
+so confused he did not know what to say. He couldn’t think how ever he
+could have taken such a liberty; might he be permitted to retire? and
+with this he tried to slip away.
+
+“Let me detain you one instant,” said Josephine, and made for the house.
+
+Left alone so suddenly with the culprit, the dignity, and majesty, and
+valor of Rose seemed to ooze gently out; and she stood blushing, and had
+not a word to say; no more had Edouard. But he hung his head, and she
+hung her head. And, somehow or other, whenever she raised her eyes
+to glance at him, he raised his to steal a look at her, and mutual
+discomfiture resulted.
+
+This awkward, embarrassing delirium was interrupted by Josephine’s
+return. She now held another purse in her hand, and quietly poured the
+rest of the coin into it. She then, with a blush, requested him to take
+back the money.
+
+At that he found his tongue. “No, no,” he cried, and put up his hands in
+supplication. “Ladies, do let me speak ONE word to you. Do not reject my
+friendship. You are alone in the world; your father is dead; your mother
+has but you to lean on. After all, I am your neighbor, and neighbors
+should be friends. And I am your debtor; I owe you more than you could
+ever owe me; for ever since I came into this neighborhood I have been
+happy. No man was ever so happy as I, ever since one day I was
+walking, and met for the first time an angel. I don’t say it was you,
+Mademoiselle Rose. It might be Mademoiselle Josephine.”
+
+“How pat he has got our names,” said Rose, smiling.
+
+“A look from that angel has made me so good, so happy. I used to
+vegetate, but now I live. Live! I walk on wings, and tread on roses. Yet
+you insist on declining a few miserable louis d’or from him who owes you
+so much. Well, don’t be angry; I’ll take them back, and throw them into
+the nearest pond, for they are really no use to me. But then you will
+be generous in your turn. You will accept my devotion, my services.
+You have no brother, you know; well, I have no sisters; let me be your
+brother, and your servant forever.”
+
+At all this, delivered in as many little earnest pants as there were
+sentences, the water stood in the fair eyes he was looking into so
+piteously.
+
+Josephine was firm, but angelical. “We thank you, Monsieur Riviere,”
+ said she, softly, “for showing us that the world is still embellished
+with hearts like yours. Here is the money;” and she held it out in her
+creamy hand.
+
+“But we are very grateful,” put in Rose, softly and earnestly.
+
+“That we are,” said Josephine, “and we beg to keep the purse as a
+souvenir of one who tried to do us a kindness without mortifying us. And
+now, Monsieur Riviere, you will permit us to bid you adieu.”
+
+Edouard was obliged to take the hint. “It is I who am the intruder,”
+ said he. “Mesdemoiselles, conceive, if you can, my pride and my
+disappointment.” He then bowed low; they courtesied low to him in
+return; and he retired slowly in a state of mixed feeling indescribable.
+
+With all their sweetness and graciousness, he felt overpowered by their
+high breeding, their reserve, and their composure, in a situation that
+had set his heart beating itself nearly out of his bosom. He acted the
+scene over again, only much more adroitly, and concocted speeches for
+past use, and was very hot and very cold by turns.
+
+I wish he could have heard what passed between the sisters as soon as
+ever he was out of earshot. It would have opened his eyes, and given him
+a little peep into what certain writers call “the sex.”
+
+“Poor boy,” murmured Josephine, “he has gone away unhappy.”
+
+“Oh, I dare say he hasn’t gone far,” replied Rose, gayly. “I shouldn’t
+if I was a boy.”
+
+Josephine held up her finger like an elder sister; then went on to say
+she really hardly knew why she had dismissed him.
+
+“Well, dear,” said Rose, dryly, “since you admit so much, I must say I
+couldn’t help thinking--while you were doing it--we were letting ‘the
+poor boy’ off ridiculously cheap.”
+
+“At least I did my duty?” suggested Josephine, inquiringly.
+
+“Magnificently; you overawed even me. So now to business, as the
+gentlemen say. Which of us two takes him?”
+
+“Takes whom?” inquired Josephine, opening her lovely eyes.
+
+“Edouard,” murmured Rose, lowering hers.
+
+Josephine glared on the lovely minx with wonder and comical horror.
+
+“Oh! you shall have him,” said Rose, “if you like. You are the eldest,
+you know.”
+
+“Fie!”
+
+“Do now; TO OBLIGE ME.”
+
+“For shame! Rose. Is this you? talking like that!”
+
+“Oh! there’s no compulsion, dear; I never force young ladies’
+inclinations. So you decline him?”
+
+“Of course I decline him.”
+
+“Then, oh, you dear, darling Josephine, this is the prettiest present
+you ever made me,” and she kissed her vehemently.
+
+Josephine was frightened now. She held Rose out at arm’s length with
+both hands, and looked earnestly into her, and implored her not to play
+with fire. “Take warning by me.”
+
+Rose recommended her to keep her pity for Monsieur Riviere, “who had
+fallen into nice hands,” she said. That no doubt might remain on that
+head, she whispered mysteriously, but with much gravity and conviction,
+“I am an Imp;” and aimed at Josephine with her forefinger to point the
+remark. For one second she stood and watched this important statement
+sink into her sister’s mind, then set-to and gambolled elfishly round
+her as she moved stately and thoughtful across the grass to the chateau.
+
+Two days after this a large tree was blown down in Beaurepaire park,
+and made quite a gap in the prospect. You never know what a big thing a
+leafy tree is till it comes down. And this ill wind blew Edouard good;
+for it laid bare the chateau to his inquiring telescope. He had not
+gazed above half an hour, when a female figure emerged from the chateau.
+His heart beat. It was only Jacintha. He saw her look this way and that,
+and presently Dard appeared, and she sent him with his axe to the fallen
+tree. Edouard watched him hacking away at it. Presently his heart gave a
+violent leap; for why? two ladies emerged from the Pleasaunce and walked
+across the park. They came up to Dard, and stood looking at the tree and
+Dard hacking it, and Edouard watched them greedily. You know we all love
+to magnify her we love. And this was a delightful way of doing it. It
+is “a system of espionage” that prevails under every form of government.
+How he gazed, and gazed, on his now polar star; studied every turn,
+every gesture, with eager delight, and tried to gather what she said, or
+at least the nature of it.
+
+But by and by they left Dard and strolled towards the other end of the
+park. Then did our astronomer fling down his tube, and come running out
+in hopes of intercepting them, and seeming to meet them by some strange
+fortuity. Hope whispered he should be blessed with a smile; perhaps
+a word even. So another minute and he was running up the road to
+Beaurepaire. But his good heart was doomed to be diverted to a much
+humbler object than his idol; as he came near the fallen tree he heard
+loud cries for help, followed by groans of pain. He bounded over the
+hedge, and there was Dard hanging over his axe, moaning. “What is the
+matter? what is the matter?” cried Edouard, running to him.
+
+“Oh! oh! cut my foot. Oh!”
+
+Edouard looked, and turned sick, for there was a gash right through
+Dard’s shoe, and the blood welling up through it. But, recovering
+himself by an effort of the will, he cried out, “Courage, my lad!
+don’t give in. Thank Heaven there’s no artery there. Oh, dear, it is
+a terrible cut! Let us get you home, that is the first thing. Can you
+walk?”
+
+“Lord bless you, no! nor stand neither without help.”
+
+Edouard flew to the wheelbarrow, and, reversing it, spun a lot of billet
+out. “Ye must not do that,” said Dard with all the energy he was capable
+of in his present condition. “Why, that is Jacintha’s wood.”--“To the
+devil with Jacintha and her wood too!” cried Edouard, “a man is worth
+more than a fagot. Come, I shall wheel you home: it is only just across
+the park.”
+
+With some difficulty he lifted him into the barrow. Luckily he had his
+shooting-jacket on with a brandy-flask in it: he administered it with
+excellent effect.
+
+The ladies, as they walked, saw a man wheeling a barrow across the park,
+and took no particular notice; but, as Riviere was making for the same
+point they were, though at another angle, presently the barrow came near
+enough for them to see Dard’s head and arms in it. Rose was the first to
+notice this. “Look! look! if he is not wheeling Dard in the barrow now.”
+
+“Who?”
+
+“Can you ask? Who provides all our excitement?”
+
+Josephine instantly divined there was something amiss. “Consider,” said
+she, “Monsieur Riviere would not wheel Dard all across the park for
+amusement.”
+
+Rose assented; and in another minute, by a strange caprice of fate,
+those Edouard had come to intercept, quickened their pace to intercept
+him. As soon as he saw their intention he thrilled all over, but did not
+slacken his pace. He told Dard to take his coat and throw it over his
+foot, for here were the young ladies coming.
+
+“What for?” said Dard sulkily. “No! let them see what they have done
+with their little odd jobs: this is my last for one while. I sha’n’t go
+on two legs again this year.”
+
+The ladies came up with them.
+
+“O monsieur!” said Josephine, “what is the matter?”
+
+“We have met with a little accident, mademoiselle, that is all. Dard has
+hurt his foot; nothing to speak of, but I thought he would be best at
+home.”
+
+Rose raised the coat which Riviere, in spite of Dard, had flung over his
+foot.
+
+“He is bleeding! Dard is bleeding! Oh, my poor Dard. Oh! oh!”
+
+“Hush, Rose!”
+
+“No, don’t put him out of heart, mademoiselle. Take another pull at the
+flask, Dard. If you please, ladies, I must have him home without delay.”
+
+“Oh yes, but I want him to have a surgeon,” cried Josephine. “And we
+have no horses nor people to send off as we used to have.”
+
+“But you have me, mademoiselle,” said Edouard tenderly. “Me, who would
+go to the world’s end for you.” He said this to Josephine, but his eye
+sought Rose. “I’m a famous runner,” he added, a little bumptiously;
+“I’ll be at the town in half an hour, and send a surgeon up full
+gallop.”
+
+“You have a good heart,” said Rose simply.
+
+He bowed his blushing, delighted face, and wheeled Dard to his cottage
+hard by with almost more than mortal vigor. How softly, how nobly, that
+frolicsome girl could speak! Those sweet words rang in his ears and ran
+warm round and round his heart, as he straightened his arms and his back
+to the work. When they had gone about a hundred yards, a single snivel
+went off in the wheelbarrow. Five minutes after, Dard was at home in
+charge of his grandmother, his shoe off, his foot in a wet linen cloth;
+and Edouard, his coat tied round the neck, squared his shoulders, and
+ran the two short leagues out. He ran them in forty minutes, found the
+surgeon at home, told the case, pooh-poohed that worthy’s promise to
+go to the patient presently, darted into his stable, saddled the horse,
+brought him round, saw the surgeon into the saddle, started him, dined
+at the restaurateur’s, strolled back, and was in time to get a good look
+at the chateau of Beaurepaire just as the sun set on it.
+
+Jacintha came into Dard’s cottage that evening.
+
+“So you have been at it, my man,” cried she cheerfully and rather
+roughly, then sat down and rocked herself, with her apron over her head.
+She explained this anomalous proceeding to his grandmother privately. “I
+thought I would keep his heart up anyway, but you see I was not fit.”
+
+Next morning, as Riviere sat writing, he received an unexpected visit
+from Jacintha. She came in with her finger to her lips, and said, “You
+prowl about Dard’s cottage. They are sure to go and see him every day,
+and him wounded in their service.”
+
+“Oh, you good girl! you dear girl!” cried Edouard.
+
+She did not reply in words, but, after going to the door, returned and
+gave him a great kiss without ceremony. “Dare say you know what that’s
+for,” said she, and went off with a clear conscience and reddish cheeks.
+
+Dard’s grandmother had a little house, a little land, a little money,
+and a little cow. She could just maintain Dard and herself, and her
+resources enabled Dard to do so many little odd jobs for love, yet keep
+his main organ tolerably filled.
+
+“Go to bed, my little son, since you have got hashed,” said she.--“Bed
+be hanged,” cried he. “What good is bed? That’s a silly old custom wants
+doing away with. It weakens you: it turns you into train oil: it is the
+doctor’s friend, and the sick man’s bane. Many a one dies through taking
+to bed, that could have kept his life if he had kept his feet like a
+man. If I had cut myself in two I would not go to bed,--till I go to the
+bed with a spade in it. No! sit up like Julius Caesar; and die as you
+lived, in your clothes: don’t strip yourself: let the old women strip
+you; that is their delight laying out a chap; that is the time they
+brighten up, the old sorceresses.” He concluded this amiable rhapsody,
+the latter part of which was levelled at a lugubrious weakness of his
+grandmother’s for the superfluous embellishment of the dead, by telling
+her it was bad enough to be tied by the foot like an ass, without
+settling down on his back like a cast sheep. “Give me the armchair. I’ll
+sit in it, and, if I have any friends, they will show it now: they will
+come and tell me what is going on in the village, for I can’t get out to
+see it and hear it, they must know that.”
+
+Seated in state in his granny’s easy-chair, the loss of which after
+thirty years’ use made her miserable, she couldn’t tell why, le Sieur
+Dard awaited his friends.
+
+They did not come.
+
+The rain did, and poured all the afternoon. Night succeeded, and
+solitude. Dard boiled over with bitterness. “They are a lot of pigs
+then, all those fellows I have drunk with at Bigot’s and Simmet’s. Down
+with all fair-weather friends.”
+
+The next day the sun shone, the air was clear, and the sky blue. “Ah!
+let us see now,” cried Dard.
+
+Alas! no fellow-drinkers, no fellow-smokers, came to console their hurt
+fellow. And Dard, who had boiled with anger yesterday, was now sad and
+despondent. “Down with egotists,” he groaned.
+
+About three in the afternoon came a tap at the door.
+
+“Ah! at last,” cried Dard: “come in!”
+
+The door was slowly opened, and two lovely faces appeared at the
+threshold. The demoiselles De Beaurepaire wore a tender look of
+interest and pity when they caught sight of Dard, and on the old woman
+courtesying to them they courtesied to her and Dard. The next moment
+they were close to him, one a little to his right, the other to his
+left, and two pair of sapphire eyes with the mild lustre of sympathy
+playing down incessantly upon him. How was he? How had he slept? Was he
+in pain? Was he in much pain? tell the truth now. Was there anything to
+eat or drink he could fancy? Jacintha should make it and bring it, if
+it was within their means. A prince could not have had more solicitous
+attendants, nor a fairy king lovelier and less earthly ones.
+
+He looked in heavy amazement from one to the other. Rose bent, and was
+by some supple process on one knee, taking the measure of the wounded
+foot. When she first approached it he winced: but the next moment he
+smiled. He had never been touched like this--it was contact and no
+contact--she treated his foot as the zephyr the violets--she handled
+it as if it had been some sacred thing. By the help of his eye he
+could just know she was touching him. Presently she informed him he
+was measured for a list shoe: and she would run home for the materials.
+During her absence came a timid tap to the door; and Edouard Riviere
+entered. He was delighted to see Josephine, and made sure Rose was not
+far off. It was Dard who let out that she was gone to Beaurepaire for
+some cloth to make him a shoe. This information set Edouard fidgeting
+on his chair. He saw such a chance as was not likely to occur again. He
+rose with feigned nonchalance, and saying, “I leave you in good hands;
+angel visitors are best enjoyed alone,” slowly retired, with a deep
+obeisance. Once outside the door, dignity vanished in alacrity; he flew
+off into the park, and ran as hard as he could towards the chateau.
+He was within fifty yards of the little gate, when sure enough Rose
+emerged. They met; his heart beat violently. “Mademoiselle,” he
+faltered.
+
+“Ah! it is Monsieur Riviere, I declare,” said Rose, coolly; all over
+blushes though.
+
+“Yes, mademoiselle, and I am so out of breath. Mademoiselle Josephine
+awaits you at Dard’s house.”
+
+“She sent you for me?” inquired Rose, demurely.
+
+“Not positively. But I could see I should please her by coming for you;
+there is, I believe, a bull or so about.”
+
+“A bull or two! don’t talk in that reckless way about such things. She
+has done well to send you; let us make haste.”
+
+“But I am a little out of breath.”
+
+“Oh, never mind that! I abhor bulls.”
+
+“But, mademoiselle, we are not come to them yet, and the faster we go
+now the sooner we shall.”
+
+“Yes; but I always like to get a disagreeable thing over as soon as
+possible,” said Rose, slyly.
+
+“Ah,” replied Edouard, mournfully, “in that case let us make haste.”
+
+After a little spurt, mademoiselle relaxed the pace of her own accord,
+and even went slower than before. There was an awkward silence. Edouard
+eyed the park boundary, and thought, “Now what I have to say I must say
+before we get to you;” and being thus impressed with the necessity of
+immediate action, he turned to lead.
+
+Rose eyed him and the ground, alternately, from under her long lashes.
+
+At last he began to color and flutter. She saw something was coming, and
+all the woman donned defensive armor.
+
+“Mademoiselle.”
+
+“Monsieur.”
+
+“Is it quite decided that your family refuse my acquaintance, my
+services, which I still--forgive me--press on you? Ah! Mademoiselle
+Rose, am I never to have the happiness of--of--even speaking to you?”
+
+“It seems so,” said Rose, ironically.
+
+“Have you then decided against me too?”
+
+“I?” asked Rose. “What have I to do with questions of etiquette? I am
+only a child: so considered at least.”
+
+“You a child--an angel like you?”
+
+“Ask any of them, they will tell you I am a child; and it is to that I
+owe this conversation, no doubt; if you did not look on me as a child,
+you would not take this liberty with me,” said the young cat, scratching
+without a moment’s notice.
+
+“Mademoiselle, do not be angry. I was wrong.”
+
+“Oh! never mind. Children are little creatures without reserve, and
+treated accordingly, and to notice them is to honor them.”
+
+“Adieu then, mademoiselle. Try to believe no one respects you more than
+I do.”
+
+“Yes, let us part, for there is Dard’s house; and I begin to suspect
+that Josephine never sent you.”
+
+“I confess it.”
+
+“There, he confesses it. I thought so all along; WHAT A DUPE I HAVE
+BEEN!”
+
+“I will offend no more,” said poor silly Edouard. “Adieu, mademoiselle.
+May you find friends as sincere as I am, and more to your taste!”
+
+“Heaven hear your prayers!” replied the malicious thing, casting up her
+eyes with a mock tragic air.
+
+Edouard sighed; a chill conviction that she was both heartless and empty
+fell on him. He turned away without another word. She called to him
+with a sudden airy cheerfulness that made him start. “Stay, monsieur, I
+forgot--I have a favor to ask you.”
+
+“I wish I could believe that:” and his eyes brightened.
+
+Rose stopped, and began to play with her parasol. “You seem,” said
+she softly, “to be pretty generous in bestowing your acquaintance on
+strangers. I should be glad if I might secure you for a dear friend of
+mine, Dr. Aubertin. He will not discredit my recommendation; and he will
+not make so many difficulties as we do; shall I tell you why? Because
+he is really worth knowing. In short, believe me, it will be a valuable
+acquaintance for you--and for him,” added she with all the grace of the
+De Beaurepaires.
+
+Many a man, inferior in a general way to Edouard Riviere, would have
+made a sensible reply to this. Such as, “Oh, any friend of yours,
+mademoiselle, must be welcome to me,” or the like. But the proposal
+caught Edouard on his foible, his vanity, to wit; and our foibles are
+our manias. He was mortified to the heart’s core. “She refuses to know
+me herself,” thought he, “but she will use my love to make me amuse that
+old man.” His heart swelled against her injustice and ingratitude,
+and his crushed vanity turned to strychnine. “Mademoiselle,” said he,
+bitterly and doggedly, but sadly, “were I so happy as to have your
+esteem, my heart would overflow, not only on the doctor but on every
+honest person around. But if I must not have the acquaintance I value
+more than life, suffer me to be alone in the world, and never to say a
+word either to Dr. Aubertin, or to any human creature if I can help it.”
+
+The imperious young beauty drew herself up directly. “So be it,
+monsieur; you teach me how a child should be answered that forgets
+herself, and asks a favor of a stranger--a perfect stranger,” added she,
+maliciously.
+
+Could one of the dog-days change to mid-winter in a second, it would
+hardly seem so cold and cross as Rose de Beaurepaire turned from the
+smiling, saucy fairy of the moment before. Edouard felt as it were a
+portcullis of ice come down between her and him. She courtesied and
+glided away. He bowed and stood frozen to the spot.
+
+He felt so lonely and so bitter, he must go to Jacintha for comfort.
+
+He took advantage of the ladies being with Dard, and marched boldly into
+the kitchen of Beaurepaire.
+
+“Well, I never,” cried Jacintha. “But, after all, why not?”
+
+He hurled himself on the kitchen table (clean as china), and told her it
+was all over. “She hates me now; but it is not my fault,” and so poured
+forth his tale, and feeling sure of sympathy, asked Jacintha whether it
+was not bitterly unjust of Rose to refuse him her own acquaintance, yet
+ask him to amuse that old fogy.
+
+Jacintha stood with her great arms akimbo, taking it all in, and looking
+at him with a droll expression of satirical wonder.
+
+“Now you listen to a parable,” said she. “Once there was a little boy
+madly in love with raspberry jam.”
+
+“A thing I hate.”
+
+“Don’t tell me! Who hates raspberry jam? He came to the store closet,
+where he knew there were jars of it, and--oh! misery--the door was
+locked. He kicked the door, and wept bitterly. His mamma came and said,
+‘Here is the key,’ and gave him the key. And what did he do? Why,
+he fell to crying and roaring, and kicking the door. ‘I don’t
+wa-wa-wa-wa-nt the key-ey-ey. I wa-a-ant the jam--oh! oh! oh! oh!’”
+ and Jacintha mimicked, after her fashion, the mingled grief and ire of
+infancy debarred its jam. Edouard wore a puzzled air, but it was only
+for a moment; the next he hid his face in his hands, and cried, “Fool!”
+
+“I shall not contradict you,” said his Mentor.
+
+“She was my best friend. Once acquainted with the doctor, I could visit
+at Beaurepaire.”
+
+“Parbleu!”
+
+“She had thought of a way to reconcile my wishes with this terrible
+etiquette that reigns here.”
+
+“She thinks to more purpose than you do; that is clear.”
+
+“Nothing is left now but to ask her pardon, and to consent; I am off.”
+
+“No, you are not,” and Jacintha laid a grasp of iron on him. “Will you
+be quiet?--is not one blunder a day enough? If you go near her now, she
+will affront you, and order the doctor not to speak to you.”
+
+“O Jacintha! your sex then are fiends of malice?”
+
+“While it lasts. Luckily with us nothing lasts very long. Now you don’t
+go near her till you have taken advantage of her hint, and made the
+doctor’s acquaintance; that is easy done. He walks two hours on the east
+road every day, with his feet in the puddles and his head in the clouds.
+Them’s HIS two tastes.”
+
+“But how am I to get him out of the clouds and the puddles?” inquired
+Riviere half peevishly.
+
+“How?” asked Jacintha, with a dash of that contempt uneducated persons
+generally have for any one who does not know some little thing they
+happen to know themselves. “How? Why, with the nearest blackbeetle, to
+be sure.”
+
+“A blackbeetle?”
+
+“Black or brown; it matters little. Have her ready for use in your
+handkerchief: pull a long face: and says you--‘Excuse me, sir, I have
+THE MISFORTUNE not to know the Greek name of this merchandise here.’ Say
+that, and behold him launched. He will christen you the beast in Hebrew
+and Latin as well as Greek, and tell you her history down from the
+flood: next he will beg her of you, and out will come a cork and a pin,
+and behold the creature impaled. For that is how men love beetles. He
+has a thousand pinned down at home--beetles, butterflies, and so forth.
+When I go near the rubbish with my duster he trembles like an aspen.
+I pretend to be going to clean them, but it is only to see the face he
+makes, for even a domestic must laugh now and then--or die. But I never
+do clean them, for after all he is more stupid than wicked, poor man: I
+have not therefore the sad courage to make him wretched.”
+
+“Let us return to our beetle--what will his tirades about its antiquity
+advance me?”
+
+“Oh! one begins about a beetle, but one ends Heaven knows where.”
+
+Riviere profited by this advice. He even improved on it. In due
+course he threw himself into Aubertin’s way. He stopped the doctor
+reverentially, and said he had heard he was an entomologist. WOULD he
+be kind enough to tell him what was this enormous chrysalis he had just
+found?
+
+“The death’s head moth!” cried Aubertin with enthusiasm--“the death’s
+head moth! a great rarity in this district. Where found you this?”
+ Riviere undertook to show him the place.
+
+It was half a league distant. Coming and going he had time to make
+friends with Aubertin, and this was the easier that the old gentleman,
+who was a physiognomist as well as ologist, had seen goodness and
+sensibility in Edouard’s face. At the end of the walk he begged the
+doctor to accept the chrysalis. The doctor coquetted. “That would be a
+robbery. You take an interest in these things yourself--at least I hope
+so.”
+
+The young rogue confessed modestly to the sentiment of entomology, but
+“the government worked him so hard as to leave him no hopes of shining
+in so high a science,” said he sorrowfully.
+
+The doctor pitied him. “A young man of your attainments and tastes to
+be debarred from the everlasting secrets of nature, by the fleeting
+politics of the day.”
+
+Riviere shrugged his shoulders. “Somebody must do the dirty work,” said
+he, chuckling inwardly.
+
+The chrysalis went to Beaurepaire in the pocket of a grateful man,
+who that same evening told the whole party his conversation with
+young Riviere, on whom he pronounced high encomiums. Rose’s saucy eyes
+sparkled with fun: you might have lighted a candle at one and exploded a
+mine at the other; but not a syllable did she utter.
+
+The doctor proved a key, and opened the enchanted castle. One fine
+day he presented his friend in the Pleasaunce to the baroness and her
+daughters.
+
+They received him with perfect politeness. Thus introduced, and as he
+was not one to let the grass grow under his feet, he soon obtained a
+footing as friend of the family, which, being now advised by Josephine,
+he took care not to compromise by making love to Rose before the
+baroness. However, he insisted on placing his financial talent at their
+service. He surveyed and valued their lands, and soon discovered that
+all their farms were grossly underlet. Luckily most of the leases were
+run out. He prepared a new rent roll, and showed it Aubertin, now his
+fast friend. Aubertin at his request obtained a list of the mortgages,
+and Edouard drew a balance-sheet founded on sure data, and proved to the
+baroness that in able hands the said estate was now solvent.
+
+This was a great comfort to the old lady: and she said to Aubertin,
+“Heaven has sent us a champion, a little republican--with the face of an
+angel.”
+
+Descending to practice, Edouard actually put three of the farms into
+the market, and let them at an advance of twenty per cent on the expired
+leases. He brought these leases signed; and the baroness had scarcely
+done thanking him, when her other secret friend, Monsieur Perrin, was
+announced. Edouard exchanged civilities with him, and then retired to
+the Pleasaunce. There he found both sisters, who were all tenderness and
+gratitude to him. By this time he had learned to value Josephine: she
+was so lovely and so good, and such a true womanly friend to him. Even
+Rose could not resist her influence, and was obliged to be kind to him,
+when Josephine was by. But let Josephine go, and instead of her being
+more tender, as any other girl would, left alone with her lover,
+sauciness resumed its empire till sweet Josephine returned. Whereof
+cometh an example; for the said Josephine was summoned to a final
+conference with the baroness and Monsieur Perrin.
+
+“Don’t be long,” said Rose, as Josephine glided away, and (taking the
+precaution to wait till she was quite out of hearing), “I shall be so
+dull, dear, till you come back.”
+
+“I shall not though,” said Edouard.
+
+“I am not so sure of that. Now then.”
+
+“Now then, what?”
+
+“Begin.”
+
+“Begin what?”
+
+“Amusing me.” And she made herself look sullen and unamusable all over.
+
+“I will try,” said Riviere. “I’ll tell you what they say of you: that
+you are too young to love.”
+
+“So I am, much.”
+
+“No, no, no! I made a mistake. I mean too young to be loved.”
+
+“Oh, I am not too young for that, not a bit.”
+
+This point settled, she suggested that, if he could not amuse her, he
+had better do THE NEXT BEST THING, and that was, talk sense.
+
+“I think I had better not talk at all,” said he, “for I am no match
+for such a nimble tongue. And then you are so remorseless. I’ll hold my
+tongue, and make a sketch of this magnificent oak.”
+
+“Ay, do: draw it as it appeared on a late occasion: with two ladies
+flying out of it, and you rooted with dismay.”
+
+“There is no need; that scene is engraved.”
+
+“Where? in all the shops?”
+
+“No; on all our memories.”
+
+“Not on mine; not on mine. How terrified you were--ha, ha! and how
+terrified we should have been if you had not. Listen: once upon a
+time--don’t be alarmed: it was long after Noah--a frightened hare ran by
+a pond; the frogs splashed in the water, smit with awe. Then she said,
+‘Ah ha! there are people in the world I frighten in my turn; I am the
+thunderbolt of war.’ Excuse my quoting La Fontaine: I am not in ‘Charles
+the Twelfth of Sweden’ yet. I am but a child.”
+
+“And it’s a great mercy, for when you grow up, you will be too much
+for me, that is evident. Come, then, Mademoiselle the Quizzer, come and
+adorn my sketch.”
+
+“Monsieur, shall I make you a confession? You will not be angry: I could
+not support your displeasure. I have a strange inclination to walk
+up and down this terrace while you go and draw that tree in the
+Pleasaunce.”
+
+“Resist that inclination; perhaps it will fly from you.”
+
+“No; you fly from me, and draw. I will rejoin you in a few minutes.”
+
+“Thank you, I’m not so stupid. You will step indoors directly.”
+
+“Do you doubt my word, sir?” asked she haughtily.
+
+He had learned to obey all her caprices; so he went and placed himself
+on the west side of the oak and took out his sketch-book, and worked
+zealously and rapidly. He had done the outlines of the tree and was
+finishing in detail a part of the huge trunk, when his eyes were
+suddenly dazzled: in the middle of the rugged bark, deformed here and
+there with great wart-like bosses, and wrinkled, seamed, and ploughed
+all over with age, burst a bit of variegated color; bright as a poppy on
+a dungeon wall, it glowed and glittered out through a large hole in the
+brown bark; it was Rose’s face peeping. To our young lover’s eye how
+divine it shone! None of the half tints of common flesh were there,
+but a thing all rose, lily, sapphire, and soul. His pencil dropped, his
+mouth opened, he was downright dazzled by the glowing, bewitching face,
+sparkling with fun, in the gaunt tree. Tell me, ladies, did she know,
+even at that age, the value of that sombre frame to her brightness? The
+moment she found herself detected, the gaunt old tree rang musical with
+a crystal laugh, and out came the arch-dryad. “I have been there all the
+time. How solemn you looked! Now for the result of such profound study.”
+ He showed her his work; she altered her tone. “Oh, how clever!” she
+cried, “and how rapid! What a facility you have! Monsieur is an artist,”
+ said she gravely; “I will be more respectful,” and she dropped him a low
+courtesy. “Mind you promised it me,” she added sharply.
+
+“You will accept it, then?”
+
+“That I will, now it is worth having: dear me, I never reckoned on that.
+Finish it directly,” cried this peremptory young person.
+
+“First I must trouble you to stand out there near the tree.”
+
+“Me? what for?”
+
+“Because art loves contrasts. The tree is a picture of age and gradual
+decay; by its side then I must place a personification of youth and
+growing loveliness.”
+
+She did not answer, but made a sort of defiant pirouette, and went where
+she was bid, and stood there with her back to the artist. “That will
+never do,” said he; “you really must be so good as to turn round.”
+
+“Oh, very well.” And when she came round, behold her color had risen
+mightily. Flattery is sweet.
+
+This child of nature was delighted, and ashamed it should be seen that
+she was.
+
+And so he drew her, and kept looking off the paper at her, and had a
+right in his character of artist to look her full in the face; and he
+did so with long lingering glances. To be sure, they all began severe
+and businesslike with half-closed eyes, and the peculiar hostile
+expression art puts on; but then they always ended open-eyed, and so
+full and tender, that she, poor girl, who was all real gold, though sham
+brass, blushed and blushed, and did not know which way to look not to
+be scorched up by his eye like a tender flower, or blandly absorbed like
+the pearly dew. Ah, happy hour! ah, happy days of youth and innocence
+and first love!
+
+Trouble loves to intrude on these halcyon days.
+
+The usually quiet Josephine came flying from the house, pale and
+agitated, and clung despairingly to Rose, and then fell to sobbing and
+lamenting piteously.
+
+I shall take leave to relate in my own words what had just occurred
+to agitate her so. When she entered her mother’s room, she found the
+baroness and Perrin the notary seated watching for her. She sat down
+after the usual civilities, and Perrin entered upon the subject that had
+brought him.
+
+He began by confessing to them that he had not overcome the refractory
+creditor without much trouble; and that he had since learned there was
+another, a larger creditor, likely to press for payment or for sale of
+the estate. The baroness was greatly troubled by this communication: the
+notary remained cool as a cucumber, and keenly observant. After a pause
+he went on to say all this had caused him grave reflections. “It seems,”
+ said he with cool candor, “a sad pity the estate should pass from a
+family that has held it since the days of Charlemagne.”
+
+“Now God forbid!” cried the baroness, lifting her eyes and her quivering
+hands to heaven.
+
+The notary held the republican creed in all its branches. “Providence,
+madame, does not interfere--in matters of business,” said he. “Nothing
+but money can save the estate. Let us then be practical. Has any means
+occurred to you of raising money to pay off these incumbrances?”
+
+“No. What means can there be? The estate is mortgaged to its full value:
+so they say, at least.”
+
+“And they say true,” put in the notary quickly. “But do not distress
+yourself, madame: confide in me.”
+
+“Ah, my good friend, may Heaven reward you.”
+
+“Madame, up to the present time I have no complaint to make of Heaven.
+I am on the rise: here, mademoiselle, is a gimcrack they have given me;”
+ and he unbuttoned his overcoat, and showed them a piece of tricolored
+ribbon and a clasp. “As for me, I look to ‘the solid;’ I care little for
+these things,” said he, swelling visibly, “but the world is dazzled by
+them. However, I can show you something better.” He took out a letter.
+“This is from the Minister of the Interior to a client of mine: a
+promise I shall be the next prefect; and the present prefect--I am happy
+to say--is on his death-bed. Thus, madame, your humble servant in a few
+short months will be notary no longer, but prefect; I shall then sell my
+office of notary: and I flatter myself when I am a prefect you will not
+blush to own me.”
+
+“Then, as now, monsieur,” said the baroness politely, “we shall
+recognize your merit. But”--
+
+“I understand, madame: like me you look to ‘the solid.’ Thus then it is;
+I have money.”
+
+“Ah! all the better for you.”
+
+“I have a good deal of money. But it is dispersed in a great many small
+but profitable investments: to call it in suddenly would entail some
+loss. Nevertheless, if you and my young lady there have ever so little
+of that friendly feeling towards me of which I have so much towards you,
+all my investments shall be called in, and two-thirds of your creditors
+shall be paid off at once. A single client of mine, no less a man than
+the Commandant Raynal, will, I am sure, advance me the remaining third
+at an hour’s notice; and so Beaurepaire chateau, park, estate, and
+grounds, down to the old oak-tree, shall be saved; and no power shall
+alienate them from you, mademoiselle, and from the heirs of your body.”
+
+The baroness clasped her hands in ecstasy.
+
+“But what are we to do for this?” inquired Josephine calmly, “for it
+seems to me that it can only be effected by a sacrifice on your part.”
+
+“I thank you, mademoiselle, for your penetration in seeing that I must
+make sacrifices. I would never have told you, but you have seen it;
+and I do not regret that you have seen it. Madame--mademoiselle--those
+sacrifices appear little to me; will seem nothing; will never be
+mentioned, or even alluded to after this day, if you, on your part, will
+lay me under a far heavier obligation, if in short”--here the contemner
+of things unsubstantial reopened his coat, and brought his ribbon to
+light again--“if you, madame, will accept me for your son-in-law--if
+you, mademoiselle, will take me for your husband.”
+
+The baroness and her daughter looked at one another in silence.
+
+“Is it a jest?” inquired the former of the latter.
+
+“Can you think so? Answer Monsieur Perrin. He has just done us a kind
+office, mother.”
+
+“I shall remember it. Monsieur, permit me to regret that having lately
+won our gratitude and esteem, you have taken this way of modifying those
+feelings. But after all,” she added with gentle courtesy, “we may well
+put your good deeds against this--this error in judgment. The balance is
+in your favor still, provided you never return to this topic. Come,
+is it agreed?” The baroness’s manner was full of tact, and the latter
+sentences were said with an open kindliness of manner. There was nothing
+to prevent Perrin from dropping the subject, and remaining good friends.
+A gentleman or a lover would have so done. Monsieur Perrin was neither.
+He said bitterly, “You refuse me, then.”
+
+The tone and the words were each singly too much for the baroness’s
+pride. She answered coldly but civilly,--
+
+“I do not refuse you. I do not take an affront into consideration.”
+
+“Be calm, mamma; no affront whatever was intended.”
+
+“Ah! here is one that is more reasonable,” cried Perrin.
+
+“There are men,” continued Josephine without noticing him, “who look
+to but one thing--interest. It was an offer made politely in the way of
+business: decline it in the same spirit; that is what you have to do.”
+
+“Monsieur, you hear what mademoiselle says? She carries politeness
+a long way. After all it is a good fault. Well, monsieur, I need not
+answer you, since Mademoiselle de Beaurepaire has answered you; but I
+detain you no longer.”
+
+Strictly a weasel has no business with the temper of a tiger, but this
+one had, and the long vindictiveness of a Corsican. “Ah! my little lady,
+you turn me out of the house, do you?” cried he, grinding his teeth.
+
+“Turn him out of the house? what a phrase! where has this man lived?”
+
+“A man!” snarled Perrin, “whom none ever yet insulted without repenting
+it, and repenting in vain. You are under obligations to me, and you
+think to turn me out! You are at my mercy, and you think I will let you
+turn me to your door! In less than a mouth I will stand here, and say to
+you, Beaurepaire is mine. Begone from it!”
+
+When he uttered these terrible words, each of which was like a
+sword-stroke to the baroness, the old lady, whose courage was not
+equal to her strength, shrank over the side of her arm-chair, and cried
+piteously--“He threatens me! he threatens me! I am frightened;” and put
+up her trembling hands, for the notary’s eloquence, being accompanied
+with abundance of gesture, bordered upon physical violence. His
+brutality received an unexpected check. Imagine that a sparrow-hawk had
+seized a trembling pigeon, and that a royal falcon swooped, and with one
+lightning-like stroke of body and wing, buffeted him away, and sent him
+gaping and glaring and grasping at pigeonless air with his claws. So
+swift and majestic, Josephine de Beaurepaire came from her chair with
+one gesture of her body between her mother and the notary, who was
+advancing with arms folded in a brutal, menacing way--not the Josephine
+we have seen her, the calm languid beauty, but the demoiselle de
+Beaurepaire--her great heart on fire--her blood up--not her own only,
+but all the blood of all the De Beaurepaires--pale as ashes with great
+wrath, her purple eyes on fire, and her whole panther-like body full
+of spring. “Wretch! you dare to insult her, and before me! Arriere
+miserable! or I soil my hand with your face.” And her hand was up with
+the word, up, up, higher it seemed than ever a hand was raised before.
+And if he had hesitated one moment, I really believe it would have come
+down; not heavily, perhaps--the lightning is not heavy. But there was
+no need. The towering threat and the flaming eye and the swift rush
+buffeted the caitiff away: he recoiled. She followed him as he went,
+strong, FOR A MOMENT OR TWO, as Hercules, beautiful and terrible as
+Michael driving Satan. He dared not, or could not stand before her: he
+writhed and cowered and recoiled all down the room, while she marched
+upon him. But the driven serpent hissed horribly as it wriggled away.
+
+“You shall both be turned out of Beaurepaire by me, and forever; I swear
+it, parole de Perrin.”
+
+He had not been gone a minute when Josephine’s courage oozed away,
+and she ran, or rather tottered, into the Pleasaunce, and clung like a
+drowning thing to Rose, and, when Edouard took her hand, she clung to
+him. They had to gather what had happened how they could: the account
+was constantly interrupted with her sobs and self-reproaches. She said
+she had ruined all she loved: ruined her sister, ruined her mother,
+ruined the house of Beaurepaire. Why was she ever born? Why had she
+not died three years ago? (Query, what was the date at which Camille’s
+letters suddenly stopped?) “That coward,” said she, “has the heart of a
+fiend. He told us he never forgave an affront; and he holds our fate
+in his hands. He will drive our mother from her home, and she will die:
+murdered by her own daughter. After all, why did I refuse him? What
+should I have sacrificed by marrying him? Rose, write to him, and
+say--say--I was taken by surprise, I--I”--a violent flood of tears
+interrupted the sentence.
+
+Rose flung her arms round her neck. “My beautiful Josephine marry that
+creature? Let house and lands go a thousand times sooner. I love my
+sister a thousand times better than the walls of this or any other
+house.”
+
+“Come, come,” cried Edouard, “you are forgetting ME all this time. Do
+you really think I am the sort of man to stand by with my hands in
+my pockets, and let her marry that cur, or you be driven out of
+Beaurepaire? Neither, while I live.”
+
+“Alas! dear boy,” sighed Josephine, “what can you do?”
+
+“I’ll soon show you. From this hour forth it is a duel between that
+Perrin and me. Now, Josephine--Rose--don’t you cry and fret like that:
+but just look quietly on, and enjoy the fight, both of you.”
+
+Josephine shook her head with a sad smile: but Rose delivered herself
+thus, after a sob, “La, yes; I forgot: we have got a gentleman now;
+that’s one comfort.”
+
+Edouard rose to the situation: he saw that Perrin would lose no time;
+and that every day, or even hour, might be precious. He told them that
+the first thing he must do for them was to leave the company he loved
+best on earth, and run down to the town to consult Picard the rival
+notary: he would be back by supper-time, when he hoped they would do
+him the honor, in a matter of such importance, to admit him to a family
+council.
+
+Josephine assented with perfect simplicity; Rose with a deep blush, for
+she was too quick not to see all the consequences of admitting so brisk
+a wooer into a family council.
+
+
+It was a wet evening, and a sad and silent party sat round a wood fire
+in the great dining-hall. The baroness was almost prostrated by the
+scene with Perrin; and a sombre melancholy and foreboding weighed on
+all their spirits, when presently Edouard Riviere entered briskly, and
+saluted them all profoundly, and opened the proceedings with a little
+favorite pomposity. “Madame the baroness, and you Monsieur Aubertin, who
+honor me with your esteem, and you Mademoiselle de Beaurepaire, whom I
+adore, and you Mademoiselle Rose, whom I hoped to be permitted--you have
+this day done me the honor to admit me as your adviser. I am here to
+lay my plans before you. I believe, madame, I have already convinced
+you that your farms are under-let, and your property lowered in value by
+general mismanagement; this was doubtless known to Perrin, and set him
+scheming. Well, I rely on the same circumstance to defeat him. I have
+consulted Picard and shown him the rent-roll and balance-sheet I had
+already shown you. He has confessed that the estate is worth more
+than its debts, so capitalists can safely advance the money. To-morrow
+morning, then, I ride to Commandant Raynal for a week’s leave of
+absence; then, armed with Picard’s certificate, shall proceed to my
+uncle and ask him to lend the money. His estate is very small compared
+with Beaurepaire, but he has always farmed it himself. ‘I’ll have no
+go-between,’ says he, ‘to impoverish both self and soil.’ He is also a
+bit of a misanthrope, and has made me one. I have a very poor opinion of
+my fellow-creatures, very.”
+
+“Well, but,” said Rose, “if he is all that, he will not sympathize with
+us, who have so mismanaged Beaurepaire. Will he not despise us?”
+
+Edouard was a little staggered, but Aubertin came to his aid.
+
+“Permit me, Josephine,” said he. “Natural history steps in here, and
+teaches by me, its mouth-piece. A misanthrope hates all mankind, but is
+kind to every individual, generally too kind. A philanthrope loves the
+whole human race, but dislikes his wife, his mother, his brother, and
+his friends and acquaintances. Misanthrope is the potato: rough and
+repulsive outside, but good to the core. Philanthrope is a peach: his
+manner all velvet and bloom, his words sweet juice, his heart of hearts
+a stone. Let me read Philanthrope’s book, and fall into the hands of
+Misanthrope.”
+
+Edouard admitted the shrewdness of this remark.
+
+“And so,” said he, “my misanthrope will say plenty of biting
+words,--which, by-the-by, will not hurt you, who will not hear them,
+only me,--and then he’ll lend us the money, and Beaurepaire will be
+free, and I shall have had a hand in it. Hurrah!”
+
+Then came a delicious hour to Edouard Riviere. Young and old poured out
+their glowing thanks and praises upon him till his checks burned like
+fire.
+
+The baroness was especially grateful, and expressed a gentle regret that
+she could see no way of showing her gratitude except in words. “What can
+we do for this little angel?” said she, turning to Josephine.
+
+“Leave that to me, mamma,” replied Josephine, turning her lovely eyes
+full on Edouard, with a look the baroness misunderstood directly.
+
+She sat and watched Josephine and Edouard with comical severity all the
+rest of the time she was there; and, when she retired, she kissed Rose
+affectionately, but whispered her eldest daughter, “I hope you are not
+serious. A mere boy compared with you.”
+
+“But such a sweet one,” suggested Josephine, apologetically.
+
+“What will the world come to?” said the baroness out loud, and retreated
+with a sour glance at all of them--except Rose.
+
+She had not been gone five minutes when a letter came by messenger to
+Edouard. It was from Picard. He read it out.
+
+
+“Perrin has been with me, to raise money. He wants it in forty-eight
+hours. Promises good legal security. I have agreed to try and arrange
+the matter for him.”
+
+
+They were all astonished at this.
+
+“The double-faced traitor!” cried Edouard. “Stay; wait a minute. Let us
+read it to an end.”
+
+
+“This promise is, of course, merely to prevent his going elsewhere. At
+the end of the forty-eight hours I shall begin to make difficulties.
+Meantime, as Perrin is no fool, you had better profit to the full by
+this temporary delay.”
+
+
+“Well done, Picard!” shouted Edouard. “Notary cut notary. I won’t
+lose an hour. I’ll start at five; Commandant Raynal is an early riser
+himself.”
+
+Accordingly, at five he was on the road; Raynal’s quarters lay in the
+direct line to his uncle’s place. He found the commandant at home, and
+was well received. Raynal had observed his zeal, and liked his manners.
+He gave him the week’s leave, and kept him to breakfast, and had his
+horse well fed. At eight o’clock Edouard rode out of the premises in
+high spirits. At the very gate he met a gaunt figure riding in on a
+squab pony. It was Perrin the notary coming in hot haste to his friend
+and employer, Commandant Raynal.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+
+After Edouard’s departure, Josephine de Beaurepaire was sad, and weighed
+down with presentiments. She felt as soldiers sometimes feel who know
+the enemy is undermining them; no danger on the surface; nothing that
+can be seen, met, baffled, attacked, or evaded; in daily peril, all the
+more horrible that it imitates perfect serenity, they await the fatal
+match. She imparted her misgivings to Aubertin; but he assured her she
+exaggerated the danger.
+
+“We have a friend still more zealous and active than our enemy; believe
+me, your depression is really caused by his absence; we all miss the
+contact of that young heroic spirit; we are a body, and he its soul.”
+
+Josephine was silent, for she said to herself, “Why should I dash their
+spirits? they are so happy and confident.”
+
+Edouard had animated Rose and Aubertin with his own courage, and had
+even revived the baroness.
+
+It had been agreed between him and Picard that the latter should
+communicate with Dr. Aubertin direct, should anything fresh occur. And
+on the third day after Edouard’s departure, Picard sent up a private
+message: “Perrin has just sent me a line to say he will not trouble us,
+as he is offered the money in another quarter.”
+
+This was a heavy blow, and sent them all to bed more or less despondent.
+
+The next day brought a long letter from Edouard to Rose, telling her he
+had found his uncle crusty at first; but at last with a little patience,
+and the co-operation of Martha, his uncle’s old servant, and his nurse,
+the old boy had come round. They might look on the affair as all but
+settled.
+
+The contents of this letter were conveyed to the baroness. The house
+brightened under it: the more so that there was some hope of their
+successful champion returning in person next day. Meantime Perrin had
+applied to Raynal for the immediate loan of a large sum of money on
+excellent security. Raynal refused plump. Perrin rode away disconsolate.
+
+But the next day he returned to the charge with another proposal: and
+the nature of this second proposal we shall learn from events.
+
+The day Edouard was expected opened deliciously. It was a balmy morning,
+and tempted the sisters out before breakfast. They strolled on the
+south terrace with their arms round each other’s waists, talking about
+Edouard, and wondering whether they should really see him before night.
+Rose owned she had missed him, and confessed for the first time she was
+a proud and happy girl.
+
+“May I tell him so?” asked Josephine.
+
+“Not for all the world. Would you dare?”
+
+Further discussion of that nice point was stopped by the baroness coming
+out, leaning on Dr. Aubertin.
+
+Then--how we young people of an unceremonious age should have
+stared--the demoiselles de Beaurepaire, inasmuch as this was their
+mother’s first appearance, lowered their fair heads at the same time
+like young poplars bowing to the wind, and so waited reverently till she
+had slightly lifted her hands, and said, “God bless you, my children!”
+
+It was done in a moment on both sides, but full of grace and piety, and
+the charm of ancient manners.
+
+“How did our dear mother sleep?” inquired Josephine. Aubertin interposed
+with a theory that she slept very well indeed if she took what he gave
+her.
+
+“Ay, IF,” suggested Rose, saucily.
+
+“I slept,” said the baroness, “and I wish I had not for I dreamed an
+ugly dream.” They all gathered round her, and she told her dream.
+
+“I thought I was with you all in this garden. I was admiring the flowers
+and the trees, and the birds were singing with all their might. Suddenly
+a dark cloud came; it cleared almost directly; but flowers, trees, sky,
+and birds were gone now, and I could see the chateau itself no more. It
+means that I was dead. An ugly dream, my children, an ugly dream.”
+
+“But only a dream, dear mother,” said Rose: then with a sweet, consoling
+smile, “See, here is your terrace and your chateau.”
+
+“And here are your daughters,” said Josephine; and they both came
+and kissed her to put their existence out of doubt. “And here is your
+Aesculapius,” said Aubertin. “And here is your Jacintha.”
+
+“Breakfast, madame,” said Jacintha. “Breakfast, mesdemoiselles.
+Breakfast, monsieur:” dropping each a distinct courtesy in turn.
+
+“She has turned the conversation very agreeably,” said the baroness, and
+went in leaning on her old friend.
+
+But the sisters lagged behind and took several turns in silence. Rose
+was the first to speak. “How superstitious of you!”
+
+“I said nothing.”
+
+“No; but you looked volumes at me while mamma was telling her dream. For
+my part I feel sure love is stronger than hate; and we shall stay all
+our days in this sweet place: and O Josey! am I not a happy girl that
+it’s all owing to HIM!”
+
+At this moment Jacintha came running towards them. They took it for a
+summons to breakfast, and moved to meet her. But they soon saw she was
+almost as white as her apron, and she came open-mouthed and wringing her
+hands. “What shall I do? what shall I do? Oh, don’t let my poor mistress
+know!”
+
+They soon got from her that Dard had just come from the town, and
+learned the chateau was sold, and the proprietor coming to take
+possession this very day. The poor girls were stupefied by the blow.
+
+If anything, Josephine felt it worst. “It is my doing,” she gasped, and
+tottered fainting. Rose supported her: she shook it off by a violent
+effort. “This is no time for weakness,” she cried, wildly; “come to the
+Pleasaunce; there is water there. I love my mother. What will I not do
+for her? I love my mother.”
+
+Muttering thus wildly she made for the pond in the Pleasaunce. She had
+no sooner turned the angle of the chateau than she started back with
+a convulsive cry, and her momentary feebleness left her directly; she
+crouched against the wall and griped the ancient corner-stone with her
+tender hand till it powdered, and she spied with dilating eye into the
+Pleasaunce, Rose and Jacintha panting behind her. Two men stood with
+their backs turned to her looking at the oak-tree; one an officer in
+full uniform, the other the human snake Perrin. Though the soldier’s
+back was turned, his off-handed, peremptory manner told her he was
+inspecting the place as its master.
+
+“The baroness! the baroness!” cried Jacintha, with horror. They looked
+round, and the baroness was at their very backs.
+
+“What is it?” cried she, gayly.
+
+“Nothing, mamma.”
+
+“Let me see this nothing.”
+
+They glanced at one another, and, idle as the attempt was, the habit
+of sparing her prevailed, and they flung themselves between her and the
+blow.
+
+“Josephine is not well,” said Rose. “She wants to go in.” Both girls
+faced the baroness.
+
+“Jacintha,” said the baroness, “fetch Dr. Aubertin. There, I have sent
+her away. So now tell me, why do you drive me back so? Something has
+happened,” and she looked keenly from one to the other.
+
+“O mamma! do not go that way: there are strangers in the Pleasaunce.”
+
+“Let me see. So there are. Call Jacintha back that I may order these
+people out of my premises.” Josephine implored her to be calm.
+
+“Be calm when impertinent intruders come into my garden?”
+
+“Mother, they are not intruders.”
+
+“What do you mean?”
+
+“They have a right to be in our Pleasaunce. They have bought the
+chateau.”
+
+“It is impossible. HE was to buy it for us--there is some mistake--what
+man would kill a poor old woman like me? I will speak to this gentleman:
+he wears a sword. Soldiers do not trample on women. Ah! that man.”
+
+The notary, attracted by her voice, was coming towards her, a paper in
+his hand.
+
+Raynal coolly inspected the tree, and tapped it with his scabbard, and
+left Perrin to do the dirty work. The notary took off his hat, and, with
+a malignant affectation of respect, presented the baroness with a paper.
+
+The poor old thing took it with a courtesy, the effect of habit, and
+read it to her daughters as well as her emotion permitted, and the
+language, which was as new to her as the dialect of Cat Island to
+Columbus.
+
+“Jean Raynal, domiciled by right, and lodging in fact at the Chateau
+of Beaurepaire, acting by the pursuit and diligence of Master Perrin,
+notary; I, Guillaume Le Gras, bailiff, give notice to Josephine Aglae
+St. Croix de Beaurepaire, commonly called the Baroness de Beaurepaire,
+having no known place of abode”--
+
+“Oh!”
+
+“But lodging wrongfully at the said Chateau of Beaurepaire, that she is
+warned to decamp within twenty-four hours”--
+
+“To decamp!”
+
+“Failing which that she will be thereto enforced in the manner for that
+case made and provided with the aid of all the officers and agents of
+the public force.”
+
+“Ah! no, messieurs, pray do not use force. I am frightened enough
+already. I did not know I was doing anything wrong. I have been here
+thirty years. But, since Beaurepaire is sold, I comprehend perfectly
+that I must go. It is just. As you say, I am not in my own house. I will
+go, gentlemen, I will go. Whither shall I go, my children? The house
+where you were born to me is ours no longer. Excuse me, gentlemen--this
+is nothing to you. Ah! sir, you have revenged yourself on two weak
+women--may Heaven forgive you!”
+
+The notary turned on his heel. The poor baroness, all whose pride the
+iron law, with its iron gripe, had crushed into dismay and terror,
+appealed to him. “O sir! send me from the house, but not from the soil
+where my Henri is laid! is there not in all this domain a corner where
+she who was its mistress may lie down and die? Where is the NEW BARON,
+that I may ask this favor of him on my knees?”
+
+She turned towards Raynal and seemed to be going towards him with
+outstretched arms. But Rose checked her with fervor. “Mamma! do not
+lower yourself. Ask nothing of these wretches. Let us lose all, but not
+forget ourselves.”
+
+The baroness had not her daughter’s spirit. Her very person tottered
+under this blow. Josephine supported her, and the next moment Aubertin
+came out and hastened to her side. Her head fell back; what little
+strength she had failed her; she was half lifted, half led, into the
+house.
+
+Commandant Raynal was amazed at all this, and asked what the deuce was
+the matter.
+
+“Oh!” said the notary, “we are used to these little scenes in our
+business.”
+
+“But I am not,” replied the soldier. “You never told me there was to be
+all this fuss.”
+
+He then dismissed his friend rather abruptly and strode up and down the
+Pleasaunce. He twisted his mustaches, muttered, and “pested,” and
+was ill at ease. Accustomed to march gayly into a town, and see the
+regiment, that was there before, marching gayly out, or vice versa, and
+to strike tents twice a quarter at least, he was little prepared for
+such a scene as this. True, he did not hear all the baroness’s words,
+but more than one tone of sharp distress reached him where he stood, and
+the action of the whole scene was so expressive, there was little need
+of words. He saw the notice given; the dismay it caused, and the old
+lady turn imploringly towards him with a speaking gesture, and above all
+he saw her carried away, half fainting, her hands clasped, her
+reverend face pale. He was not a man of quick sensibilities. He did not
+thoroughly take the scene in at first: it grew upon him afterwards.
+
+“Confound it,” thought he, “I am the proprietor. They all say so.
+Instead of which I feel like a thief. Fancy her getting so fond of a
+PLACE as all this.”
+
+Presently it occurred to him that the shortness of the notice might
+have much to do with her distress. “These notaries,” said he to himself,
+“understand nothing save law: women have piles of baggage, and can’t
+strike tents directly the order comes, as we can. Perhaps if I were to
+give them twenty-four days instead of hours?--hum!”
+
+With this the commandant fell into a brown study. Now each of us has his
+attitude of brown study. One runs about the room like hyena in his den;
+another stands stately with folded arms (this one seldom thinks to the
+purpose); another sits cross-legged, brows lowered: another must put
+his head into his hand, and so keep it up to thinking mark: another must
+twiddle a bit of string, or a key; grant him this, he can hatch an epic.
+This commandant must draw himself up very straight, and walk six paces
+and back very slowly, till the problem was solved: I suspect he had done
+a good bit of sentinel work in his time.
+
+Now whilst he was guarding the old oak-tree, for all the world as if
+it had been the gate of the Tuileries or the barracks, Josephine de
+Beaurepaire came suddenly out from the house and crossed the Pleasaunce:
+her hair was in disorder, her manner wild: she passed swiftly into the
+park.
+
+Raynal recognized her as one of the family; and after a moment’s
+reflection followed her into the park with the good-natured intention of
+offering her a month to clear out instead of a day.
+
+But it was not so easy to catch her: she flew. He had to take his
+scabbard in his left hand and fairly run after her. Before he could
+catch her, she entered the little chapel. He came up and had his foot on
+the very step to go in, when he was arrested by that he heard within.
+
+Josephine had thrown herself on her knees and was praying aloud: praying
+to the Virgin with sighs and sobs and all her soul: wrestling so in
+prayer with a dead saint as by a strange perversity men cannot or will
+not wrestle with Him, who alone can hear a million prayers at once from
+a million different places,--can realize and be touched with a sense
+of all man’s infirmities in a way no single saint with his partial
+experience of them can realize and be touched by them; who unasked
+suspended the laws of nature that had taken a stranger’s only son, and
+she a widow; and wept at another great human sorrow, while the eyes of
+all the great saints that stood around it and Him were dry.
+
+Well, the soldier stood, his right foot on the step and his sword in
+his left hand, transfixed: listening gravely to the agony of prayer the
+innocent young creature poured forth within:--
+
+“O Madonna! hear me: it is for my mother’s life. She will die--she will
+die. You know she cannot live if she is taken away from her house and
+from this holy place where she prays to you this many years. O Queen
+of Heaven! put out your hand to us unfortunates! Virgin, hear a virgin:
+mother, listen to a child who prays for her mother’s life! The doctor
+says she will not live away from here. She is too old to wander over the
+world. Let them drive us forth: we are young, but not her, mother, oh,
+not her! Forgive the cruel men that do this thing!--they are like those
+who crucified your Son--they know not what they are doing. But you,
+Queen of Heaven, you know all; and, sweet mother, if you have kind
+sentiments towards me, poor Josephine, ah! show them now: for you know
+that it was I who insulted that wicked notary, and it is out of hatred
+to me he has sold our beloved house to a hard stranger. Look down on me,
+a child who loves her mother, yet will destroy her unless you pity me
+and help me. Oh! what shall I say?--what shall I do? mercy! mercy! for
+my poor mother, for me!”
+
+Here her utterance was broken by sobs.
+
+The soldier withdrew his foot quietly. Her words had knocked against
+his very breast-bone. He marched slowly to and fro before the chapel,
+upright as a dart, and stiff as a ramrod, and actually pale: for even
+our nerves have their habits; a woman’s passionate grief shook him as a
+cannon fired over his head could not.
+
+Josephine little thought who was her sentinel. She came to the door
+at last, and there he was marching backwards and forwards, upright and
+stiff. She gave a faint scream and drew back with a shudder at the sight
+of their persecutor. She even felt faintish at him, as women will in
+such cases.
+
+Not being very quick at interpreting emotion, Raynal noticed her alarm,
+but not her repugnance; he saluted her with military precision by
+touching his cap as only a soldier can, and said rather gently for him,
+“A word with you, mademoiselle.”
+
+She replied only by trembling.
+
+“Don’t be frightened,” said Raynal, in a tone not very reassuring. “I
+propose an armistice.”
+
+“I am at your disposal, sir,” said Josephine, now assuming a calmness
+that was belied by the long swell of her heaving bosom.
+
+“Of course you look on me as an enemy.”
+
+“How can I do otherwise, sir? yet perhaps I ought not. You did not know
+us. You just wanted an estate, I suppose--and--oh!”
+
+“Well, don’t cry; and let us come to the point, since I am a man of few
+words.”
+
+“If you please, sir. My mother may miss me.”
+
+“Well, I was in position on your flank when the notary delivered his
+fire. And I saw the old woman’s distress.”
+
+“Ah, sir!”
+
+“When you came flying out I followed to say a good word to you. I could
+not catch you. I listened while you prayed to the Virgin. That was not a
+soldier-like trick, you will say. I confess it.”
+
+“It matters little, sir, and you heard nothing I blush for.”
+
+“No! by St. Denis; quite the contrary. Well, to the point. Young lady,
+you love your mother.”
+
+“What has she on earth now but her children’s love?”
+
+“Now look here, young lady, I had a mother; I loved her in my humdrum
+way very dearly. She promised me faithfully not to die till I should be
+a colonel; and she went and died before I was a commandant, even; just
+before, too.”
+
+“Then I pity you,” murmured Josephine; and her soft purple eye began to
+dwell on him with less repugnance.
+
+“Thank you for that word, my good young lady,” said Raynal. “Now, I
+declare, you are the first that has said that word to me about my losing
+the true friend, that nursed me on her knee, and pinched and pinched to
+make a man of me. I should like to tell you about her and me.”
+
+“I shall feel honored,” said Josephine, politely, but with considerable
+restraint.
+
+Then he told her all about how he had vexed her when he was a boy, and
+gone for a soldier, though she was all for trade, and how he had
+been the more anxious to see her enjoy his honors and success. “And,
+mademoiselle,” said he, appealingly, “the day this epaulet was put on my
+shoulder in Italy, she died in Paris. Ah! how could you have the heart
+to do that, my old woman?”
+
+The soldier’s mustache quivered, and he turned away brusquely, and
+took several steps. Then he came back to Josephine, and to his infinite
+surprise saw that her purple eyes were thick with tears. “What? you are
+within an inch of crying for my mother, you who have your own trouble at
+this hour.”
+
+“Monsieur, our situations are so alike, I may well spare some little
+sympathy for your misfortune.”
+
+“Thank you, my good young lady. Well, then, to business; while you were
+praying to the Virgin, I was saying a word or two for my part to her who
+is no more.”
+
+“Sir!”
+
+“Oh! it was nothing beautiful like the things you said to the other.
+Can I turn phrases? I saw her behind her little counter in the Rue
+Quincampoix; for she is a woman of the people, is my mother. I saw
+myself come to the other side of the counter, and I said, ‘Look here,
+mother, here is the devil to pay about this new house. The old woman
+talks of dying if we take her from her home, and the young one weeps
+and prays to all the saints in paradise; what shall we do, eh?’ Then
+I thought my old woman said to me, ‘Jean, you are a soldier, a sort of
+vagabond; what do you want with a house in France? you who are always in
+a tent in Italy or Austria, or who knows where. Have you the courage to
+give honest folk so much pain for a caprice? Come now,’ says she, ‘the
+lady is of my age, say you, and I can’t keep your fine house, because
+God has willed it otherwise; so give her my place; so then you can fancy
+it is me you have set down at your hearth: that will warm your heart up
+a bit, you little scamp,’ said my old woman in her rough way. She was
+not well-bred like you, mademoiselle. A woman of the people, nothing
+more.”
+
+“She was a woman of God’s own making, if she was like that,” cried
+Josephine, the tears now running down her cheeks.
+
+“Ah, that she was, she was. So between her and me it is settled--what
+are you crying for NOW? why, you have won the day; the field is yours;
+your mother and you remain; I decamp.” He whipped his scabbard up with
+his left hand, and was going off without another word, if Josephine had
+not stopped him.
+
+“But, sir, what am I to think? what am I to hope? it is impossible that
+in this short interview--and we must not forget what is due to you. You
+have bought the estate.”
+
+“True; well, we will talk over that, to-morrow; but being turned out of
+the house, that was the bayonet thrust to the old lady. So you run in
+and put her heart at rest about it. Tell her that she may live and die
+in this house for Jean Raynal; and tell her about the old woman in the
+Rue Quincampoix.”
+
+“God bless you, Jean Raynal!” cried Josephine, clasping her hands.
+
+“Are you going?” said he, peremptorily.
+
+“Oh, yes!” and she darted towards the chateau.
+
+But when she had taken three steps she paused, and seemed irresolute.
+She turned, and in a moment she had glided to Raynal again and had taken
+his hand before he could hinder her, and pressed two velvet lips on it,
+and was away again, her cheeks scarlet at what she had done, and her wet
+eyes beaming with joy. She skimmed the grass like a lapwing; you would
+have taken her at this minute for Rose, or for Virgil’s Camilla; at the
+gate she turned an instant and clasped her hands together, with such a
+look, to show Raynal she blessed him again, then darted into the house.
+
+“Aha, my lady,” said he, as he watched her fly, “behold you changed a
+little since you came out.” He was soon on the high road marching
+down to the town at a great rate, his sword clanking, and thus ran his
+thoughts: “This does one good; you are right, my old woman. Your son’s
+bosom feels as warm as toast. Long live the five-franc pieces! And they
+pretend money cannot make a fellow happy. They lie; it is because they
+do not know how to spend it.”
+
+Meantime at the chateau, as still befalls in emergencies and trials,
+the master spirit came out and took its real place. Rose was now the
+mistress of Beaurepaire; she set Jacintha, and Dard, and the doctor,
+to pack up everything of value in the house. “Do it this moment!” she
+cried; “once that notary gets possession of the house, it may be too
+late. Enough of folly and helplessness. We have fooled away house and
+lands; our movables shall not follow them.”
+
+The moment she had set the others to work, she wrote a single line to
+Riviere to tell him the chateau and lands were sold, and would he come
+to Beaurepaire at once? She ran with it herself to Bigot’s auberge, the
+nearest post-office, and then back to comfort her mother.
+
+The baroness was seated in her arm-chair, moaning and wringing her
+hands, and Rose was nursing and soothing her, and bathing her temples
+with her last drop of eau de Cologne, and trying in vain to put some of
+her own courage into her, when in came Josephine radiant with happiness,
+crying “Joy! joy! joy!” and told her strange tale, with this difference,
+that she related her own share in it briefly and coldly, and was more
+eloquent than I about the strange soldier’s goodness, and the interest
+her mother had awakened in his heart. And she told about the old woman
+in the Rue Quincampoix, her rugged phrases, and her noble, tender heart.
+The baroness, deaf to Rose’s consolations, brightened up directly at
+Josephine’s news, and at her glowing face, as she knelt pouring the good
+news, and hope, and comfort, point blank into her. But Rose chilled them
+both.
+
+“It is a generous offer,” said, she, “but one we cannot accept. We
+cannot live under so great an obligation. Is all the generosity to be on
+the side of this Bonapartist? Are we noble in name only? What would our
+father have said to such a proposal?”
+
+Josephine hung her head. The baroness groaned.
+
+“No, mother,” continued Rose; “let house and land go, but honor and true
+nobility remain.”
+
+“What shall I do? you are cruel to me, Rose.”
+
+“Mamma,” cried the enthusiastic girl, “we need depend on no one.
+Josephine and I have youth and spirit.”
+
+“But no money.”
+
+“We have plenty of jewels, and pictures, and movables. We can take a
+farm.”
+
+“A farm!” shrieked the baroness.
+
+“Why, his uncle has a farm, and we have had recourse to him for help:
+better a farmhouse than an almshouse, though that almshouse were a
+palace instead of a chateau.”
+
+Josephine winced and held up her hand deprecatingly. The baroness paled:
+it was a terrible stroke of language to come from her daughter. She said
+sternly, “There is no answer to that. We were born nobles, let us die
+farmers: only permit me to die first.”
+
+“Forgive me, mother,” said Rose, kneeling. “I was wrong; it is for me
+to obey you, not to dictate. I speak no more.” And, after kissing her
+mother and Josephine, she crept away, but she left her words sticking in
+both their consciences.
+
+“HIS uncle,” said the shrewd old lady. “She is no longer a child; and
+she says his uncle. This makes me half suspect it is her that dear
+boy--Josephine, tell me the truth, which of you is it?”
+
+“Dear mother, who should it be? they are nearly of an age: and what man
+would not love our sweet Rose, that had eyes or a heart?”
+
+The baroness sighed deeply; and was silent. After awhile she said, “The
+moment they have a lover, he detaches their hearts from their poor old
+mother. She is no longer what my Josephine is to me.”
+
+“Mamma, she is my superior. I see it more and more every day. She is
+proud: she is just; she looks at both sides. As for me, I am too apt to
+see only what will please those I love.”
+
+“And that is the daughter for me,” cried the poor baroness, opening her
+arms wide to her.
+
+The next morning when they were at breakfast, in came Jacintha to say
+the officer was in the dining-room and wanted to speak with the young
+lady he talked to yesterday. Josephine rose and went to him. “Well,
+mademoiselle,” said he gayly, “the old woman was right. Here I have just
+got my orders to march: to leave France in a month. A pretty business
+it would have been if I had turned your mother out. So you see there is
+nothing to hinder you from living here.”
+
+“In your house, sir?”
+
+“Why not, pray?”
+
+“Forgive us. But we feel that would be unjust to you, humiliating to us:
+the poor are sometimes proud.”
+
+“Of course they are,” said Raynal: “and I don’t want to offend your
+pride. Confound the house: why did I go and buy it? It is no use to
+me except to give pain to worthy people.” He then, after a moment’s
+reflection, asked her if the matter could not be arranged by some third
+party, a mutual friend. “Then again,” said he, “I don’t know any friend
+of yours.”
+
+“Yes, sir,” said Josephine; “we have one friend, who knows you, and
+esteems you highly.”
+
+She wanted to name Edouard; but she hesitated, and asked her conscience
+if it was fair to name him: and while she blushed and hesitated, lo and
+behold a rival referee hove in sight. Raynal saw him, suddenly opened a
+window, and shouted, “Hallo come in here: you are wanted.”
+
+Perrin had ridden up to complete the exodus of the De Beaurepaires, and
+was strolling about inspecting the premises he had expelled them from.
+
+Here was a pretty referee!
+
+Josephine almost screamed--“What are you doing? that is our enemy, our
+bitterest enemy. He has only sold you the estate to spite us, not for
+the love of you. I had--we had--we mortified his vanity. It was not our
+fault: he is a viper. Sir, pray, pray, pray be on your guard against his
+counsels.”
+
+These words spoken with rare fire and earnestness carried conviction:
+but it was too late to recall the invitation. The notary entered the
+room, and was going to bow obsequiously to Raynal, when he caught sight
+of Josephine, and almost started. Raynal, after Josephine’s warning, was
+a little at a loss how to make him available; and even that short delay
+gave the notary’s one foible time to lead him into temptation. “Our
+foibles are our manias.”
+
+“So,” said he, “you have taken possession, commandant. These military
+men are prompt, are they not, mademoiselle?”
+
+“Do not address yourself to me, sir, I beg,” said Josephine quietly.
+
+Perrin kept his self-command. “It is only as Commandant Raynal’s agent
+I presume to address so distinguished a lady: in that character I must
+inform you that whatever movables you have removed are yours: those we
+find in the house on entering we keep.”
+
+“Come, come, not so fast,” cried Raynal; “bother the chairs and tables!
+that is not the point.”
+
+“Commandant,” said the notary with dignity, “have I done anything to
+merit this? have I served your interests so ill that you withdraw your
+confidence from me?”
+
+“No, no, my good fellow; but you exceed your powers. Just now I want you
+to take orders, not give them.”
+
+“That is only just,” said Perrin, “and I recall my hasty remark: excuse
+the susceptibility of a professional man, who is honored with the esteem
+of his clients; and favor me with your wishes.”
+
+“All right,” said Raynal heartily. “Well, then--I want mademoiselle
+and her family to stay here while I go to Egypt with the First Consul.
+Mademoiselle makes difficulties; it offends her delicacy.”
+
+“Comedy!” said the notary contemptuously.
+
+“Though her mother’s life depends on her staying here.”
+
+“Comedy!” said Perrin. Raynal frowned.
+
+“Her pride (begging her pardon) is greater than her affection.”
+
+“Farce!”
+
+“I have pitched upon you to reconcile the two.”
+
+“Then you have pitched upon the wrong man,” said Perrin bluntly. He
+added obsequiously, “I am too much your friend. She has been talking you
+over, no doubt; but you have a friend, an Ulysses, who is deaf to the
+siren’s voice. I will be no party to such a transaction. I will not
+co-operate to humbug my friend and rob him of his rights.”
+
+If Josephine was inferior to the notary in petty sharpness, she was
+his superior in the higher kinds of sagacity; and particularly in
+instinctive perception of character. Her eye flashed with delight at the
+line Perrin was now taking with Raynal. The latter speedily justified
+her expectations: he just told Perrin to be off, and send him a more
+accommodating notary.
+
+“A more accommodating notary!” screamed Perrin, stung to madness by
+this reproach. “There is not a more accommodating notary in Europe.
+Ungrateful man! is this the return for all my zeal, my integrity, my
+unselfishness? Is there another agent in the world who would have let
+such a bargain as Beaurepaire fall into your hands? It serves me right
+for deviating from the rules of business. Send me another agent--oh!”
+
+The honest soldier was confused. The lawyer’s eloquence overpowered
+him. He felt guilty. Josephine saw his simplicity, and made a cut with
+a woman’s two-edged sword. “Sir,” said she coolly, “do you not see it is
+an affair of money? This is his way of saying, Pay me handsomely for so
+unusual a commission.”
+
+“And I’ll pay him double,” cried Raynal, catching the idea; “don’t be
+alarmed, I’ll pay you for it.”
+
+“And my zeal, my devotion?”
+
+“Put ‘em in figures.”
+
+“And my prob--?”
+
+“Add it up.”
+
+“And my integ--?”
+
+“Add them together: and don’t bother me.”
+
+“I see! I see! my poor soldier. You are no match for a woman’s tongue.”
+
+“Nor, for a notary’s. Go to h---, and send in your bill!” roared the
+soldier in a fury. “Well, will you go?” and he marched at him.
+
+The notary scuttled out, with something between a snarl and a squeak.
+
+Josephine hid her face in her hands.
+
+“What is the matter with you?” inquired Raynal. “Not crying again,
+surely!”
+
+“Me! I never cry--hardly. I hid my face because I could not help
+laughing. You frightened me, sir,” said she: then very demurely, “I was
+afraid you were going to beat him.”
+
+“No, no; a good soldier never leathers a civilian if he can possibly
+help it; it looks so bad; and before a lady!”
+
+“Oh, I would have forgiven you, monsieur,” said Josephine benignly, and
+something like a little sun danced in her eye.
+
+“Now, mademoiselle, since my referee has proved a pig, it is your turn.
+Choose you a mutual friend.”
+
+Josephine hesitated. “Ours is so young. You know him very well. You
+are doubtless the commandant of whom I once heard him speak with such
+admiration: his name is Riviere, Edouard Riviere.”
+
+“Know him? he is my best officer, out and out.” And without a moment’s
+hesitation he took Edouard’s present address, and accepted that youthful
+Daniel as their referee; then looked at his watch and marched off to his
+public duties with sabre clanking at his heels.
+
+The notary went home gnashing his teeth. His sweet revenge was turned to
+wormwood this day. Raynal’s parting commissions rang in his ear; in his
+bitter mood the want of logical sequence in the two orders disgusted
+him.
+
+So he inverted them.
+
+He sent in a thundering bill the very next morning, but postponed the
+other commission till his dying day.
+
+As for Josephine, she came into the drawing-room beaming with love
+and happiness, and after kissing both her mother and Rose with gentle
+violence, she let them know the strange turn things had taken.
+
+And she whispered to Rose, “Only think, YOUR Edouard to be OUR referee!”
+
+Rose blushed and bent over her work; and wondered how Edouard would
+discharge so grave an office.
+
+The matter approached a climax; for, as the reader is aware, Edouard was
+hourly expected at Beaurepaire.
+
+He did not come; but it was not his fault. On receiving Rose’s letter he
+declined to stay another hour at his uncle’s.
+
+He flung himself on his horse; and, before he was well settled on the
+stirrups, the animal shied violently at a wheelbarrow some fool had left
+there; and threw Edouard on the stones of the courtyard. He jumped up in
+a moment and laughed at Marthe’s terror; meantime a farm-servant caught
+the nag and brought him back to his work.
+
+But when Edouard went to put his hand on the saddle, he found it would
+not obey him. “Wait a minute,” said he; “my arm is benumbed.”
+
+“Let me see!” said the farmer, and examined the limb himself; “benumbed?
+yes; and no wonder. Jacques, get on the brute and ride for the surgeon.”
+
+“Are you mad, uncle?” cried Edouard. “I can’t spare my horse, and I want
+no surgeon; it will be well directly.”
+
+“It will be worse before it is better.”
+
+“I don’t know what you mean, uncle; it is only numbed, ah! it hurts when
+I rub it.”
+
+“It is worse than numbed, boy; it is broken.”
+
+“Broken? nonsense:” and he looked at it in piteous bewilderment: “how
+can it be broken? it does not hurt except when I touch it.”
+
+“It WILL hurt: I know all about it. I broke mine fifteen years ago: fell
+off a haystack.”
+
+“Oh, how unfortunate I am!” cried Edouard, piteously. “But I will go to
+Beaurepaire all the same. I can have the thing mended there, as well as
+here.”
+
+“You will go to bed,” said the old man, quietly; “that is where YOU’LL
+go.”
+
+“I’ll go to blazes sooner,” yelled the young one.
+
+The old man made a signal to his myrmidons, whom Marthe’s cries had
+brought around, and four stout fellows took hold of Edouard by the legs
+and the left shoulder and carried him up-stairs raging and kicking; and
+deposited him on a bed.
+
+Presently he began to feel faint, and so more reasonable. They cut his
+coat off, and put him in a loose wrapper, and after considerable delay
+the surgeon came, and set his arm skilfully, and behold this ardent
+spirit caged. He chafed and fretted sadly. Fortitude was not his forte.
+
+It was two days after his accident. He was lying on his back, environed
+by slops and cursing his evil fate, and fretting his soul out of its
+fleshly prison, when suddenly he heard a cheerful trombone saying three
+words to Marthe, then came a clink-clank, and Marthe ushered into the
+sickroom the Commandant Raynal. The sick man raised himself in bed, with
+great surprise and joy.
+
+“O commandant! this is kind to come and see your poor officer in
+purgatory.”
+
+“Ah,” cried Raynal, “you see I know what it is. I have been chained down
+by the arm, and the leg, and all: it is deadly tiresome.”
+
+“Tiresome! it is--it is--oh, dear commandant, Heaven bless you for
+coming!”
+
+“Ta! ta! ta! I am come on my own business.”
+
+“All the better. I have nothing to do; that is what kills me. I’m eating
+my own heart.”
+
+“Cannibal! Well, my lad, since you are in that humor, cheer up, for I
+bring you a job, and a tough one; it has puzzled me.”
+
+“What is it, commandant? What is it?”
+
+“Well, do you know a house and a family called Beaurepaire?”
+
+“Do I know Beaurepaire?”
+
+And the pale youth turned very red; and stared with awe at this wizard
+of a commandant. He thought he was going to be called over the coals for
+frequenting a disaffected family. “Well,” said Raynal, “I have been and
+bought this Beaurepaire.”
+
+Edouard uttered a loud exclamation. “It was YOU bought it! she never
+told me that.”
+
+“Yes,” said Raynal, “I am the culprit; and we have fixed on you to undo
+my work without hurting their pride too much, poor souls; but let us
+begin with the facts.”
+
+Then Raynal told him my story after his fashion. Of course I shall not
+go and print his version; you might like his concise way better than my
+verbose; and I’m not here to hold up any man’s coat-tails. Short as he
+made it, Edouard’s eyes were moist more than once; and at the end he
+caught Raynal’s hand and kissed it. Then he asked time to reflect;
+“for,” said he, “I must try and be just.”
+
+“I’ll give you an hour,” said Raynal, with an air of grand munificence.
+The only treasure he valued was time.
+
+In less than an hour Edouard had solved the knot, to his entire
+satisfaction; he even gave the commandant particular instructions for
+carrying out his sovereign decree. Raynal received these orders from
+his subordinate with that simplicity which formed part of his amazing
+character, and rode home relieved of all responsibility in the matter.
+
+
+COMMANDANT RAYNAL TO MADEMOISELLE DE BEAUREPAIRE.
+
+Mademoiselle,--Before I could find time to write to our referee, news
+came in that he had just broken his arm;--
+
+“Oh! oh, dear! our poor Edouard!”
+
+And if poor Edouard had seen the pale faces, and heard the faltering
+accents, it would have reconciled him to his broken arm almost. This
+hand-grenade the commandant had dropped so coolly among them, it was a
+long while ere they could recover from it enough to read the rest of the
+letter,--
+
+So I rode over to him, and found him on his back, fretting for want of
+something to do. I told him the whole story. He undertook the business.
+I have received his instructions, and next week shall be at his quarters
+to clear off his arrears of business, and make acquaintance with all
+your family, if they permit.
+
+RAYNAL.
+
+
+As the latter part of this letter seemed to require a reply, the
+baroness wrote a polite note, and Jacintha sent Dard to leave it for the
+commandant at Riviere’s lodgings. But first they all sat down and wrote
+kind and pitying and soothing letters to Edouard. Need I say these
+letters fell upon him like balm?
+
+They all inquired carelessly in their postscripts what he had decided
+as their referee. He replied mysteriously that they would know that in
+a week or two. Meantime, all he thought it prudent to tell them was that
+he had endeavored to be just to both parties.
+
+“Little solemn puppy,” said Rose, and was racked with curiosity.
+
+Next week Raynal called on the baroness. She received him alone. They
+talked about Madame Raynal. The next day he dined with the whole party,
+and the commandant’s manners were the opposite of what the baroness
+had inculcated. But she had a strong prejudice in his favor. Had her
+feelings been the other way his brusquerie would have shocked her. It
+amused her. If people’s hearts are with you, THAT for their heads!
+
+He came every day for a week, chatted with the baroness, walked with the
+young ladies; and when after work he came over in the evening, Rose
+used to cross-examine him, and out came such descriptions of battles and
+sieges, such heroism and such simplicity mixed, as made the evening pass
+delightfully. On these occasions the young ladies fixed their glowing
+eyes on him, and drank in his character as well as his narrative, in
+which were fewer “I’s” than in anything of the sort you ever read or
+heard.
+
+At length Rose contrived to draw him aside, and, hiding her curiosity
+under feigned nonchalance, asked him what the referee had decided. He
+told her that was a secret for the present.
+
+“Well, but,” said Rose, “not from me. Edouard and I have no secrets.”
+
+“Come, that’s good,” said Raynal. “Why, you are the very one he warned
+me against the most; said you were as curious as Mother Eve, and as
+sharp as her needle.”
+
+“Then he is a little scurrilous traitor,” cried Rose, turning very red.
+“So that is how he talks of me behind my back, and calls me an angel to
+my face; I’ll pay him for this. Do tell me, commandant; never mind what
+HE says.”
+
+“What! disobey orders?”
+
+“Orders? to you from that boy!”
+
+“Oh!” said Raynal, “for that matter, we soldiers are used to command one
+moment, and obey the next.”
+
+In a word, this military pedant was impracticable, and Rose gave him up
+in disgust, and began to call up a sulky look when the other two sang
+his praises. For the old lady pronounced him charming, and Josephine
+said he was a man of crystal; never said a word he did not mean, and
+she wished she was like him. But the baroness thought this was going a
+little too far.
+
+“No, thank you,” said she hastily; “he is a man, a thorough man. He
+would make an intolerable woman. A fine life if one had a parcel of
+women about, all blurting out their real minds every moment, and never
+smoothing matters.”
+
+“Mamma, what a horrid picture!” chuckled Rose.
+
+She then proposed that at his next visit they should all three make an
+earnest appeal to him to let them know what Edouard had decided.
+
+But Josephine begged to be excused, feared it would be hardly delicate;
+and said languidly that for her part she felt they were in good hands,
+and prescribed patience. The baroness acquiesced, and poor Rose and her
+curiosity were baffled on every side.
+
+At last, one fine day, her torments were relieved without any further
+exertion on her part. Jacintha bounced into the drawing-room with a
+notice that the commandant wanted to speak to Josephine a minute out in
+the Pleasaunce.
+
+“How droll he is,” said Rose; “fancy sending in for a young lady like
+that. Don’t go, Josephine; how, he would stare.”
+
+“My dear, I no more dare disobey him than if I was one of his soldiers.”
+ And she laid down her work, and rose quietly to do what she was bid.
+
+“Well,” said Rose, superciliously, “go to your commanding officer. And,
+O Josephine, if you are worth anything at all, do get out of him what
+that Edouard has settled.”
+
+Josephine kissed her, and promised to try. After the first salutation,
+there was a certain hesitation about Raynal which Josephine had never
+seen a trace of in him before; so, to put him at his ease, and at the
+same time keep her promise to Rose, she asked timidly if their mutual
+friend had been able to suggest anything.
+
+“What! don’t you know that I have been acting all along upon his
+instructions?” answered Raynal.
+
+“No, indeed! and you have not told us what he advised.”
+
+“Told you? why, of course not; they were secret instructions. I
+have obeyed one set, and now I come to the other; and there is the
+difficulty, being a kind of warfare I know nothing about.”
+
+“It must be savage warfare, then,” suggested the lady politely.
+
+“Not a bit of it. Now, who would have thought I was such a coward?”
+
+Josephine was mystified; however, she made a shrewd guess. “Do you
+fear a repulse from any one of us? Then, I suppose, you meditate some
+extravagant act of generosity.”
+
+“Not I.”
+
+“Of delicacy, then.”
+
+“Just the reverse. Confound the young dog! why is he not here to help
+me?”
+
+“But, after all,” suggested Josephine, “you have only to carry out his
+instructions.”
+
+“That is true! that is true! but when a fellow is a coward, a poltroon,
+and all that sort of thing.”
+
+This repeated assertion of cowardice on the part of the living Damascus
+blade that stood bolt-upright before her, struck Josephine as so funny
+that she laughed merrily, and bade him fancy it was only a fort he
+was attacking instead of the terrible Josephine; whom none but heroes
+feared, she assured him.
+
+This encouragement, uttered in jest, was taken in earnest. The soldier
+thanked her, and rallied visibly at the comparison. “All right,” said
+he, “as you say, it is only a fort--so--mademoiselle!”
+
+“Monsieur!”
+
+“Hum! will you lend me your hand for a moment?”
+
+“My hand! what for? there,” and she put it out an inch a minute. He took
+it, and inspected it closely.
+
+“A charming hand; the hand of a virtuous woman?”
+
+“Yes,” said Josephine as cool as a cucumber, too sublimely and absurdly
+innocent even to blush.
+
+“Is it your own?”
+
+“Sir!” She blushed at that, I can tell you.
+
+“Because if it was, I would ask you to give it me. (I’ve fired the first
+shot anyway.)”
+
+Josephine whipped her hand off his palm, where it lay like cream spilt
+on a trencher.
+
+“Ah! I see; you are not free: you have a lover.”
+
+“No, no!” cried Josephine in distress; “I love nobody but my mother and
+sister: I never shall.”
+
+“Your mother,” cried Raynal; “that reminds me; he told me to ask her;
+by Jove, I think he told me to ask her first;” and Raynal up with his
+scabbard and was making off.
+
+Josephine begged him to do nothing of the kind.
+
+“I can save you the trouble,” said she.
+
+“Ah, but my instructions! my instructions!” cried the military pedant,
+and ran off into the house, and left Josephine “planted there,” as they
+say in France.
+
+Raynal demanded a private interview of the baroness so significantly
+and unceremoniously that Rose had no alternative but to retire, but not
+without a glance of defiance at the bear. She ran straight, without her
+bonnet, into the Pleasaunce to slake her curiosity at Josephine. That
+young lady was walking pensively, but turned at sight of Rose, and the
+sisters came together with a clash of tongues.
+
+“O Rose! he has”--
+
+“Oh!”
+
+So nimbly does the female mind run on its little beaten tracks, that it
+took no more than those syllables for even these innocent young women to
+communicate that Raynal had popped.
+
+Josephine apologized for this weakness in a hero. “It wasn’t his fault,”
+ said she. “It is your Edouard who set him to do it.”
+
+“My Edouard? Don’t talk in that horrid way: I have no Edouard. You said
+‘no’ of course.”
+
+“Something of the kind.”
+
+“What, did you not say ‘no’ plump?”
+
+“I did not say it brutally, dear.”
+
+“Josephine, you frighten me. I know you can’t say ‘no’ to any one; and
+if you don’t say ‘no’ plump to such a man as this, you might as well say
+‘yes.’”
+
+“Well, love,” said Josephine, “you know our mother will relieve me of
+this; what a comfort to have a mother!”
+
+They waited for Raynal’s departure, to go to the baroness. They had
+to wait a long time. Moreover, when he did leave the chateau he came
+straight into the Pleasaunce. At sight of him Rose seized Josephine
+tight and bade her hold her tongue, as she could not say “no” plump
+to any one. Josephine was far from raising any objection to the
+arrangement.
+
+“Monsieur,” said Rose, before he could get a word out, “even if she had
+not declined, I could not consent.”
+
+Raynal tapped his forehead reflectively, and drew forth from memory that
+he had no instructions whatever to ask HER consent.
+
+She colored high, but returned to the charge.
+
+“Is her own consent to be dispensed with too? She declined the honor,
+did she not?”
+
+“Of course she did; but this was anticipated in my instructions. I am to
+be sure and not take the first two or three refusals.”
+
+“O Josephine, look at that insolent boy: he has found you out.”
+
+“Insolent boy!” cried Raynal; “why, it is the referee of your own
+choosing, and as well behaved a lad as ever I saw, and a zealous
+officer.”
+
+“My kind friends,” put in Josephine with a sweet languor, “I cannot let
+you quarrel about a straw.”
+
+“It is not about a straw,” said Raynal, “it is about you.”
+
+“The distinction involves a compliment, sir,” said Josephine; then she
+turned to Rose, “Is it possible you do not see Monsieur Raynal’s strange
+proposal in its true light? and you so shrewd in general. He has no
+personal feeling whatever in this eccentric proceeding: he wants to make
+us all happy, especially my mother, without seeming to lay us under too
+great an obligation. Surely good-nature was never carried so far before;
+ha, ha! Monsieur, I will encumber you with my friendship forever, if you
+permit me, but farther than that I will not abuse your generosity.”
+
+“Now look here, mademoiselle,” began Raynal bluntly, “I did start with
+a good motive at first, that there’s no denying. But, since I have been
+every day in your company, and seen how good and kind you are to all
+about you, I have turned selfish; and I say to myself, what a comfort
+such a wife as you would be to a soldier! Why, only to have you to
+write letters home to, would be worth half a fellow’s pay. Do you know
+sometimes when I see the fellows writing their letters it gives me a
+knock here to think I have no one at all to write to.”
+
+Josephine sighed.
+
+“So you see I am not so mighty disinterested. Now, mademoiselle, you
+speak so charmingly, I can’t tell what you mean: can’t tell whether
+you say ‘no’ because you could never like me, or whether it is out of
+delicacy, and you only want pressing. So I say no more at present: it is
+a standing offer. Take a day to consider. Take two if you like. I must
+go to the barracks; good-day.”
+
+“Oh! this must be put an end to at once,” said Rose.
+
+“With all my heart,” replied Josephine; “but how?”
+
+“Come to our mother, and settle that,” said the impetuous sister, and
+nearly dragged the languid one into the drawing-room.
+
+To their surprise they found the baroness walking up and down the room
+with unusual alacrity for a person of her years. She no sooner caught
+sight of Josephine than she threw her arms open to her with joyful
+vivacity, and kissed her warmly. “My love, you have saved us. I am a
+happy old woman. If I had all France to pick from I could not have found
+a man so worthy of my Josephine. He is brave, he is handsome, he is
+young, he is a rising man, he is a good son, and good sons make good
+husbands--and--I shall die at Beaurepaire, shall I not, Madame the
+Commandante?”
+
+Josephine held her mother round the neck, but never spoke. After a
+silence she held her tighter, and cried a little.
+
+“What is it?” asked the baroness confidentially of Rose, but without
+showing any very profound concern.
+
+“Mamma! mamma! she does not love him.”
+
+“Love him? She would be no daughter of mine if she loved a man at sight.
+A modest woman loves her husband only.”
+
+“But she scarcely knows Monsieur Raynal.”
+
+“She knows more of him than I knew of your father when I married him.
+She knows his virtues and appreciates them. I have heard her, have
+I not, love? Esteem soon ripens into love when they are once fairly
+married.”
+
+“Mother, does her silence then tell you nothing? Her tears--are they
+nothing to you?”
+
+“Silly child! These are tears that do not scald. The sweet soul weeps
+because she now for the first time sees she will have to leave her
+mother. Alas! my eldest, it is inevitable. Mothers are not immortal.
+While they are here it is their duty to choose good husbands for their
+daughters. My youngest, I believe, has chosen for herself--like the
+nation. But for my eldest I choose. We shall see which chooses the best.
+Meantime we stay at Beaurepaire, thanks to my treasure here.”
+
+“Josephine! Josephine! you don’t say one word,” cried Rose in dismay.
+
+“What CAN I say? I love my mother and I love you. You draw me different
+ways. I want you to be both happy.”
+
+“Then if you will not speak out I must. Mother, do not deceive yourself:
+it is duty alone that keeps her silent: this match is odious to her.”
+
+“Then we are ruined. Josephine, is this match odious to you?”
+
+“Not exactly odious: but I am very, very indifferent.”
+
+“There!” cried Rose triumphantly.
+
+“There!” cried the baroness in the same breath, triumphantly. “She
+esteems his character; but his person is indifferent to her: in other
+words, she is a modest girl, and my daughter; and let me tell you, Rose,
+that but for the misfortunes of our house, both my daughters would be
+married as I was, without knowing half as much of their husbands as
+Josephine knows of this brave, honest, generous, filial gentleman.”
+
+“Well, then, since she will not speak out, I will. Pity me: I love her
+so. If this stranger, whom she does not love, takes her away from us, he
+will kill me. I shall die; oh!”
+
+Josephine left her mother and went to console Rose.
+
+The baroness lost her temper at this last stroke of opposition. “Now
+the truth comes out, Rose; this is selfishness. Do not deceive
+YOURself--selfishness!”
+
+“Mamma!”
+
+“You are only waiting to leave me yourself. Yet your eldest sister,
+forsooth, must be kept here for you,--till then.” She added more gently,
+“Let me advise you to retire to your own room, and examine your heart
+fairly. You will find there is a strong dash of egoism in all this.”
+
+“If I do”--
+
+“You will retract your opposition.”
+
+“My heart won’t let me; but I will despise myself, and be silent.”
+
+And the young lady, who had dried her eyes the moment she was accused
+of selfishness, walked, head erect, from the room. Josephine cast a
+deprecating glance at her mother. “Yes, my angel!” said the latter, “I
+was harsh. But we are no longer of one mind, and I suppose never shall
+be again.”
+
+“Oh, yes, we shall. Be patient! Mother--you shall not leave
+Beaurepaire.”
+
+The baroness colored faintly at these four last words of her daughter,
+and hung her head.
+
+Josephine saw that, and darted to her and covered her with kisses.
+
+That day the doctor scolded them both. “You have put your mother into
+a high fever,” said he; “here’s a pulse; I do wish you would be more
+considerate.”
+
+The commandant did not come to dinner as usual. The evening passed
+heavily; their hearts were full of uncertainty.
+
+“We miss our merry, spirited companion,” said the baroness with a grim
+look at Rose. Both young ladies assented with ludicrous eagerness.
+
+That night Rose came and slept with Josephine, and more than once she
+awoke with a start and seized Josephine convulsively and held her tight.
+
+Accused of egoism! at first her whole nature rose in arms against the
+charge: but, after a while, coming as it did from so revered a person,
+it forced her to serious self-examination. The poor girl said to
+herself, “Mamma is a shrewd woman. Am I after all deceiving myself?
+Would she be happy, and am I standing in the way?” In the morning she
+begged her sister to walk with her in the park, so that they might be
+safe from interruption.
+
+There, she said sadly, she could not understand her own sister. “Why are
+you so calm and cold, while am I in tortures of anxiety? Have you made
+some resolve and not confided it to your Rose?”
+
+“No, love,” was the reply; “I am scarce capable of a resolution; I am a
+mere thing that drifts.”
+
+“Let me put it in other words, then. How will this end?”
+
+“I hardly know.”
+
+“Do you mean to marry Monsieur Raynal, then? answer me that.”
+
+“No; but I should not wonder if he were to marry ME.”
+
+“But you said ‘no.’”
+
+“Yes, I said ‘no’ once.”
+
+“And don’t you mean to say it again, and again, and again, till kingdom
+come?”
+
+“What is the use? you heard him say he would not desist any the
+more, and I care too little about the matter to go on persisting, and
+persisting, and persisting.”
+
+“Why not, if he goes on pestering, and pestering, and pestering?”
+
+“Ah, he is like you, all energy, at all hours; but I have so little
+where my heart is unconcerned: he seems, too, to have a wish! I have
+none either way, and my conscience says ‘marry him!’”
+
+“Your conscience say marry one man when you love another?”
+
+“Heaven forbid! Rose, I love no one: I HAVE loved; but now my heart is
+dead and silent; only my conscience says, ‘You are the cause of all your
+mother’s trouble; you are the cause that Beaurepaire was sold. Now you
+can repair that mischief, and at the same time make a brave man happy,
+our benefactor happy.’ It is a great temptation: I hardly know why I
+said ‘no’ at all; surprise, perhaps--or to please you, pretty one.”
+
+Rose groaned: “Are you then worth so little that you would throw
+yourself away on a man who does not love you, nor want you, and is quite
+as happy single?”
+
+“No; not happy; he is only stout-hearted and good, and therefore
+content; and he is a character that it would be easy--in short, I feel
+my power here: I could make that man happy; he has nobody to write to
+even, when he is away--poor fellow!”
+
+“I shall lose all patience,” cried Rose; “you are at your old trick,
+thinking of everybody but yourself: I let you do it in trifles, but I
+love you too well to permit it when the happiness of your whole life is
+at stake. I must be satisfied on one point, or else this marriage shall
+never take place: just answer me this; if Camille Dujardin stood on one
+side, and Monsieur Raynal on the other, and both asked your hand, which
+would you take?”
+
+“That will never be. Whose? Not his whom I despise. Esteem might ripen
+into love, but what must contempt end in?”
+
+This reply gave Rose great satisfaction. To exhaust all awkward
+contingencies, she said, “One question more, and I have done. Suppose
+Camille should turn out--be not quite--what shall I say--inexcusable?”
+
+At this unlucky gush, Josephine turned pale, then red, then pale again,
+and cried eagerly, “Then all the world should not part us. Why torture
+me with such a question? Ah! you have heard something.” And in a moment
+the lava of passion burst wildly through its thin sheet of ice. “I was
+blind. This is why you would save me from this unnatural marriage.
+You are breaking the good news to me by degrees. There is no need.
+Quick--quick--let me have it. I have waited three years; I am sick of
+waiting. Why don’t you speak? Why don’t you tell me? Then I will tell
+YOU. He is alive--he is well--he is coming. It was not he those soldiers
+saw; they were so far off. How could they tell? They saw a uniform but
+not a face. Perhaps he has been a prisoner, and so could not write;
+could not come: but he is coming now. Why do you groan? why do you turn
+pale? ah! I see; I have once more deceived myself. I was mad. He I love
+is still a traitor to France and me, and I am wretched forever. Oh! that
+I were dead! oh! that I were dead! No; don’t speak to me: never mind me;
+this madness will pass as it has before, and leave me a dead thing
+among the living. Ah! sister, why did you wake me from my dream? I was
+drifting so calmly, so peacefully, so dead, and painless, drifting over
+the dead sea of the heart towards the living waters of gratitude and
+duty. I was going to make more than one worthy soul happy; and seeing
+them happy, I should have been content and useful--what am I now?--and
+comforted other hearts, and died joyful--and young. For God is good; he
+releases the meek and patient from their burdens.”
+
+With this came a flood of tears; and she leaned against a bough with her
+forehead on her arm, bowed like a wounded lily.
+
+“Accursed be that man’s name, and MY tongue if ever I utter it again in
+your hearing!” cried Rose, weeping bitterly. “You are wiser than I, and
+every way better. O my darling, dry your tears! Here he comes: look!
+riding across the park.”
+
+“Rose,” cried Josephine, hastily, “I leave all to you. Receive Monsieur
+Raynal, and decline his offer if you think proper. It is you who love me
+best. My mother would give me up for a house; for an estate, poor dear.”
+
+“I would not give you for all the world.”
+
+“I know it. I trust all to you.”
+
+“Well, but don’t go; stay and hear what I shall say.”
+
+“Oh, no; that poor man is intolerable to me NOW. Let me avoid his sight,
+and think of his virtues.”
+
+Rose was left alone, mistress of her sister’s fate. She put her head
+into her hands and filled with anxiety and sudden doubt.
+
+Like a good many more of us, she had been positive so long as the
+decision did not rest with her. But with power comes responsibility,
+with responsibility comes doubt. Easy to be an advocate in re incerta;
+hard to be the judge. And she had but a few seconds to think in; for
+Raynal was at hand. The last thing in her mind before he joined her was
+the terrible power of that base Camille over her sister. She despaired
+of curing Josephine, but a husband might. There’s such divinity doth
+hedge a husband in innocent girls’ minds.
+
+“Well, little lady,” began Raynal, “and how are you, and how is my
+mother-in-law that is to be--or is not to be, as your sister pleases;
+and how is SHE? have I frightened her away? There were two petticoats,
+and now there is but one.”
+
+“She left me to answer you.”
+
+“All the worse for me: I am not to your taste.”
+
+“Do not say that,” said Rose, almost hysterically.
+
+“Oh! it is no sacrilege. Not one in fifty likes me.”
+
+“But I do like you, sir.”
+
+“Then why won’t you let me have your sister?”
+
+“I have not quite decided that you shall not have her,” faltered poor
+Rose. She murmured on, “I dare say you think me very unkind, very
+selfish; but put yourself in my place. I love my sister as no man can
+ever love her, I know: my heart has been one flesh and one soul with
+hers all my life. A stranger comes and takes her away from me as if she
+was I don’t know what; his portmanteau; takes her to Egypt, oh! oh! oh!”
+
+Raynal comforted her.
+
+“What, do you think I am such a brute as to take that delicate creature
+about fighting with me? why, the hot sand would choke her, to begin.
+No. You don’t take my manoeuvre. I have no family; I try for a wife that
+will throw me in a mother and sister. You will live all together the
+same as before, of course; only you must let me make one of you when I
+am at home. And how often will that be? Besides, I am as likely to
+be knocked on the head in Egypt as not; you are worrying yourself for
+nothing, little lady.”
+
+He uttered the last topic of consolation in a broad, hearty, hilarious
+tone, like a trombone impregnated with cheerful views of fate.
+
+“Heaven forbid!” cried Rose: “and I will, for even I shall pray for you
+now. What you will leave her at home? forgive me for not seeing all your
+worth: of course I knew you were an angel, but I had no idea you were a
+duck. You are just the man for my sister. She likes to obey: you are all
+for commanding. So you see. Then she never thinks of herself; any other
+man but you would impose on her good-nature; but you are too generous
+to do that. So you see. Then she esteems you so highly. And one whom I
+esteem (between you and me) has chosen you for her.”
+
+“Then say yes, and have done with it,” suggested the straightforward
+soldier.
+
+“Why should I say ‘no?’ you will make one another happy some day: you
+are both so good. Any other man but you would tear her from me; but you
+are too just, too kind. Heaven will reward you. No! I will. I will give
+you Josephine: ah, my dear brother-in-law, it is the most precious thing
+I have to give in the world.”
+
+“Thank you, then. So that is settled. Hum! no, it is not quite; I
+forgot; I have something for you to read; an anonymous letter. I got it
+this morning; it says your sister has a lover.”
+
+The letter ran to this tune: a friend who had observed the commandant’s
+frequent visits at Beaurepaire wrote to warn him against traps. Both
+the young ladies of Beaurepaire were doubtless at the new proprietor’s
+service to pick and choose from. But for all that each of them had a
+lover, and though these lovers had their orders to keep out of the way
+till monsieur should be hooked, he might be sure that if he married
+either, the man of her heart would come on the scene soon after, perhaps
+be present at the wedding.
+
+In short, it was one of those poisoned arrows a coarse vindictive coward
+can shoot.
+
+It was the first anonymous letter Rose had ever seen. It almost drove
+her mad on the spot. Raynal was sorry he had let her see it.
+
+She turned red and white by turns, and gasped for breath.
+
+“Why am I not a man?--why don’t I wear a sword? I would pass it through
+this caitiff’s heart. The cowardly slave!--the fiend! for who but a
+fiend could slander an angel like my Josephine? Hooked? Oh! she will
+never marry you if she sees this.”
+
+“Then don’t let her see it: and why take it to heart like that? I don’t
+trust to the word of a man who owns that his story is a thing he dares
+not sign his name to; at all events, I shall not put his word against
+yours. But it is best to understand one another in time. I am a plain
+man, but not a soft one. I should not be an easygoing husband like some
+I see about: I’d have no wasps round my honey; if my wife took a lover I
+would not lecture THE WOMAN--what is the use?--I’d kill THE MAN then and
+there, in-doors or out, as I would kill a snake. If she took another,
+I’d send him after the first, and so on till one killed me.”
+
+“And serve the wretches right.”
+
+“Yes; but for my own sake I don’t choose to marry a woman that loves any
+other man. So tell me the plain truth; come.”
+
+Rose turned chill in her inside. “I have no lover,” she stammered. “I
+have a young fool that comes and teases me: but it is no secret. He is
+away, but why? he is on a sickbed, poor little fellow!”
+
+“But your sister? She could not have a lover unknown to you.”
+
+“I defy her. No, sir; I have not seen her speak three words to any young
+man except Monsieur Riviere this three years past.”
+
+“That is enough;” and he tore the letter quietly to atoms.
+
+Then Rose saw she could afford a little more candor. “Understand me; I
+can’t speak of what happened when I was a child. But if ever she had a
+girlish attachment, he has not followed it up, or surely I should have
+seen something of him all these years.”
+
+“Of course. Oh! as for flirtations, let them pass: a lovely girl does
+not grow up without one or two whispering some nonsense into her ear.
+Why, I myself should have flirted no doubt; but I never had the time.
+Bonaparte gives you time to eat and drink, but not to sleep or
+flirt, and that reminds me I have fifty miles to ride, so good-by,
+sister-in-law, eh?”
+
+“Adieu, brother-in-law.”
+
+Left alone, Rose had some misgivings. She had equivocated with one whose
+upright, candid nature ought to have protected him: but an enemy had
+accused Josephine; and it came so natural to shield her. “Did he really
+think I would expose my own sister?” said she to herself, angrily. Was
+not this anger secret self-discontent?
+
+
+“Well, love,” said Josephine, demurely, “have you dismissed him?”
+
+“No.”
+
+Josephine smiled feebly. “It is easy to say ‘say no;’ but it is not so
+easy to say ‘no,’ especially when you feel you ought to say ‘yes,’ and
+have no wish either way except to give pleasure to others.”
+
+“But I am not such skim milk as all that,” replied Rose: “I have always
+a strong wish where you are concerned, and your happiness. I hesitated
+whilst I was in doubt, but I doubt no longer: I have had a long talk
+with him. He has shown me his whole heart: he is the best, the noblest
+of creatures: he has no littleness or meanness. And then he is a
+thorough man; I know that by his being the very opposite of a woman in
+his ways. Now you are a thorough woman, and so you will suit one another
+to a T. I have decided: so no more doubts, love; no more tears; no more
+disputes. We are all of one mind, and I do think I have secured your
+happiness. It will not come in a day, perhaps, but it will come. So then
+in one little fortnight you marry Monsieur Raynal.”
+
+“What!” said Josephine, “you have actually settled that?”
+
+“Yes.”
+
+“But are you sure I can make him as happy as he deserves?”
+
+“Positive.”
+
+“I think so too; still”--
+
+“It is settled, dear,” said Rose soothingly.
+
+“Oh, the comfort of that! you relieve me of a weight; you give me peace.
+I shall have duties; I shall do some good in the world. They were all
+for it but you before, were they not?”
+
+“Yes, and now I am strongest for it of them all. Josephine, it is
+settled.”
+
+Josephine looked at her for a moment in silence, then said eagerly,
+“Bless you, dear Rose; you have saved your sister;” then, after a
+moment, in a very different voice, “O Camille! Camille! why have you
+deserted me?”
+
+And with this she fell to sobbing terribly. Rose wept on her neck,
+but said nothing. She too was a woman, and felt that this was the last
+despairing cry of love giving up a hopeless struggle.
+
+They sat twined together in silence till Jacintha came to tell them it
+was close upon dinner-time; so then they hastened to dry their tears and
+wash their red eyes, for fear their mother should see what they had been
+at, and worry herself.
+
+
+“Well, mademoiselle, these two consent; but what do you say? for after
+all, it is you I am courting, and not them. Have you the courage to
+venture on a rough soldier like me?”
+
+This delicate question was put point-blank before the three ladies.
+
+“Sir,” replied Josephine timidly, “I will be as frank, as
+straightforward as you are. I thank you for the honor you do me.”
+
+Raynal looked perplexed.
+
+“And does that mean ‘yes’ or ‘no’?”
+
+“Which you please,” said Josephine, hanging her sweet head.
+
+The wedding was fixed for that day fortnight. The next morning wardrobes
+were ransacked. The silk, muslin, and lace of their prosperous days were
+looked out: grave discussions were held over each work of art. Rose was
+active, busy, fussy. The baroness threw in the weight of her judgment
+and experience.
+
+Josephine managed to smile whenever either Rose or the baroness looked
+at all fixedly at her.
+
+So glided the peaceful days. So Josephine drifted towards the haven of
+wedlock.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+
+At Bayonne, a garrison town on the south frontier of France, two
+sentinels walked lethargically, crossing and recrossing before the
+governor’s house. Suddenly their official drowsiness burst into energy;
+for a pale, grisly man, in rusty, defaced, dirty, and torn regimentals,
+was walking into the courtyard as if it belonged to him. The sentinels
+lowered their muskets, and crossed them with a clash before the gateway.
+
+The scarecrow did not start back. He stopped and looked down with a
+smile at the steel barrier the soldiers had improvised for him, then
+drew himself a little up, carried his hand carelessly to his cap, which
+was nearly in two, and gave the name of an officer in the French army.
+
+If you or I, dressed like a beggar who years ago had stolen regimentals
+and worn them down to civil garments, had addressed these soldiers with
+these very same words, the bayonets would have kissed closer, or perhaps
+the points been turned against our sacred and rusty person: but there is
+a freemasonry of the sword. The light, imperious hand that touched that
+battered cap, and the quiet clear tone of command told. The sentinels
+slowly recovered their pieces, but still looked uneasy and doubtful in
+their minds. The battered one saw this, and gave a sort of lofty smile;
+he turned up his cuffs and showed his wrists, and drew himself still
+higher.
+
+The sentinels shouldered their pieces sharp, then dropped them
+simultaneously with a clatter and ring upon the pavement.
+
+“Pass, captain.”
+
+The rusty figure rang the governor’s bell. A servant came and eyed
+him with horror and contempt. He gave his name, and begged to see the
+governor. The servant left him in the hall, and went up-stairs to tell
+his master. At the name the governor reflected, then frowned, then bade
+his servant reach him down a certain book. He inspected it. “I thought
+so: any one with him?”
+
+“No, your excellency.”
+
+“Load my pistols, put them on the table, show him in, and then order a
+guard to the door.”
+
+The governor was a stern veteran with a powerful brow, a shaggy eyebrow,
+and a piercing eye. He never rose, but leaned his chin on his hand, and
+his elbow on a table that stood between them, and eyed his visitor very
+fixedly and strangely. “We did not expect to see you on this side the
+Pyrenees,” said he gravely.
+
+“Nor I myself, governor.”
+
+“What do you come for?”
+
+“A suit of regimentals, and money to take me to Paris.”
+
+“And suppose, instead of that, I turn out a corporal’s guard, and bid
+them shoot you in the courtyard?”
+
+“It would be the drollest thing you ever did, all things considered,”
+ said the other coolly, but bitterly.
+
+The governor looked for the book he had lately consulted, found the
+page, handed it to the rusty officer, and watched him keenly: the blood
+rushed all over his face, and his lip trembled; but his eye dwelt stern
+yet sorrowful on the governor.
+
+“I have read your book, now read mine.” He drew off his coat and showed
+his wrists and arms, blue and waled. “Can you read that, sir?”
+
+“No.”
+
+“All the better for you: Spanish fetters, general.” He showed a white
+scar on his shoulder. “Can you read that? This is what I cut out of it,”
+ and he handed the governor a little round stone as big and almost as
+regular as a musket-ball.
+
+“Humph! that could hardly have been fired from a French musket.”
+
+“Can you read this?” and he showed him a long cicatrix on his other arm.
+
+“Knife I think,” said the governor.
+
+“You are right, sir: Spanish knife. Can you read this?” and opening his
+bosom he showed a raw wound on his breast.
+
+“Oh, the devil!” cried the governor.
+
+The wounded man put his rusty coat on again, and stood erect, and
+haughty, and silent.
+
+The general eyed him, and saw his great spirit shining through this man.
+The more he looked the less could the scarecrow veil the hero from his
+practised eye. He said there must be some mistake, or else he was in
+his dotage; after a moment’s hesitation, he added, “Be seated, if you
+please, and tell me what you have been doing all these years.”
+
+“Suffering.”
+
+“Not all the time, I suppose.”
+
+“Without intermission.”
+
+“But what? suffering what?”
+
+“Cold, hunger, darkness, wounds, solitude, sickness, despair, prison,
+all that man can suffer.”
+
+“Impossible! a man would be dead at that rate before this.”
+
+“I should have died a dozen deaths but for one thing; I had promised her
+to live.”
+
+There was a pause. Then the old soldier said gravely, but more kindly,
+to the young one, “Tell me the facts, captain” (the first time he had
+acknowledged his visitor’s military rank).
+
+An hour had scarce elapsed since the rusty figure was stopped by the
+sentinels at the gate, when two glittering officers passed out under
+the same archway, followed by a servant carrying a furred cloak. The
+sentinels presented arms. The elder of these officers was the governor:
+the younger was the late scarecrow, in a brand-new uniform belonging to
+the governor’s son. He shone out now in his true light; the beau ideal
+of a patrician soldier; one would have said he had been born with a
+sword by his side and drilled by nature, so straight and smart, yet easy
+he was in every movement. He was like a falcon, eye and all, only, as
+it were, down at the bottom of the hawk’s eye lay a dove’s eye. That
+compound and varying eye seemed to say, I can love, I can fight: I can
+fight, I can love, as few of you can do either.
+
+The old man was trying to persuade him to stay at Bayonne, until his
+wound should be cured.
+
+“No, general, I have other wounds to cure of longer standing than this
+one.”
+
+“Well, promise me to lay up at Paris.”
+
+“General, I shall stay an hour at Paris.”
+
+“An hour in Paris! Well, at least call at the War Office and present
+this letter.”
+
+That same afternoon, wrapped in the governor’s furred cloak, the young
+officer lay at his full length in the coupe of the diligence, the whole
+of which the governor had peremptorily demanded for him, and rolled day
+and night towards Paris.
+
+He reached it worn with fatigue and fevered by his wound, but his spirit
+as indomitable as ever. He went to the War Office with the governor’s
+letter. It seemed to create some little sensation; one functionary came
+and said a polite word to him, then another. At last to his infinite
+surprise the minister himself sent down word he wished to see him; the
+minister put several questions to him, and seemed interested in him and
+touched by his relation.
+
+“I think, captain, I shall have to send to you: where do you stay in
+Paris?”
+
+“Nowhere, monsieur; I leave Paris as soon as I can find an easy-going
+horse.”
+
+“But General Bretaux tells me you are wounded.”
+
+“Not dangerously.”
+
+“Pardon me, captain, but is this prudent? is it just to yourself and
+your friends?”
+
+“Yes, I owe it to those who perhaps think me dead.”
+
+“You can write to them.”
+
+“I grudge so great, so sacred a joy to a letter. No! after all I have
+suffered I claim to be the one to tell her I have kept my word: I
+promised to live, and I live.”
+
+“HER? then I say no more, only tell me what road you take.”
+
+“The road to Brittany.”
+
+As the young officer was walking his horse by the roadside about a
+league and a half from Paris, he heard a clatter behind him, and up
+galloped an aide-de-camp and drew up alongside, bringing his horse
+nearly on his haunches.
+
+He handed him a large packet sealed with the arms of France. The other
+tore it open; and there was his brevet as colonel. His cheek flushed
+and his eye glittered with joy. The aide-de-camp next gave him a parcel:
+“Your epaulets, colonel! We hear you are going into the wilds where
+epaulets don’t grow. You are to join the army of the Rhine as soon as
+your wound is well.”
+
+“Wherever my country calls me.”
+
+“Your address, then, colonel, that we may know where to put our finger
+on a tried soldier when we want one.”
+
+“I am going to Beaurepaire.”
+
+“Beaurepaire? I never heard of it.”
+
+“You never heard of Beaurepaire? it is in Brittany, forty-five leagues
+from Paris, forty-three leagues and a half from here.”
+
+“Good! Health and honor to you, colonel.”
+
+“The same to you, lieutenant; or a soldier’s death.”
+
+The new colonel read the precious document across his horse’s mane, and
+then he was going to put one of the epaulets on his right shoulder, bare
+at present: but he reflected.
+
+“No; she should make him a colonel with her own dear hand. He put them
+in his pocket. He would not even look at them till she had seen them.
+Oh, how happy he was not only to come back to her alive, but to come
+back to her honored.”
+
+His wound smarted, his limbs ached, but no pain past or present could
+lay hold of his mind. In his great joy he remembered past suffering
+and felt present pain--yet smiled. Only every now and then he pined for
+wings to shorten the weary road.
+
+He was walking his horse quietly, drooping a little over his saddle,
+when another officer well mounted came after him and passed him at a
+hand gallop with one hasty glance at his uniform, and went tearing on
+like one riding for his life.
+
+“Don’t I know that face?” said Dujardin.
+
+He cudgelled his memory, and at last he remembered it was the face of
+an old comrade. At least it strongly reminded him of one Jean Raynal who
+had saved his life in the Arno, when they were lieutenants together.
+
+Yes, it was certainly Raynal, only bronzed by service in some hot
+country.
+
+“Ah!” thought Camille; “I suppose I am more changed than he is; for he
+certainly did not recognize me at all. Now I wonder what that fellow has
+been doing all this time. What a hurry he was in! a moment more and
+I should have hailed him. Perhaps I may fall in with him at the next
+town.”
+
+He touched his horse with the spur, and cantered gently on, for trotting
+shook him more than he could bear. Even when he cantered he had to press
+his hand against his bosom, and often with the motion a bitterer pang
+than usual came and forced the water from his eyes; and then he smiled.
+His great love and his high courage made this reply to the body’s
+anguish. And still his eyes looked straight forward as at some object
+in the distant horizon, while he came gently on, his hand pressed to his
+bosom, his head drooping now and then, smiling patiently, upon the road
+to Beaurepaire.
+
+Oh! if anybody had told him that in five days his Josephine was to be
+married; and that the bronzed comrade, who had just galloped past him,
+was to marry her!
+
+
+At Beaurepaire they were making and altering wedding-dresses. Rose was
+excited, and even Josephine took a calm interest. Dress never goes for
+nothing with her sex. The chairs and tables were covered, and the floor
+was littered. The baroness was presiding over the rites of vanity, and
+telling them what she wore at her wedding, under Louis XV., with strict
+accuracy, and what we men should consider a wonderful effort of memory,
+when the Commandant Raynal came in like a cannon-ball, without
+any warning, and stood among them in a stiff, military attitude.
+Exclamations from all the party, and then a kind greeting, especially
+from the baroness.
+
+“We have been so dull without you, Jean.”
+
+“And I have missed you once or twice, mother-in-law, I can tell you.
+Well, I have got bad news; but you must consider we live in a busy time.
+To-morrow I start for Egypt.”
+
+Loud ejaculations from the baroness and Rose. Josephine put down her
+work quietly.
+
+The baroness sighed deeply, and the tears came into her eyes. “Oh,
+you must not be down-hearted, old lady,” shouted Raynal. “Why, I am as
+likely to come back from Egypt as not. It is an even chance, to say the
+least.”
+
+This piece of consolation completed the baroness’s unhappiness. She
+really had conceived a great affection for Raynal, and her heart had
+been set on the wedding.
+
+“Take away all that finery, girls,” said she bitterly; “we shall not
+want it for years. I shall not be alive when he comes home from Egypt.
+I never had a son--only daughters--the best any woman ever had; but a
+mother is not complete without a son, and I shall never live to have one
+now.”
+
+“I hate General Bonaparte,” said Rose viciously.
+
+“Hate my general?” groaned Raynal, looking down with a sort of
+superstitious awe and wonder at the lovely vixen. “Hate the best soldier
+the world ever saw?”
+
+“What do I care for his soldiership? He has put off our wedding. For how
+many years did you say?”
+
+“No; he has put it on.”
+
+In answer to the astonished looks this excited, he explained that the
+wedding was to have been in a week, but now it must be to-morrow at ten
+o’clock.
+
+The three ladies set up their throats together. “Tomorrow?”
+
+“To-morrow. Why, what do you suppose I left Paris for yesterday? left my
+duties even.”
+
+“What, monsieur?” asked Josephine, timidly, “did you ride all that
+way, and leave your duties MERELY TO MARRY ME?” and she looked a little
+pleased.
+
+“You are worth a great deal more trouble than that,” said Raynal simply.
+“Besides, I had passed my word, and I always keep my word.”
+
+“So do I,” said Josephine, a little proudly. “I will not go from it now,
+if you insist; but I confess to you, that such a proposal staggers me;
+so sudden--no preliminaries--no time to reflect; in short, there are so
+many difficulties that I must request you to reconsider the matter.”
+
+“Difficulties,” shouted Raynal with merry disdain; “there are none,
+unless you sit down and make them; we do more difficult things than
+this every day of our lives: we passed the bridge of Arcola in thirteen
+minutes; and we had not the consent of the enemy, as we have yours--have
+we not?”
+
+Her only reply was a look at her mother, to which the baroness replied
+by a nod; then turning to Raynal, “This empressement is very flattering;
+but I see no possibility: there is an etiquette we cannot altogether
+defy: there are preliminaries before a daughter of Beaurepaire can
+become a wife.”
+
+“There used to be all that, madam,” laughed Raynal, putting her down
+good-humoredly; “but it was in the days when armies came out and touched
+their caps to one another, and went back into winter quarters. Then the
+struggle was who could go slowest; now the fight is who can go fastest.
+Time and Bonaparte wait for nobody; and ladies and other strong
+places are taken by storm, not undermined a foot a month as under Noah
+Quartorze: let me cut this short, as time is short.”
+
+He then drew a little plan of a wedding campaign. “The carriages will be
+here at 9 A.M.,” said he; “they will whisk us down to the mayor’s
+house by a quarter to ten: Picard, the notary, meets us there with the
+marriage contract, to save time; the contract signed, the mayor will do
+the marriage at quick step out of respect for me--half an hour--quarter
+past ten; breakfast in the same house an hour and a quarter:--we mustn’t
+hurry a wedding breakfast--then ten minutes or so for the old fogies to
+waste in making speeches about our virtues--my watch will come out--my
+charger will come round--I rise from the table--embrace my dear old
+mother--kiss my wife’s hand--into the saddle--canter to Paris--roll to
+Toulon--sail to Egypt. But I shall leave a wife and a mother behind
+me: they will both send me a kind word now and then; and I will write
+letters to you all from Egypt, and when I come home, my wife and I will
+make acquaintance, and we will all be happy together: and if I am killed
+out there, don’t you go and fret your poor little hearts about it; it
+is a soldier’s lot sooner or later. Besides, you will find I have taken
+care of you; nobody shall come and turn you out of your quarters,
+even though Jean Raynal should be dead; I have got to meet Picard at
+Riviere’s on that very business--I am off.”
+
+He was gone as brusquely as he came.
+
+“Mother! sister!” cried Josephine, “help me to love this man.”
+
+“You need no help,” cried the baroness, with enthusiasm, “not love him,
+we should all be monsters.”
+
+Raynal came to supper looking bright and cheerful. “No more work to-day.
+I have nothing to do but talk; fancy that.”
+
+This evening Josephine de Beaurepaire, who had been silent and
+thoughtful, took a quiet opportunity, and purred in his ear, “Monsieur!”
+
+“Mademoiselle!” rang the trombone.
+
+“Am I not to go to Egypt?”
+
+“No.”
+
+Josephine drew back at this brusque reply like a sensitive plant. But
+she returned to the attack.
+
+“But is it not a wife’s duty to be by her husband’s side to look after
+his comfort--to console him when others vex him--to soothe him when he
+is harassed?”
+
+“Her first duty is to obey him.”
+
+“Certainly.”
+
+“Well, when I am your husband, I shall bid you stay with your mother and
+sister while I go to Egypt.”
+
+“I shall obey you.”
+
+He told her bluntly he thought none the worse of her for making the
+offer; but should not accept it.
+
+
+Camille Dujardin slept that night at a roadside inn about twelve miles
+from Beaurepaire, and not more than six from the town where the wedding
+was to take place next day.
+
+It was a close race.
+
+And the racers all unconscious of each other, yet spurred impartially by
+events that were now hurrying to a climax.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+
+The next day at sharp nine two carriages were at the door.
+
+But the ladies were not ready. Thus early in the campaign did they throw
+all into disorder. For so nicely had Raynal timed the several events
+that this threw him all into confusion. He stamped backwards and
+forwards, and twisted his mustaches, and swore. This enforced
+unpunctuality was a new torture to him. Jacintha told them he was angry,
+and that made them nervous and flurried, and their fingers strayed
+wildly among hooks and eyes, and all sorts of fastenings; they were not
+ready till half-past nine. Conscious they deserved a scolding, they sent
+Josephine down first to mollify. She dawned upon the honest soldier so
+radiant, so dazzling in her snowy dress, with her coronet of pearls (an
+heirloom), and her bridal veil parted, and the flush of conscious beauty
+on her cheek, that instead of scolding her, he actually blurted out,
+“Well! by St. Denis it was worth waiting half an hour for.”
+
+He recovered a quarter of an hour by making the driver gallop. Then
+occasional shrieks issued from the carriage that held the baroness. That
+ancient lady feared annihilation: she had not come down from a galloping
+age.
+
+They drove into the town, drew up at the mayor’s house, were received
+with great ceremony by that functionary and Picard, and entered the
+house.
+
+When their carriages rattled into the street from the north side,
+Colonel Dujardin had already entered it from the south, and was riding
+at a foot’s pace along the principal street. The motion of his horse now
+shook him past endurance. He dismounted at an inn a few doors from the
+mayor’s house, and determined to do the rest of the short journey on
+foot. The landlord bustled about him obsequiously. “You are faint,
+colonel; you have travelled too far. Let me order you an excellent
+breakfast.”
+
+“No. I want a carriage; have you one?”
+
+“I have two; but, unluckily, they are both engaged for the day, and by
+people of distinction. Commandant Raynal is married to-day.”
+
+“Ah! I wish him joy,” said Camille, heartily. He then asked the landlord
+to open the window, as he felt rather faint. The landlord insisted on
+breakfast, and Camille sat down to an omelet and a bottle of red wine.
+Then he lay awhile near the window, revived by the air, and watched
+the dear little street he had not seen for years. He felt languid, but
+happy, celestially happy.
+
+She was a few doors from him, and neither knew it.
+
+A pen was put into her white hand, and in another moment she had signed
+a marriage contract.
+
+“Now to the church,” cried the baroness, gayly. To get to the church,
+they must pass by the window Camille reclined at.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+
+“Oh! there’s no time for that,” said Raynal. And as the baroness looked
+horrified and amazed, Picard explained: “The state marries its citizens
+now, with reason: since marriage is a civil contract.”
+
+“Marriage a civil contract!” repeated the baroness. “What, is it then no
+longer one of the holy sacraments? What horrible impiety shall we come
+to next? Unhappy France! Such a contract would never be a marriage in my
+eyes: and what would become of an union the Church had not blessed?”
+
+“Madame,” said Picard, “the Church can bless it still; but it is only
+the mayor here that can DO it.”
+
+All this time Josephine was blushing scarlet, and looking this way
+and that, with a sort of instinctive desire to fly and hide, no matter
+where, for a week or so.
+
+“Haw! haw! haw!” roared Raynal; “here is a pretty mother. Wants her
+daughter to be unlawfully married in a church, instead of lawfully in a
+house. Give me the will!”
+
+“Look here, mother-in-law: I have left Beaurepaire to my lawful wife.”
+
+“Otherwise,” put in Picard, “in case of death, it would pass to his
+heir-at-law.”
+
+“And HE would turn you all out, and that does not suit me. Now there
+stands the only man who can make mademoiselle my LAWFUL wife. So quick
+march, monsieur the mayor, for time and Bonaparte wait for no man.”
+
+“Stay a minute, young people,” said the mayor. “We should soothe
+respectable prejudices, not crush them. Madam, I am at least as old as
+you, and have seen many changes. I perfectly understand your feelings.”
+
+“Ah, monsieur! oh!”
+
+“Calm yourself, dear madam; the case is not so bad as you think. It is
+perfectly true that in republican France the civil magistrate alone can
+bind French citizens in lawful wedlock. But this does not annihilate the
+religious ceremony. You can ask the Church’s blessing on my work; and be
+assured you are not the only one who retains that natural prejudice. Out
+of every ten couples that I marry, four or five go to church afterwards
+and perform the ancient ceremonies. And they do well. For there before
+the altar the priest tells them what it is not my business to dilate
+upon--the grave moral and religious duties they have undertaken along
+with this civil contract. The state binds, but the Church still blesses,
+and piously assents to that”--
+
+“From which she has no power to dissent.”
+
+“Monsieur Picard, do you consider it polite to interrupt the chief
+magistrate of the place while he is explaining the law to a citizen?”
+
+(This closed Picard.)
+
+“I married a daughter last year,” continued the worthy mayor.
+
+“What, after this fashion?”
+
+“I married her myself, as I will marry yours, if you will trust me with
+her. And after I have made them one, there is nothing to prevent them
+adjourning to the church.”
+
+“I beg your pardon,” cried Raynal, “there are two things to prevent it:
+a couple that wait for no man: Time and Bonaparte. Come, sir; marry us,
+and have done with it.”
+
+The mayor assented. He invited Josephine to stand before him. She
+trembled and wept a little: Rose clung to her and wept, and the good
+mayor married the parties off hand.
+
+“Is that all?” asked the baroness; “it is terribly soon done.”
+
+“It is done effectively, madam,” said the mayor, with a smile. “Permit
+me to tell you that his Holiness the Pope cannot undo my work.”
+
+Picard grinned slyly, and whispered something into Raynal’s ear.
+
+“Oh! indeed,” said Raynal aloud and carelessly. “Come, Madame Raynal, to
+breakfast: follow us, the rest of you.”
+
+They paired, and followed the bride and bridegroom into the
+breakfast-room.
+
+
+The light words Picard whispered were five in number.
+
+Now if the mayor had not snubbed Picard just before, he would have
+uttered those jocose but true words aloud. There was no particular
+reason why he should not. And if he had,--The threads of the web of
+life, how subtle they are! The finest cotton of Manchester, the finer
+meshes of the spider, seem three-inch cables by comparison with those
+moral gossamers which vulgar eyes cannot see at all, the “somethings,
+nothings,” on which great fates have hung.
+
+It was a cheerful breakfast, thanks to Raynal, who would be in high
+spirits, and would not allow a word of regret from any one. Madame
+Raynal sat by his side, looking up at him every now and then with
+innocent admiration. A merry wedding breakfast.
+
+But if men and women could see through the walls of houses!
+
+Two doors off sat the wounded colonel alone, recruiting the small
+remnant of his sore tried strength, that he might struggle on to
+Beaurepaire, and lose in one moment years of separation, pain, prison,
+anguish, martyrdom, in one great gush of joy without compare.
+
+
+The wedding breakfast was ended. The time was drawing near to part.
+There was a silence. It was broken by Madame Raynal. She asked Raynal
+very timidly if he had reflected. “On what?” said he.
+
+“About taking me to Egypt.”
+
+“No: I have not given it a thought since I said ‘no.’”
+
+“Yet permit me to say that it is my duty to be by your side, my
+husband.” And she colored at this word, being the first time she had
+ever used it. Raynal was silent. She murmured on, “I would not be an
+encumbrance to you, sir: I should not be useless. Gentlemen, I could add
+more to his comfort than he gives me credit for.”
+
+Warm assent of the mayor and notary to this hint.
+
+“I give you credit for being an angel,” said Raynal warmly.
+
+He hesitated. Rose was trembling, her fork shaking in her poor little
+hand.
+
+She cast a piteous glance at him. He saw it.
+
+“You shall go with me next time,” said he. “Let us speak of it no more.”
+
+Josephine bowed her head. “At least give me something to do for you
+while you are away. Tell me what I can do for my absent friend to show
+my gratitude, my regard, my esteem.”
+
+“Well, let me think. I saw a plain gray dress at Beaurepaire.”
+
+“Yes, monsieur. My gray silk, Rose.”
+
+“I like that dress.”
+
+“Do you? Then the moment I reach home after losing you I shall put it
+on, and it shall be my constant wear. I see; you are right; gray becomes
+a wife whose husband is not dead, but is absent, and alas! in hourly
+danger.”
+
+“Now look at that!” cried Raynal to the company. “That is her all
+over: she can see six meanings where another would see but one. I never
+thought of that, I swear. I like modest colors, that is all. My mother
+used to be all for modest wives wearing modest colors.”
+
+“I am of her mind, sir. Is there nothing more difficult you will be so
+good as give me to do?”
+
+“No; there is only one order more, and that will be easier still to such
+a woman as you. I commit to your care the name of Raynal. It is not
+so high a name as yours, but it is as honest. I am proud of it: I am
+jealous of it. I shall guard it for you in Egypt: you guard it in France
+for me.”
+
+“With my life,” cried Josephine, lifting her eyes and her hand to
+heaven.
+
+Soon after this Raynal ordered his charger.
+
+The baroness began to cry. “The young people may hope to see you again,”
+ said she; “but there are two chances against your poor old mother.”
+
+“Courage, mother!” cried the stout soldier. “No, no; you won’t play me
+such a trick: once is enough for that game.”
+
+“Brother!” cried Rose, “do not go without kissing your little sister,
+who loves you and thanks you.” He kissed her. “Bravo, generous soul!”
+ she cried, with her arms round his neck. “God protect you, and send you
+back safe to us!”
+
+“Amen!” cried all present by one impulse, even the cold notary.
+
+Raynal’s mustache quivered. He kissed Josephine hastily on the brow, the
+baroness on both cheeks; shook the men’s hands warmly but hastily, and
+strode out without looking behind him. He was moved for once.
+
+They all followed him to the door of the house. He was tightening his
+horse’s girths. He flung himself with all the resolution of his steel
+nature into the saddle, and, with one grand wave of his cocked hat to
+the tearful group, he spurred away for Egypt.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+
+The baroness took the doctor a-shopping; she must buy Rose a gray silk.
+In doing this she saw many other tempting things. I say no more.
+
+But the young ladies went up to Beaurepaire in the other carriage, for
+Josephine wished to avoid the gaze of the town, and get home and be
+quiet. The driver went very fast. He had drunk the bride’s health at the
+mayor’s, item the bridegroom’s, the bridesmaid’s, the mayor’s, etc.,
+and “a spur in the head is worth two in the heel,” says the proverb.
+The sisters leaned back on the soft cushions, and enjoyed the smooth and
+rapid motion once so familiar to them, so rare of late.
+
+Then Rose took her sister gently to task for having offered to go to
+Egypt. She had forgotten her poor sister.
+
+“No, love,” replied Josephine, “did you not see I dared not look towards
+you? I love you better than all the world; but this was my duty. I
+was his wife: I had no longer a feeble inclination and a feeble
+disinclination to decide between, but right on one side, wrong on the
+other.”
+
+“Oh! I know where your ladyship’s strength lies: my force is--in--my
+inclinations.”
+
+“Yes, Rose,” continued Josephine thoughtfully, “duty is a great comfort:
+it is so tangible; it is something to lay hold of for life or death; a
+strong tower for the weak but well disposed.”
+
+Rose assented, and they were silent a minute; and when she spoke again
+it was to own she loved a carriage. “How fast we glide! Now lean back
+with me, and take my hand, and as we glide shut your eyes and think:
+whisper me all your feelings, every one of them.”
+
+“Well, then,” said Josephine, half closing her eyes, “in the first
+place I feel a great calm, a heavenly calm. My fate is decided. No more
+suspense. My duties are clear. I have a husband I am proud of. There is
+no perfidy with him, no deceit, no disingenuousness, no shade. He is a
+human sun. He will make me a better, truer woman, and I him a happier
+man. Yes, is it not nice to think that great and strong as he is I can
+teach him a happiness he knows not as yet?” And she smiled with the
+sense of her delicate power, but said no more; for she was not the one
+to talk much about herself. But Rose pressed her. “Yes, go on, dear,”
+ she said, “I seem to see your pretty little thoughts rising out of your
+heart like a bubbling fountain: go on.”
+
+Thus encouraged, Josephine thought on aloud, “And then, gratitude!” said
+she. “I have heard it said, or read it somewhere, that gratitude is a
+burden: I cannot understand that sentiment; why, to me gratitude is a
+delight, gratitude is a passion. It is the warmest of all the tender
+feelings I have for dear Monsieur Raynal. I feel it glow here, in my
+bosom. I think I shall love him as I ought long before he comes back.”
+
+“BEFORE?”
+
+“Yes,” murmured Josephine, her eyes still half closed. “His virtues
+will always be present to me. His little faults of manner will not be
+in sight. Good Raynal! The image of those great qualities I revere so,
+perhaps because I fail in them myself, will be before my mind; and ere
+he comes home I shall love him dearly. I’ll tell you one reason why I
+wished to go home at once was--no--you must guess.”
+
+“Guess?” said Rose, contemptuously. “As if I did not see it was to put
+on your gray silk.”
+
+Josephine smiled assent, and said almost with fervor, “Good Raynal! I
+feel prouder of his honest name than of our noble one. And I am so calm,
+dear, thanks to you, so tranquil; so pleased that my mother’s mind is at
+rest, so convinced all is for the best, so contented with my own lot; so
+hap--py.”
+
+A gentle tear stole from beneath her long lashes. Rose looked at her
+wistfully: then laid her cheek to hers. They leaned back hand in hand,
+placid and silent.
+
+The carriage glided fast. Beaurepaire was almost in sight.
+
+Suddenly Josephine’s hand tightened on Rose’s, and she sat up in the
+carriage like a person awakened from a strange dream.
+
+“What is it?” asked Rose.
+
+“Some one in uniform.”
+
+“Oh, is that all? Ah! you thought it was a message from Raynal.”
+
+“Oh! no! on foot--walking very slowly. Coming this way, too. Coming
+this way!” and she became singularly restless, and looked round in the
+carriage. It was one of those old chariots with no side windows, but
+a peep hole at the back. This aperture, however, had a flap over it.
+Josephine undid the flap with nimble though agitated fingers; and
+saw--nothing. The road had taken a turn. “Oh,” said Rose, carelessly,
+“for that matter the roads are full of soldiers just now.”
+
+“Ay, but not of officers on foot.”
+
+Rose gave her such a look, and for the first time this many a day spoke
+sternly to her, and asked her what on earth she had to do with uniforms
+or officers except one, the noblest in the world, her husband.
+
+A month ago that word was almost indifferent to Josephine, or rather she
+uttered it with a sort of mild complacency. Now she started at it, and
+it struck chill upon her. She did not reply, however, and the carriage
+rolled on.
+
+“He seemed to be dragging himself along.” This was the first word
+Josephine had spoken for some time. “Oh, did he?” replied Rose
+carelessly; “well, let him. Here we are, at home.”
+
+“I am glad of it,” said Josephine, “very glad.”
+
+On reaching Beaurepaire she wanted to go up-stairs at once and put on
+her gray gown. But the day was so delightful that Rose begged her to
+stroll in the Pleasaunce for half an hour and watch for their mother’s
+return. She consented in an absent way, and presently began to walk very
+fast, unconscious of her companion. Rose laid a hand upon her playfully
+to moderate her, and found her skin burning.
+
+“Why, what is the matter?” said she, anxiously.
+
+“Nothing, nothing,” was the sharp reply.
+
+“There’s a fretful tone; and how excited you look, and feel too. Well, I
+thought you were unnaturally calm after such an event.”
+
+“I only saw his back,” said Josephine. “Did not you see him?”
+
+“See who? Oh, that tiresome officer. Why, how much more are we to hear
+about him? I don’t believe there WAS one.”
+
+At this moment a cocked hat came in sight, bobbing up and down above
+the palings that divided the park from the road. Josephine pointed to it
+without a word.
+
+Rose got a little cross at being practically confuted, and said coldly,
+“Come, let us go in; the only cocked hat we can see is on the way to
+Paris.”
+
+Josephine assented eagerly. But she had not taken two steps towards the
+house ere she altered her mind, and said she felt faint, she wanted air;
+no, she should stay out a little longer. “Look, Rose,” said she, in a
+strangely excited way, “what a shame! They put all manner of rubbish
+into this dear old tree: I will have it all turned out.” And she looked
+with feigned interest into the tree: but her eyes seemed turned inward.
+
+Rose gave a cry of surprise. “He is waving his hat to me! What on earth
+does that mean?”
+
+“Perhaps he takes you for me,” said Josephine.
+
+“Who is it? What do you mean?”
+
+“IT IS HE! I knew his figure at a glance.” And she blushed and trembled
+with joy; she darted behind the tree and peered round at him unseen:
+turning round a moment she found Rose at her back pale and stern. She
+looked at her, and said with terrible simplicity, “Ah, Rose, I forgot.”
+
+“Are you mad, Josephine? Into the house this moment; if it IS he, I will
+receive him and send him about his business.”
+
+But Josephine stood fascinated, and pale as ashes; for now the cocked
+hat stopped, and a pale face with eyes whose eager fire shone even at
+that distance, rose above the palings. Josephine crouched behind Rose,
+and gasped out, “Something terrible is coming, terrible! terrible!”
+
+“Say something hateful,” said Rose, trembling in her turn, but only with
+anger. “The heartless selfish traitor! He never notices you till you are
+married to the noblest of mankind; and then he comes here directly to
+ruin your peace. No; I have altered my mind. He shall not see you, of
+course; but YOU shall hear HIM. I’ll soon make you know the wretch and
+loathe him as I do. There, now he has turned the corner; hide in the
+oak while he is out of sight. Hide, quick, quick.” Josephine obeyed
+mechanically; and presently, through that very aperture whence her
+sister had smiled on her lover she hissed out, in a tone of which one
+would not have thought her capable, “Be wise, be shrewd; find out who is
+the woman that has seduced him from me, and has brought two wretches to
+this. I tell you it is some wicked woman’s doing. He loved me once.”
+
+“Not so loud!--one word: you are a wife. Swear to me you will not let
+him see you, come what may.”
+
+“Oh! never! never!” cried Josephine with terror. “I would rather die.
+When you have heard what he has to say, then tell him I am dead. No,
+tell him I adore my husband, and went to Egypt this day with him. Ah!
+would to God I had!”
+
+“Sh! sh!”
+
+“Sh!”
+
+Camille was at the little gate.
+
+Rose stood still, and nerved herself in silence. Josephine panted in her
+hiding-place.
+
+Rose’s only thought now was to expose the traitor to her sister, and
+restore her peace. She pretended not to see Camille till he was near
+her. He came eagerly towards her, his pale face flushing with great joy,
+and his eyes like diamonds.
+
+“Josephine! It is not Josephine, after all,” said he. “Why, this must be
+Rose, little Rose, grown up to a fine lady, a beautiful lady.”
+
+“What do you come here for, sir?” asked Rose in a tone of icy
+indifference.
+
+“What do I come here for? is that the way to speak to me? but I am too
+happy to mind. Dear Beaurepaire! do I see you once again!”
+
+“And madame?”
+
+“What madame?”
+
+“Madame Dujardin that is or was to be.”
+
+“This is the first I have ever heard of her,” said Camille, gayly.
+
+“This is odd, for we have heard all about it.”
+
+“Are you jesting?”
+
+“No.”
+
+“If I understand you right, you imply that I have broken faith with
+Josephine?”
+
+“Certainly.”
+
+“Then you lie, Mademoiselle Rose de Beaurepaire.”
+
+“Insolent!”
+
+“No. It is you who have insulted your sister as well as me. She was not
+made to be deserted for meaner women. Come, mademoiselle, affront me,
+and me alone, and you shall find me more patient. Oh! who would have
+thought Beaurepaire would receive me thus?”
+
+“It is your own fault. You never sent her a line for all these years.”
+
+“Why, how could I?”
+
+“Well, sir, the information you did not supply others did. We know that
+you were seen in a Spanish village drinking between two guerillas.”
+
+“That is true,” said Camille.
+
+“An honest French soldier fired at you. Why, he told us so himself.”
+
+“He told you true,” said Camille, sullenly. “The bullet grazed my hand;
+see, here is the mark. Look!” She did look, and gave a little scream;
+but recovering herself, said she wished it had gone through his heart.
+“Why prolong this painful interview?” said she; “the soldier told us
+all.”
+
+“I doubt that,” said Camille. “Did he tell you that under the table I
+was chained tight down to the chair I sat in? Did he tell you that my
+hand was fastened to a drinking-horn, and my elbow to the table, and two
+fellows sitting opposite me with pistols quietly covering me, ready to
+draw the trigger if I should utter a cry? Did he tell you that I would
+have uttered that cry and died at that table but for one thing, I had
+promised her to live?”
+
+“Not he; he told me nothing so incredible. Besides, what became of you
+all these years? You are a double traitor, to your country and to her.”
+
+Camille literally gasped for breath. “You are a most cruel young lady
+to insult me so,” said he, and scalding tears forced themselves from his
+eyes.
+
+Rose eyed him with merciless scorn.
+
+He fought manfully against this weakness, with which his wound and his
+fatigue had something to do, as well as Rose’s bitter words; and after
+a gallant struggle he returned her her haughty stare, and addressed her
+thus: “Mademoiselle, I feel myself blush, but it is for you I blush, not
+for myself. This is what BECAME of me. I went out alone to explore; I
+fell into an ambuscade; I shot one of the enemy, and pinked another,
+but my arm being broken by a bullet, and my horse killed under me, the
+rascals got me. They took me about, tried to make a decoy of me as I
+have told you, and ended by throwing me into a dungeon. They loaded me
+with chains, too, though the walls were ten feet thick, and the door
+iron, and bolted and double-bolted outside. And there for months and
+years, in spite of wounds, hunger, thirst, and all the tortures those
+cowards made me suffer, I lived, because, Rose, I had promised some one
+at that gate there (and he turned suddenly and pointed to it) that I
+would come back alive. At last, one night, my jailer came to my
+cell drunk. I seized him by the throat and throttled him till he was
+insensible; his keys unlocked my fetters, and locked him in the cell,
+and I got safely outside. But there a sentinel saw me, and fired at
+me. He missed me but ran after me, and caught me. You see I was stiff,
+confined so long. He gave me a thrust of his bayonet; I flung my heavy
+keys fiercely in his face; he staggered; I wrested his piece from him,
+and disabled him.”
+
+“Ah!”
+
+“I crossed the frontier in the night, and got to Bayonne; and thence,
+day and night, to Paris. There I met a reward for all my anguish. They
+gave me the epaulets of a colonel. See, here they are. France does not
+give these to traitors, young lady.” He held them out to her in both
+hands. She eyed them half stupidly; all her thoughts were on the
+oak-tree hard by. She began to shudder. Camille was telling the truth.
+She felt that; she saw it; and Josephine was hearing it. “Ay! look at
+them, you naughty girl,” said Camille, trying to be jocose over it all
+with his poor trembling lip. He went on to say that from the moment he
+had left dark Spain, and entered fair France everybody was so kind, so
+sympathizing. “They felt for the poor worn soldier coming back to his
+love. All but you, Rose. You told me I was a traitor to her and to
+France.”
+
+“I was told so,” said Rose, faintly. She was almost at her wits’ end
+what to say or do.
+
+“Well, are you sorry or not sorry for saying such a cruel thing to a
+poor fellow?”
+
+“Sorry, very sorry,” whispered Rose. She could not persist in injustice,
+yet she did not want Josephine to hear.
+
+“Then say no more about it; there’s my hand. You are not a soldier, and
+did not know what you were talking about.”
+
+“I am very sorry I spoke so harshly to you. But you understand. How you
+look; how you pant.”
+
+“There, I will show you I forgive you. These epaulets, dear, I have
+never put them on. I said, no; Josephine shall put them on for me. I
+will take honor as well as happiness from her dear hand. But you are her
+sister, and what are epaulets compared with what she will give me? You
+shall put them on, dear. Come, then you will be sure I bear no malice.”
+
+Rose, faint at heart, consented in silence, and fastened on the
+epaulets. “Yes, Camille!” she cried, with sudden terror, “think of
+glory, now; nothing but glory.”
+
+“No one thinks of it more. But to-day how can I think of it, how can I
+give her a rival? To-day I am all love. Rose, no man ever loved a human
+creature as I love Josephine. Your mother is well, dear? All are well
+at Beaurepaire? Oh, where is she all this time? in the house?” He was
+moving quickly towards the house; but Rose instinctively put out her
+hand to stop him. He recoiled a little and winced.
+
+“What is the matter?” cried she.
+
+“Nothing, dear girl; you put your hand on my wound, that is all. What is
+that noise in the tree? Anybody listening to us?”
+
+“I’ll see,” said Rose, with all a woman’s wit, and whipped hastily
+round to hinder Camille from going. She found Josephine white as death,
+apparently fainting, and clutching at the tree convulsively with her
+nails. Such was the intensity of the situation that she left her beloved
+sister in that piteous state, and even hoped she would faint dead away,
+and so hear no more. She came back white, and told Camille it was only a
+bird got into the tree. “And to think you should be wounded,” said she,
+to divert his attention from the tree.
+
+“Yes,” said he, “and it is rather inflamed, and has worried me all the
+way. You need not go telling Josephine, though. They wanted me to stop
+and lay up at Bayonne. How could I? And again at Paris. How could I?
+They said, ‘You will die.’--‘Not before I get to Beaurepaire,’ said I.
+I could bear the motion of a horse no longer, so at the nearest town I
+asked for a carriage. Would you believe it? both his carriages were
+OUT AT A WEDDING. I could not wait till they came back. I had waited an
+eternity. I came on foot. I dragged my self along; the body was weak,
+but the heart was strong. A little way from here my wound seemed
+inclined to open. I pressed it together tight with my hand; you see I
+could not afford to lose any more blood, and so struggled on. ‘Die?’
+said I, ‘not before Beaurepaire.’ And, O Rose! now I could be content to
+die--at her feet; for I am happy. Oh! I am happy beyond words to utter.
+What I have gone through! But I kept my word, and this is Beaurepaire.
+Hurrah!” and his pale cheek flushed, and his eye gleamed, and he waved
+his hat feebly over his head, “hurrah! hurrah! hurrah!”
+
+“Oh, don’t!--don’t!--don’t!” cried Rose wild with pity and dismay.
+
+“How can I help?--I am mad with joy--hurrah! hurrah! hurrah!”
+
+“No! no! no! no! no!”
+
+“What is the matter?”
+
+“And must I stab you worse than all your enemies have stabbed you?”
+ sighed Rose, and tears of womanly pity now streamed down her cheeks.
+
+Camille’s mind began to misgive him. What was become of Josephine? she
+did not appear. He faltered out, “Your mother is well; all are well
+I hope. Oh, where is she?” and receiving no reply, began to tremble
+visibly with the fear of some terrible calamity.
+
+Rose, with a sister fainting close by, and this poor lover trembling
+before her, lost all self-command, and began to wring her hands and cry
+wildly. “Camille,” she almost screamed, “there is but one thing for you
+to do; leave Beaurepaire on the instant: fly from it; it is no place for
+you.”
+
+“She is dead,” said Camille, very quietly.
+
+When he said that, with an unnatural and monotonous calm such as
+precedes deliberate suicide, it flashed in one moment across Rose that
+it was much best he should think so.
+
+She did not reply; but she drooped her head and let him think it.
+
+“She would have come to me ere this if she was alive,” said he. “You
+are all in white: they mourn in white for angels like her, that go to
+heaven, virgins. Oh! I was blind. You might have told me at once; you
+see I can bear it. What does it matter to one who loves as I love? It is
+only to give her one more proof I lived only for her. I would have died
+a hundred times but for my promise to her. Yes, I am coming, love; I am
+coming.”
+
+He fell on his knees and smiled, and whispered, “I am coming, Josephine,
+I am coming.”
+
+A sob and a moan as of a creature dying in anguish answered him.
+
+Rose screamed with terror when she heard it.
+
+Camille rose to his feet, awestruck. “That was her voice, behind this
+tree,” he whispered.
+
+“No, no,” cried Rose; “it was me.”
+
+But at that moment a rustle and a rush was heard of some one darting out
+of the tree.
+
+Camille darted furiously round it in the same direction. Rose tried to
+stop him, but was too late. The next moment Raynal’s wife was in his
+arms.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+
+Josephine wrestled long and terribly with nature in that old oak-tree.
+But who can so struggle forever? Anguish, remorse, horror, despair, and
+love wrenched her to and fro; and O mysterious human heart! gleams of
+a mad fitful joy shot through her, coming quick as lightning, going as
+quickly, and leaving the despair darker. And then the fierce struggle of
+the soul to make itself heard! More than once she had to close her mouth
+with her hand: more than once she seized her throat not to cry out. But
+as the struggle endured, she got weaker and weaker, and nature mightier
+and mightier. And when the wounded hero fell on his knees so close to
+her; when he who had resisted death so bravely for her, prepared to give
+up life calmly for her, her bosom rose beyond all control: it seemed to
+fill to choking, then to split wide open and give the struggling soul
+passage in one gasping sob and heart-stricken cry. Could she have pent
+this in she must have died.
+
+It betrayed her. She felt it had: so then came the woman’s
+instinct--flight: the coward’s impulse--flight: the chaste wife’s
+inspiration--flight. She rushed from her hiding-place and made wildly
+for the house.
+
+But, unluckily, Camille was at that moment darting round the tree: she
+ran right into the danger she meant to flee. He caught her in his arms.
+He held her irresistibly. “I have got her; I have got her,” he shouted
+in wild triumph. “No! I will not let you go. None but God shall ever
+take you from me, and he has spared you to me. You are not dead: you
+have kept faith as I have: you have lived. See! look at me. I am alive,
+I am well, I am happy. I told Rose that I suffered. If I had suffered
+I should remember it. It is all gone at sight of you, my love! my love!
+Oh, my Josephine! my love!”
+
+His arm was firm round her waist. His glowing eyes poured love upon her.
+She felt his beating heart.
+
+All that passed in her then, what mortal can say? She seemed two women:
+that part of her which could not get away from his strong arm lost all
+strength to resist, it yielded and thrilled under his embrace, her bosom
+heaving madly: all that was free writhed away from him; her face was
+averted with a glare of terror, and both her hands put up between his
+eyes and it.
+
+“You turn away your head. Rose, she turns away. Speak for me. Scold her;
+for I don’t know how to scold her. No answer from either; oh, what has
+turned your hearts against me so?”
+
+“Camille,” cried Rose--the tears streaming down her cheeks--“my poor
+Camille! leave Beaurepaire. Oh, leave it at once.”
+
+Returned towards her with a look of inquiry.
+
+At that Josephine, like some feeble but nimble wild creature on whom
+a grasp has relaxed, writhed away from him and got free: “Farewell!
+Farewell!” she cried, in despair’s own voice, and made swiftly for the
+house.
+
+Camille stood aghast, and did not follow her.
+
+Now ere she had gone many steps who should meet her right in front but
+Jacintha.
+
+“Madame Raynal, the baroness’s carriage is just in sight. I thought
+you’d like to know.” Then she bawled proudly to Rose, “I was the first
+to call her madame;” and off went Jacintha convinced she had done
+something very clever.
+
+This blow turned those three to stone.
+
+Josephine had no longer the power or the wish to fly. “Better so,” she
+thought, and she stood cowering.
+
+The great passions that had spoken so loud were struck dumb, and a deep
+silence fell upon the place. Madame Raynal’s quivering eye turned slowly
+and askant towards Camille, but stopped in terror ere it could see him.
+For she knew by this fearful stillness that the truth was creeping on
+Camille. And so did Rose.
+
+At last Camille spoke one word in a low whisper.
+
+“Madame?”
+
+Dead silence.
+
+“White? both in white?”
+
+Rose came between him and Josephine, and sobbed out, “Camille, it was
+our doing. We drove her to it. O sir, look how afraid of you she is. Do
+not reproach her, if you are a man.”
+
+He waved her out of his way as if she had been some idle feather, and
+almost staggered up to Josephine.
+
+“It is for you to speak, my betrothed: are you married?”
+
+The poor creature, true to her nature, was thinking more of him than
+herself. Even in her despair it flashed across her, “If he knew all, he
+too would be wretched for life. If I let him think ill of me he may be
+happy one day.” She cowered the picture of sorrow and tongue-tied guilt.
+
+“Are you a wife?”
+
+“Yes.”
+
+He winced and quivered as if a bullet had pierced him.
+
+“This is how I came to be suspected; she I loved was false.”
+
+“Yes, Camille.”
+
+“No, no!” cried Rose; “don’t believe HER: she never suspected you. We
+have brought her to this, we alone.”
+
+“Be silent, Rose! oh, be silent!” gasped Josephine.
+
+“I lived for you: I would have died for you; you could not even wait for
+me.”
+
+A low moan, but not a word of excuse.
+
+“What can I do for you now?”
+
+“Forget me, Camille,” said she despairingly, doggedly.
+
+“Forget you? never, never! there is but one thing I can do to show you
+how I loved you: I will forgive you, and begone. Whither shall I go?
+whither shall I go now?”
+
+“Camile, your words stab her.”
+
+“Let none speak but I,” said Camille; “none but I have the right to
+speak. Poor weak angel that loved yet could not wait: I forgive you. Be
+happy, if you can; I bid you be hap-py.”
+
+The quiet, despairing tones died away, and with them life seemed to end
+to her, and hope to go out. He turned his back quickly on her. He cried
+hoarsely, “To the army! Back to the army, and a soldier’s grave!”
+ Then with a prodigious effort he drew himself haughtily up in marching
+attitude. He took three strides, erect and fiery and bold.
+
+At the next something seemed to snap asunder in the great heart, and the
+worn body that heart had held up so long, rolled like a dead log upon
+the ground with a tremendous fall.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+
+The baroness and Aubertin were just getting out of their carriage, when
+suddenly they heard shrieks of terror in the Pleasaunce. They came with
+quaking hearts as fast as their old limbs would carry them. They found
+Rose and Josephine crouched over the body of a man, an officer.
+
+Rose was just tearing open his collar and jacket. Dard and Jacintha had
+run from the kitchen at the screams. Camille lay on his back, white and
+motionless.
+
+The doctor was the first to come up. “Who! what is this? I seem to know
+his face.” Then shaking his head, “Whoever it is, it is a bad case.
+Stand away, ladies. Let me feel his pulse.”
+
+Whilst the old man was going stiffly down on one knee, Jacintha uttered
+a cry of terror. “See, see! his shirt! that red streak! Ah, ah! it is
+getting bigger and bigger:” and she turned faint in a moment, and would
+have fallen but for Dard.
+
+The doctor looked. “All the better,” said he firmly. “I thought he
+was dead. His blood flows; then I will save him. Don’t clutch me so,
+Josephine; don’t cling to me like that. Now is the time to show your
+breed: not turn sick at the sight of a little blood, like that foolish
+creature, but help me save him.”
+
+“Take him in-doors,” cried the baroness.
+
+“Into our house, mamma?” gasped Rose; “no, no.”
+
+“What,” said the baroness, “a wounded soldier who has fought for France!
+leave him to lie and die outside my door: what would my son say to that?
+He is a soldier himself.”
+
+Rose cast a hasty look at Josephine. Josephine’s eyes were bent on the
+ground, and her hands clenched and trembling.
+
+“Now, Jacintha, you be off,” said the doctor. “I can’t have cowards
+about him to make the others as bad. Go and stew down a piece of good
+beef for him. Stew it in red wine and water.”
+
+“That I will: poor thing!”
+
+“Why, I know him,” said the baroness suddenly; “it is an old
+acquaintance, young Dujardin: you remember, Josephine. I used to suspect
+him of a fancy for you, poor fellow! Why, he must have come here to see
+us, poor soul.”
+
+“No matter who it is; it is a man. Now, girls, have you courage, have
+you humanity? Then come one on each side of him and take hands beneath
+his back, while I lift his head and Dard his legs.”
+
+“And handle him gently whatever you do,” said Dard. “I know what it is
+to be wounded.”
+
+These four carried the lifeless burden very slowly and gently across the
+Pleasaunce to the house, then with more difficulty and caution up the
+stairs.
+
+All the while the sisters’ hands griped one another tight beneath the
+lifeless burden, and spoke to one another. And Josephine’s arm upheld
+tenderly but not weakly the hero she had struck down. She avoided Rose’s
+eye, her mother’s, and even the doctor’s: one gasping sob escaped her as
+she walked with head half averted, and vacant, terror-stricken eyes, and
+her victim on her sustaining arm.
+
+The doctor selected the tapestried chamber for him as being most airy.
+Then he ordered the women out, and with Dard’s help undressed the still
+insensible patient.
+
+Josephine sat down on the stairs in gloomy silence, her eyes on the
+ground, like one waiting for her deathblow.
+
+Rose, sick at heart, sat silent too at some distance. At last she said
+faintly, “Have we done well?”
+
+“I don’t know,” said Josephine doggedly. Her eyes never left the ground.
+
+“We could not let him die for want of care.”
+
+“He will not thank us. Better for him to die than live. Better for me.”
+
+At this instant Dard came running down. “Good news, mesdemoiselles, good
+news! the wound runs all along; it is not deep, like mine was. He has
+opened his eyes and shut them again. The dear good doctor stopped the
+blood in a twinkle. The doctor says he’ll be bound to save him. I must
+run and tell Jacintha. She is taking on in the kitchen.”
+
+Josephine, who had risen eagerly from her despairing posture, clasped
+her hands together, then lifted up her voice and wept. “He will live! he
+will live!”
+
+When she had wept a long while, she said to Rose, “Come, sister, help
+your poor Josephine.”
+
+“Yes, love, what shall we do?”
+
+“My duty,” faltered Josephine. “An hour ago it seemed so sweet,” and
+she fell to weeping patiently again. They went to Josephine’s room. She
+crept slowly to a wardrobe, and took out a gray silk dress.
+
+“Oh, never mind for to-day,” cried Rose.
+
+“Help me, Rose. It is for myself as well; to remind me every moment I am
+Madame Raynal.”
+
+They put the gray gown on her, both weeping patiently. It will be known
+at the last day, all that honest women have suffered weeping silently in
+this noisy world.
+
+
+Camille soon recovered his senses and a portion of his strength: then
+the irritation of his wound brought on fever. This in turn retired
+before the doctor’s remedies and a sound constitution, but it left
+behind it a great weakness and general prostration. And in this state
+the fate of the body depends greatly on the mind.
+
+The baroness and the doctor went constantly to see him, and soothe him:
+he smiled and thanked them, but his eager eyes watched the door for one
+who came not.
+
+When he got well enough to leave his bed the largest couch was sent up
+to him from the saloon; a kind hand lined the baron’s silk dressing-gown
+for him warm and soft and nice; and he would sit or lie on his couch, or
+take two turns in the room leaning upon Rose’s shoulder, and glad of the
+support; and he looked piteously in her eyes when she came and when she
+went. Rose looked down; she could do nothing, she could say nothing.
+
+With his strength, Camille lost a portion of his pride: he pined for a
+sight of her he no longer respected; pined for her, as the thirsty pine
+for water in Sahara.
+
+At last one day he spoke out. “How kind you are to me, Rose! how kind
+you all are--but one.”
+
+He waited in hopes she would say something, but she held her tongue.
+
+“At least tell me why it is. Is she ashamed? Is she afraid?”
+
+“Neither.”
+
+“She hates me: it is true, then, that we hate those whom we have
+wounded. Cruel, cruel Josephine! Oh, heart of marble against which my
+heart has wrecked itself forever!”
+
+“No, no! She is anything but cruel: but she is Madame Raynal.”
+
+“Ah! I forgot. But have I no claim on her? Nearly four years she has
+been my betrothed. What have I done? Was I ever false to her? I could
+forgive her for what she has done to me, but she cannot forgive me. Does
+she mean never to see me again?”
+
+“Ask yourself what good could come of it.”
+
+“Very well,” said Camille, with a malicious smile. “I am in her way. I
+see what she wants; she shall have it.”
+
+Rose carried these words to Josephine. They went through her like a
+sword.
+
+Rose pitied her. Rose had a moment’s weakness.
+
+“Let us go to him,” she said; “anything is better than this.”
+
+“Rose, I dare not,” was the wise reply.
+
+But the next day early, Josephine took Rose to a door outside the house,
+a door that had long been disused. Nettles grew before it. She produced
+a key and with great difficulty opened this door. It led to the
+tapestried chamber, and years ago they used to steal up it and peep into
+the room.
+
+Rose scarcely needed to be told that she was to watch Camille, and
+report to her. In truth, it was a mysterious, vague protection against
+a danger equally mysterious. Yet it made Josephine easier. But so
+unflinching was her prudence that she never once could be prevailed on
+to mount those stairs, and peep at Camille herself. “I must starve my
+heart, not feed it,” said she. And she grew paler and more hollow-eyed
+day by day.
+
+Yet this was the same woman who showed such feebleness and irresolution
+when Raynal pressed her to marry him. But then dwarfs feebly drew
+her this way and that. Now giants fought for her. Between a feeble
+inclination and a feeble disinclination her dead heart had drifted
+to and fro. Now honor, duty, gratitude,--which last with her was a
+passion,--dragged her one way: love, pity, and remorse another.
+
+Not one of these giants would relax his grasp, and nothing yielded
+except her vital powers. Yes; her temper, one of the loveliest Heaven
+ever gave a human creature, was soured at times.
+
+Was it a wonder? There lay the man she loved pining for her; cursing her
+for her cruelty, and alternately praying Heaven to forgive him and to
+bless her: sighing, at intervals, all the day long, so loud, so deep, so
+piteously, as if his heart broke with each sigh; and sometimes, for he
+little knew, poor soul, that any human eye was upon him, casting aside
+his manhood in his despair, and flinging himself on the very floor, and
+muffling his head, and sobbing; he a hero.
+
+And here was she pining in secret for him who pined for her? “I am not a
+woman at all,” said she, who was all woman. “I am crueller to him than a
+tiger or any savage creature is to the victim she tears. I must cure him
+of his love for me; and then die; for what shall I have to live for? He
+weeps, he sighs, he cries for Josephine.”
+
+Her enforced cruelty was more contrary to this woman’s nature than black
+is to white, or heat to cold, and the heart rebelled furiously at times.
+As when a rock tries to stem a current, the water fights its way on more
+sides than one, so insulted nature dealt with Josephine. Not only did
+her body pine, but her nerves were exasperated. Sudden twitches came
+over her, that almost made her scream. Her permanent state was utter
+despondency, but across it came fitful flashes of irritation; and then
+she was scarce mistress of herself.
+
+Wherefore you, who find some holy woman cross and bitter, stop a moment
+before you sum her up vixen and her religion naught: inquire the history
+of her heart: perhaps beneath the smooth cold surface of duties well
+discharged, her life has been, or even is, a battle against some
+self-indulgence the insignificant saint’s very blood cries out for: and
+so the poor thing is cross, not because she is bad, but because she is
+better than the rest of us; yet only human.
+
+Now though Josephine was more on her guard with the baroness than with
+Rose, or the doctor, or Jacintha, her state could not altogether escape
+the vigilance of a mother’s eye.
+
+But the baroness had not the clew we have; and what a difference that
+makes! How small an understanding, put by accident or instruction on the
+right track, shall run the game down! How great a sagacity shall wander
+if it gets on a false scent!
+
+“Doctor,” said the baroness one day, “you are so taken up with your
+patient you neglect the rest of us. Do look at Josephine! She is ill,
+or going to be ill. She is so pale, and so fretful, so peevish, which is
+not in her nature. Would you believe it, doctor, she snaps?”
+
+“Our Josephine snap? This is new.”
+
+“And snarls.”
+
+“Then look for the end of the world.”
+
+“The other day I heard her snap Rose: and this morning she half snarled
+at me, just because I pressed her to go and console our patient. Hush!
+here she is. My child, I am accusing you to the doctor. I tell him you
+neglect his patient: never go near him.”
+
+“I will visit him one of these days,” said Josephine, coldly.
+
+“One of these days,” said the baroness, shocked. “You used not to be so
+hard-hearted. A soldier, an old comrade of your husband’s, wounded
+and sick, and you alone never go to him, to console him with a word of
+sympathy or encouragement.”
+
+Josephine looked at her mother with a sort of incredulous stare. Then,
+after a struggle, she replied with a tone and manner so spiteful and icy
+that it would have deceived even us who know her had we heard it. “He
+has plenty of nurses without me.” She added, almost violently, “My
+husband, if he were wounded, would not have so many, perhaps not have
+one.”
+
+With this she rose and went out, leaving them aghast. She sat down in
+the passage on a window-seat, and laughed hysterically. Rose heard her
+and ran to her. Josephine told her what her mother had said to her.
+Rose soothed her. “Never mind, you have your sister who understands you:
+don’t you go back till they have got some other topic.”
+
+Rose out of curiosity went in, and found a discussion going on. The
+doctor was fathoming Josephine, for the benefit of his companion.
+
+“It is a female jealousy, and of a mighty innocent kind. We are so taken
+up with this poor fellow, she thinks her soldier is forgotten.”
+
+“Surely, doctor, our Josephine would not be so unreasonable, so unjust,”
+ suggested her mother.
+
+“She belongs to a sex, be it said without offending you, madame, among
+whose numberless virtues justice does not fill a prominent place.”
+
+The baroness shook her head. “That is not it. It is a piece of prudery.
+This young gentleman was a sort of admirer of hers, though she did not
+admire him much, as far as I remember. But it was four years ago; and
+she is married to a man she loves, or is going to love.”
+
+“Well, but, mamma, a trifling excess of delicacy is surely excusable.”
+ This from Rose.
+
+“No, no; it is not delicacy; it is prudery. And when people are sick and
+suffering, an honest woman should take up her charity and lay down her
+prudery, or her coquetry: two things that I suspect are the same thing
+in different shapes.”
+
+Here Jacintha came in. “Mademoiselle, here is the colonel’s broth;
+Madame Raynal has flavored it for him, and you are to take it up to him,
+and keep him company while he eats it.”
+
+“Come,” cried the baroness, “my lecture has not been lost.”
+
+Rose followed Jacintha up-stairs.
+
+Rose was heart and head on Raynal’s side.
+
+She had deceived him about Josephine’s attachment, and felt all the more
+desirous to guard him against any ill consequences of it. Then he had
+been so generous to her: he had left her her sister, who would have gone
+to Egypt, and escaped this misery, but for her.
+
+But on the other hand,
+
+                                         --Gentle pity
+     Tugged at her heartstrings with complaining cries.
+
+This watching of Camille saddened even her. When she was with him his
+pride bore him up: but when he was alone as he thought, his anguish and
+despair were terrible, and broke out in so many ways that often Rose
+shrank in terror from her peep hole.
+
+She dared not tell Josephine the half of what she saw: what she did tell
+her agitated her so terribly: and often Rose had it on the tip of her
+tongue to say, “Do pray go and see if you can say nothing that will
+do him good;” but she fought the impulse down. This battle of feeling,
+though less severe than her sister’s, was constant; it destroyed her
+gayety. She, whose merry laugh used to ring like chimes through the
+house, never laughed now, seldom smiled, and often sighed.
+
+Dr. Aubertin was the last to succumb to the deep depression, but his
+time came: and he had been for a day or two as grave and as sad as the
+rest, when one day that Rose was absent, spying on Camille, he took the
+baroness and Josephine into his confidence; and condescended finally to
+ask their advice.
+
+“It is humiliating,” said he, “after all my experience, to be obliged to
+consult unprofessional persons. Forty years ago I should have been TOO
+WISE to do so. But since then I have often seen science baffled and
+untrained intelligences throw light upon hard questions: and your sex
+in particular has luminous instincts and reads things by flashes that
+we men miss with a microscope. Our dear Madame Raynal suspected that
+plausible notary, and to this day I believe she could not tell us why.”
+
+Josephine admitted as much very frankly.
+
+“There you see,” said the doctor. “Well, then, you must help me in this
+case. And this time I promise to treat your art with more respect.”
+
+“And pray who is it she is to read now?” asked the baroness.
+
+“Who should it be but my poor patient? He puzzles me. I never knew a
+patient so faint-hearted.”
+
+“A soldier faint-hearted!” exclaimed the baroness. “To be sure these men
+that storm cities, and fire cannon, and cut and hack one another with so
+much spirit, are poor creatures compared with us when they have to lie
+quiet and suffer.”
+
+The doctor walked the room in great excitement. “It is not his wound
+that is killing him, there’s something on his mind. You, Josephine,
+with your instincts do help me: do pray, for pity’s sake, throw off that
+sublime indifference you have manifested all along to this man’s fate.”
+
+“She has not,” cried the baroness, firing up. “Did I not see her lining
+his dressing-gown for him? and she inspects everything that he eats: do
+you not?”
+
+“Yes, mother.” She then suggested in a faltering voice that time would
+cure the patient, and time alone.
+
+“Time! you speak as if time was a quality: time is only a measure of
+events, favorable or unfavorable; it kills as many as it cures.”
+
+“Why, you surely would not imply his life is in any danger?” This was
+the baroness.
+
+“Madame, if the case was not grave, should I take this unusual step? I
+tell you if some change does not take place soon, he will be a dead man
+in another fortnight. That is all TIME will do for him.”
+
+The baroness uttered an exclamation of pity and distress. Josephine put
+her hand to her bosom, and a creeping horror came over her, and then a
+faintness. She sat working mechanically, and turning like ice within.
+After a few minutes of this, she rose with every appearance of external
+composure and left the room. In the passage she met Rose coming hastily
+towards the salon laughing: the first time she had laughed this many a
+day. Oh, what a contrast between the two faces that met there--the one
+pale and horror stricken, the other rosy and laughing!
+
+“Well, dear, at last I am paid for all my trouble, and yours, by a
+discovery; he never drinks a drop of his medicine; he pours it into the
+ashes under the grate; I caught him in the fact.”
+
+“Then this is too much: I can resist no longer. Come with me,” said
+Josephine doggedly.
+
+“Where?”
+
+“To him.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+
+Josephine paused on the landing, and laid her hand on Rose’s shoulder.
+It was so cold it made Rose shudder, and exacted a promise from her not
+to contradict a word she should say to Camille. “I do not go to him for
+my pleasure, but for his life,” she said; “I must deceive him and save
+him; and then let me lie down and die.”
+
+“Oh, that the wretch had never been born!” cried Rose, in despair.
+But she gave the required promise, and offered to go and tell Camille
+Josephine was coming to visit him.
+
+But Josephine declined this. “No,” said she; “give me every advantage; I
+must think beforehand every word I shall say; but take him by surprise,
+coward and doubleface that I am.”
+
+Rose knocked at the door. A faint voice said, “Come in.” The sisters
+entered the room very softly. Camille sat on the sofa, his head bowed
+over his hands. A glance showed Josephine that he was doggedly and
+resolutely thrusting himself into the grave. Thinking it was only
+Rose--for he had now lost all hope of seeing Josephine come in at the
+door--he never moved. Some one glided gently but rapidly up to him. He
+looked up. Josephine was kneeling to him.
+
+He lifted his head with a start, and trembled all over.
+
+She whispered, “I am come to you to beg your pity; to appeal to your
+generosity; to ask a favor; I who deserve so little of you.”
+
+“You have waited a long time,” said Camille, agitated greatly; “and so
+have I.”
+
+“Camille, you are torturing one who loved you once, and who has been
+very weak and faithless, but not so wicked as she appears.”
+
+“How am I torturing you?”
+
+“With remorse; do I not suffer enough? Would you make me a murderess?”
+
+“Why have you never been near me?” retorted Camille. “I could forgive
+your weakness, but not your heartlessness.”
+
+“It is my duty. I have no right to seek your society. If you really want
+mine, you have only to get well, and so join us down-stairs a week or
+two before you leave us.”
+
+“How am I to get well? My heart is broken.”
+
+“Camille, be a man. Do not fling away a soldier’s life because a fickle,
+worthless woman could not wait for you. Forgive me like a man, or else
+revenge yourself like a man. If you cannot forgive me, kill me. See, I
+kneel at your feet. I will not resist you. Kill me.”
+
+“I wish I could. Oh! if I could kill you with a look and myself with a
+wish! No man should ever take you from me, then. We would be together in
+the grave at this hour. Do not tempt me, I say;” and he cast a terrible
+look of love, and hatred, and despair upon her. Her purple eye never
+winced; it poured back tenderness and affection in return. He saw and
+turned away with a groan, and held out his hand to her. She seized it
+and kissed it. “You are great, you are generous; you will not strike me
+as a woman strikes; you will not die to drive me to despair.”
+
+“I see,” said he, more gently, “love is gone, but pity remains. I
+thought that was gone, too.”
+
+“Yes, Camille,” said Josephine, in a whisper, “pity remains, and remorse
+and terror at what I have done to a man of whom I was never worthy.”
+
+“Well, madame, as you have come at last to me, and even do me the
+honor to ask me a favor--I shall try--if only out of courtesy--to--ah,
+Josephine! Josephine! when did I ever refuse you anything?”
+
+At this Josephine sank into a chair, and burst out crying. Camille, at
+this, began to cry too; and the two poor things sat a long way from one
+another, and sobbed bitterly.
+
+The man, weakened as he was, recovered his quiet despair first.
+
+“Don’t cry so,” said he. “But tell me what is your will, and I shall
+obey you as I used before any one came between us.”
+
+“Then, live, Camille. I implore you to live.”
+
+“Well, Josephine, since you care about it, I will try and live. Why did
+not you come before and ask me? I thought I was in your way. I thought
+you wanted me dead.”
+
+Josephine cast a look of wonder and anguish on Camille, but she said
+nothing. She rang the bell, and, on Jacintha coming up, despatched her
+to Dr. Aubertin for the patient’s medicine.
+
+“Tell the doctor,” said she, “Colonel Dujardin has let fall the glass.”
+ While Jacintha was gone, she scolded Camille gently. “How could you be
+so unkind to the poor doctor who loves you so? Only think: to throw away
+his medicines! Look at the ashes; they are wet. Camille, are you, too,
+becoming disingenuous?”
+
+Jacintha came in with the tonic in a glass, and retired with an
+obeisance. Josephine took it to Camille.
+
+“Drink with me, then,” said he, “or I will not touch it.” Josephine took
+the glass. “I drink to your health, Camille, and to your glory; laurels
+to your brow, and some faithful woman to your heart, who will make you
+forget this folly: it is for her I am saving you.” She put the glass
+with well-acted spirit to her lips; but in the very action a spasm
+seized her throat and almost choked her; she lowered her head that he
+might not see her face, and tried again; but the tears burst from her
+eyes and ran into the liquid, and her lips trembled over the brim, and
+were paralyzed.
+
+“No, no! give it me!” he cried; “there is a tear of yours in it.” He
+drank off the bitter remedy now as if it had been nectar.
+
+Josephine blushed.
+
+“If you wanted me to live, why did you not come here before?”
+
+“I did not think you would be so foolish, so wicked, so cruel as to do
+what you have been doing.”
+
+“Come and shine upon me every day, and you shall have no fresh cause of
+complaint; things flourish in the sunshine that die in the dark: Rose,
+it is as if the sun had come into my prison; you are pale, but you are
+beautiful as ever--more beautiful; what a sweet dress! so quiet, so
+modest, it sets off your beauty instead of vainly trying to vie with
+it.” With this he put out his hand and took her gray silk dress, and
+went to kiss it as a devotee kisses the altar steps.
+
+She snatched it away with a shudder.
+
+“Yes, you are right,” said she; “thank you for noticing my dress; it is
+a beautiful dress--ha! ha! A dress I take a pride in wearing, and
+always shall, I hope. I mean to be buried in it. Come, Rose. Thank you,
+Camille; you are very good, you have once more promised me to live. Get
+well; come down-stairs; then you will see me every day, you know--there
+is a temptation. Good-by, Camille!--are you coming, Rose? What are you
+loitering for? God bless you, and comfort you, and help you to forget
+what it is madness to remember!”
+
+With these wild words she literally fled; and in one moment the room
+seemed to darken to Camille.
+
+Outside the door Josephine caught hold of Rose. “Have I committed
+myself?”
+
+“Over and over again. Do not look so terrified; I mean to me, but not to
+him. How blind he is! and how much better you must know him than I do to
+venture on such a transparent deceit. He believes whatever you tell
+him. He is all ears and no eyes. Yes, love, I watched him keenly all
+the time. He really thinks it is pity and remorse, nothing more. My poor
+sister, you have a hard life to lead, a hard game to play; but so far
+you have succeeded; yet could look poor Raynal in the face if he came
+home to-day.”
+
+“Then God be thanked!” cried Josephine. “I am as happy to-day as I can
+ever hope to be. Now let us go through the farce of dressing--it is near
+dinner-time--and then the farce of talking, and, hardest of all, the
+farce of living.”
+
+From that hour Camille began to get better very slowly, yet perceptibly.
+
+The doctor, afraid of being mistaken, said nothing for some days, but
+at last he announced the good news at the dinner-table. “He is to come
+down-stairs in three days,” added the doctor.
+
+But I am sorry to say that as Camille’s body strengthened some of the
+worst passions in our nature attacked him. Fierce gusts of hate and love
+combined overpowered this man’s high sentiments of honor and justice,
+and made him clench his teeth, and vow never to leave Beaurepaire
+without Josephine. She had been his four years before she ever saw this
+interloper, and she should be his forever. Her love would soon revive
+when they should meet every day, and she would end by eloping with him.
+
+Then conscience pricked him, and reminded him how and why Raynal had
+married her: for Rose had told him all. Should he undermine an absent
+soldier, whose whole conduct in this had been so pure, so generous, so
+unselfish?
+
+But this was not all. As I have already hinted, he was under a great
+personal obligation to his quondam comrade Raynal. Whenever this was
+vividly present to his mind, a great terror fell on him, and he would
+cry out in anguish, “Oh! that some angel would come to me and tear me by
+force from this place!” And the next moment passion swept over him like
+a flood, and carried away all his virtuous resolves. His soul was in
+deep waters; great waves drove it to and fro. Perilous condition,
+which seldom ends well. Camille was a man of honor. In no other earthly
+circumstance could he have hesitated an instant between right and
+wrong. But such natures, proof against all other temptations, have often
+fallen, and will fall, where sin takes the angel form of her they love.
+Yet, of all men, they should pray for help to stand; for when they fall
+they still retain one thing that divides them from mean sinners.
+
+Remorse, the giant that rends the great hearts which mock at fear.
+
+The day came in which the doctor had promised his patient he should come
+down-stairs. First his comfortable sofa was taken down into the saloon
+for his use: then the patient himself came down leaning on the doctor’s
+arm, and his heart palpitating at the thought of the meeting. He came
+into the room; the baroness was alone. She greeted him kindly,
+and welcomed him. Rose came in soon after and did the same. But no
+Josephine. Camille felt sick at heart. At last dinner was announced;
+“She will surely join us at dinner,” thought he. He cast his eyes
+anxiously on the table; the napkins were laid for four only. The
+baroness carelessly explained this to him as they sat down. “Madame
+Raynal dines in her own room. I am sorry to say she is indisposed.”
+
+Camille muttered polite regrets: the rage of disappointment drove its
+fangs into him, and then came the heart-sickness of hope deferred.
+The next day he saw her, but could not get a word with her alone. The
+baroness tortured him another way. She was full of Raynal. She loved
+him. She called him her son; was never weary of descanting on his
+virtues to Camille. Not a day passed that she did not pester Camille to
+make a calculation as to the probable period of his return, and he was
+obliged to answer her. She related to him before Josephine and Rose, how
+this honest soldier had come to them like a guardian angel and saved the
+whole family. In vain he muttered that Rose had told him.
+
+“Let me have the pleasure of telling it you my way,” cried she, and told
+it diffusely, and kept him writhing.
+
+The next thing was, Josephine had received no letter from him this
+month; the first month he had missed. In vain did Rose represent that
+he was only a few days over his time. The baroness became anxious,
+communicated her anxieties to Camille among the rest; and, by a
+torturing interrogatory, compelled him to explain to her before
+Josephine and them all, that ships do not always sail to a day, and
+are sometimes delayed. But oh! he winced at the man’s name; and Rose
+observed that he never mentioned it, nor acknowledged the existence of
+such a person as Josephine’s husband, except when others compelled him.
+Yet they were acquainted; and Rose sometimes wondered that he did not
+detract or sneer.
+
+“I should,” said she; “I feel I should.”
+
+“He is too noble,” said Josephine, “and too wise. For, if he did, I
+should respect him less, and my husband more than I do--if possible.”
+
+Certainly Camille was not the sort of nature that detracts, but the
+reason he avoided Raynal’s name was simply that his whole internal
+battle was to forget such a man existed. From this dream he was rudely
+awakened every hour since he joined the family, and the wound his
+self-deceiving heart would fain have skinned over, was torn open. But
+worse than this was the torture of being tantalized. He was in company
+with Josephine, but never alone. Even if she left the room for an
+instant, Rose accompanied her and returned with her. Camille at last
+began to comprehend that Josephine had decided there should be no
+private interviews between her and him. Thus, not only the shadow of the
+absent Raynal stood between them, but her mother and sister in person,
+and worst of all, her own will. He called her a cold-blooded fiend in
+his rage. Then the thought of all her tenderness and goodness came to
+rebuke him. But even in rebuking it maddened him. “Yes, it is her very
+nature to love; but since she can make her heart turn whichever way her
+honor bids, she will love her husband; she does not now; but sooner or
+later she will. Then she will have children--(he writhed with anguish
+and fury at this thought)--loving ties between him and her. He has
+everything on his side. I, nothing but memories she will efface from her
+heart. Will efface? She must have effaced them, or she could not have
+married him.” I know no more pitiable state of mind than to love and
+hate the same creature. But when the two feelings are both intense, and
+meet in an ardent bosom, such a man would do well to spend a day or two
+upon his knees, praying for grace divine. For he who with all his soul
+loves and hates one woman is next door to a maniac, and is scarcely
+safe an hour together from suicide or even from homicide; this truth the
+newspapers tell us, by examples, every month; but are wonderfully little
+heeded, because newspapers do not, nor is it their business to, analyze
+and dwell upon the internal feelings of the despairing lover, whose mad
+and bloody act they record. With such a tempest in his heart did Camille
+one day wander into the park. And soon an irresistible attraction drew
+him to the side of the stream that flowed along one side of it. He eyed
+it gloomily, and wherever the stagnant water indicated a deeper pool
+than usual he stopped, and looked, and thought, “How calm and peaceful
+you are!”
+
+He sat down at last by the water-side, his eyes bent on a calm, green
+pool.
+
+It looked very peaceful; and it could give peace. He thought, oh! what
+a blessing; to be quit of rage, jealousy, despair, and life, all in a
+minute!
+
+Yet that was a sordid death for a soldier to die, who had seen great
+battles. Could he not die more nobly than that? With this he suddenly
+felt in his pocket; and there sure enough fate had placed his pistols.
+He had put them into this coat; and he had not worn this coat until
+to-day. He had armed himself unconsciously. “Ah!” said he; “it is to be;
+all these things are preordained.” (This notion of fate has strengthened
+many a fatal resolution.) Then he had a cruel regret. To die without a
+word; a parting word. Then he thought to himself, it was best so; for
+perhaps he should have taken her with him.
+
+“Sir! colonel!” uttered a solemn voice behind him.
+
+Absorbed and strung up to desperation as he was, this voice seemed
+unnaturally loud, and discordant with Camille’s mood; a sudden trumpet
+from the world of small things.
+
+It was Picard, the notary.
+
+“Can you tell me where Madame Raynal is?”
+
+“No. At the chateau, I suppose.”
+
+“She is not there; I inquired of the servant. She was out. You have not
+seen her, colonel?”
+
+“Not I; I never see her.”
+
+“Then perhaps I had better go back to the chateau and wait for her:
+stay, are you a friend of the family? Colonel, suppose I were to tell
+you, and ask you to break it to Madame Raynal, or, better still, to the
+baroness, or Mademoiselle Rose.”
+
+“Monsieur,” said Camille coldly, “charge me with no messages, for I
+cannot deliver them. I AM GOING ANOTHER WAY.”
+
+“In that case, I will go to the chateau once more; for what I have to
+say must be heard.”
+
+Picard returned to the chateau wondering at the colonel’s strange
+manner.
+
+Camille, for his part, wondered that any one could be so mad as to talk
+to him about trifles; to him, a man standing on the brink of eternity.
+Poor soul, it was he who was mad and unlucky. He should have heard what
+Picard had to say. The very gentleness and solemnity of manner ought to
+have excited his curiosity.
+
+He watched Picard’s retiring form. When he was out of sight, then he
+turned round and resumed his thoughts as if Picard had been no more than
+a fly that had buzzed and then gone.
+
+“Yes, I should have taken her with me,” he said. He sat gloomy and
+dogged like a dangerous maniac in his cell; never moved, scarce thought
+for more than half an hour; but his deadly purpose grew in him. Suddenly
+he started. A lady was at the style, about a hundred yards distant. He
+trembled. It was Josephine.
+
+She came towards him slowly, her eyes bent on the ground in a deep
+reverie. She stopped about a stone’s throw from him, and looked at the
+river long and thoughtfully; then casting her eye around, she caught
+sight of Camille. He watched her grimly. He saw her give a little start,
+and half turn round; but if this was an impulse to retreat, it was
+instantly suppressed; for the next moment she pursued her way.
+
+Camille stood gloomy and bitter, awaiting her in silence. He planted
+himself in the middle of the path, and said not a word.
+
+She looked him all over, and her color came and went.
+
+“Out so far as this,” she said kindly; “and without your cap.”
+
+He put his hand to his head, and discovered that he was bareheaded.
+
+“You will catch your death of cold. Come, let us go in and get your
+cap.”
+
+She made as if she would pass him. He planted himself right before her.
+
+“No.”
+
+“Camille!”
+
+“Why do you shun me as if I was a viper?”
+
+“I do not shun you. I but avoid conferences that can lead to no good; it
+is my duty.”
+
+“You are very wise; cold-hearted people can be wise.”
+
+“Am I cold-hearted, Camille?”
+
+“As marble.”
+
+She looked him in the face; the water came into her eyes; after awhile
+she whispered, sorrowfully, “Well, Camille, I am.”
+
+“But with all your wisdom and all your coldness,” he went on to say,
+“you have made a mistake; you have driven me to madness and despair.”
+
+“Heaven forbid!” said she.
+
+“Your prayer comes too late; you have done it.”
+
+“Camille, let me go to the oratory, and pray for you. You terrify me.”
+
+“It is no use. Heaven has no mercy for me. Take my advice; stay where
+you are; don’t hurry; for what remains of your life you gave to pass
+with me, do you understand that?”
+
+“Ah!” And she turned pale.
+
+“Can you read my riddle?”
+
+She looked him in the face. “I can read your eyes, and I know you love
+me. I think you mean to kill me. I have heard men kill the thing they
+love.”
+
+“Of course they do; sooner than another should have it, they kill
+it--they kill it.”
+
+“God has not made them patient like us women. Poor Camille!”
+
+“Patience dies when hope dies. Come, Madame Raynal, say a prayer, for
+you are going to die.”
+
+“God bless you, Camille!” said the poor girl, putting her hands together
+in her last prayer. At this sweet touch of affection, Camille hung his
+head, and sobbed. Then suddenly lashing himself into fury, he cried,--
+
+“You are my betrothed! you talk of duty; but you forget your duty to me.
+Are you not my betrothed this four years? Answer me that.”
+
+“Yes, Camille, I was.”
+
+“Did I not suffer death a hundred times for you, to keep faith with you,
+you cold-blooded traitress with an angel’s face?”
+
+“Ah, Camille! can you speak so bitterly to me? Have I denied your right
+to kill me? You shall never dishonor me, but you shall kill me, if it is
+your pleasure. I do not resist. Why, then, speak to me like that; must
+the last words I hear from your mouth be words of anger, cruel Camille?”
+
+“I was wrong. But it is so hard to kill her I love in cold blood. I want
+anger as well as despair to keep me to it. Come, turn your head away
+from me, and all our troubles shall end.”
+
+“No, Camille, let me look at you. Then you will be the last thing I
+shall see on earth.”
+
+At this he hesitated a moment; then, with a fierce stamp at what he
+thought was weakness, he levelled a pistol at her.
+
+She put up her hands with a piteous cry, “Oh! not my face, Camille! pray
+do not disfigure my face. Here--kill me here--in my bosom--my heart that
+loved you well, when it was no sin to love you.”
+
+“I can’t shoot you. I can’t spill your blood. The river will end all,
+and not disfigure your beauty, that has driven me mad, and cost you,
+poor wretch, your life.”
+
+“Thank you, dear Camille. The water does not frighten me as a pistol
+does; it will not hurt me; it will only kill me.”
+
+“No, it is but a plunge, and you will be at peace forever; and so shall
+I. Come, take my hand, Madame Raynal, Madame Raynal.”
+
+She gave him her hand with a look of infinite love. She only said, “My
+poor mother!” That word did not fall to the ground. It flashed like
+lightning at night across the demented lover, and lighted up his egotism
+(suicide, like homicide, is generally a fit of maniacal egotism), even
+to his eyes blinded by fury.
+
+“Wretch that I am,” he shrieked. “Fly, Josephine, fly! escape this
+moment, that my better angel whispers to me. Do you hear? begone, while
+it is time.”
+
+“I will not leave you, Camille.”
+
+“I say you shall. Go to your mother and Rose; go to those you love, and
+I can pity; go to the chapel and thank Heaven for your escape.”
+
+“Yes, but not without you, Camille. I am afraid to leave you.”
+
+“You have more to fear if you stay. Well, I can’t wait any longer. Stay,
+then, and live; and learn from me how to love Jean Raynal.”
+
+He levelled the pistol at himself.
+
+Josephine threw herself on him with a cry, and seized his arm. With the
+strength excitement lent her she got the better, and all but overpowered
+him. But, as usual, the man’s strength lasted longer, and with a
+sustained effort he threw her off; then, pale and panting, raised the
+pistol to take his life. This time she moved neither hand nor foot; but
+she palsied his rash hand with a word.
+
+“No; I LOVE YOU.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+
+
+There lie the dead corpses of those words on paper; but my art is
+powerless to tell you how they were uttered, those words, potent as a
+king’s, for they saved a life.
+
+They were a cry of terror and a cry of reproach and a cry of love
+unfathomable.
+
+The weapon shook in his hand. He looked at her with growing astonishment
+and joy; she at him fixedly and anxiously, her hands clasped in
+supplication.
+
+“As you used to love me?”
+
+“More, far more. Give me the pistol. I love you, dearest. I love you.”
+
+At these delicious words he lost all power of resistance, she saw;
+and her soft and supple hand stole in and closed upon his, and gently
+withdrew the weapon, and threw it into the water. “Good Camille! now
+give me the other.”
+
+“How do you know there is another?”
+
+“I know you are not the man to kill a woman and spare yourself. Come.”
+
+“Josephine, have pity on me, do not deceive me; pray do not take this,
+my only friend, from me, unless you really love me.”
+
+“I love you; I adore you,” was her reply.
+
+She leaned her head on his shoulder, but with her hand she sought his,
+and even as she uttered those loving words she coaxed the weapon from
+his now unresisting grasp.
+
+“There, it is gone; you are saved from death--saved from crime.” And
+with that, the danger was over, she trembled for the first time, and
+fell to sobbing hysterically.
+
+He threw himself at her knees, and embraced them again and again, and
+begged her forgiveness in a transport of remorse and self-reproach.
+
+She looked down with tender pity on him, and heard his cries of
+penitence and shame.
+
+“Rise, Camille, and go home with me,” said she faintly.
+
+“Yes, Josephine.”
+
+They went slowly and in silence. Camille was too ashamed and penitent
+to speak; too full of terror too at the abyss of crime from which he
+had been saved. The ancients feigned that a virgin could subdue a lion;
+perhaps they meant that a pure gentle nature can subdue a nature fierce
+but generous. Lion-like Camille walked by Josephine’s side with his eyes
+bent on the ground, the picture of humility and penitence.
+
+“This is the last walk you and I shall take together,” said Josephine
+solemnly.
+
+“I know it,” said he humbly. “I have forfeited all right to be by your
+side.”
+
+“My poor, lost love,” sighed Josephine, “will you never understand
+me? You never stood higher in my esteem than at this moment. It is the
+avowal you have forced from ME that parts us. The man to whom I have
+said ‘I’--must not remain beneath my husband’s roof. Does not your sense
+of honor agree with mine?”
+
+“It does,” faltered he.
+
+“To-morrow you must leave the chateau.”
+
+“I will obey you.”
+
+“What, you do not resist, you do not break my heart by complaints, by
+reproaches?”
+
+“No, Josephine, all is changed. I thought you unfeeling: I thought you
+were going to be HAPPY with him; that was what maddened me.”
+
+“I pray daily YOU may be happy, no matter how. But you and I are not
+alike, dear as we are to one another. Well, do not fear: I shall never
+be happy--will that soothe you, Camille?”
+
+“Yes, Josephine, all is changed; the words you have spoken have driven
+the fiends out of my heart. I have nothing to do now but to obey, you to
+command: it is your right. Since you love me a little still, dispose
+of me. Bid me live: bid me die: bid me stay: bid me go. I shall never
+disobey the angel who loves me, my only friend upon the earth.”
+
+A single deep sob from Josephine was all the answer.
+
+Then he could not help asking her why she had not trusted him?
+
+“Why did you not say to me long ago, ‘I love you, but I am a wife; my
+husband is an honest soldier, absent, and fighting for France: I am the
+guardian of his honor and my own; be just, be generous, be self-denying;
+depart and love me only as angels love’? Perhaps this might have helped
+me to show you that I too am a man of honor.”
+
+“Perhaps I was wrong,” sighed Josephine. “I think I should have trusted
+more to you. But then, who would have thought you could really doubt my
+love? You were ill; I could not bear you to go till you were well, quite
+well. I saw no other way to keep you but this, to treat you with feigned
+coldness. You saw the coldness, but not what it cost me to maintain it.
+Yes, I was unjust; and inconsiderate, for I had many furtive joys to
+sustain me: I had you in my house under my care--that thought was always
+sweet--I had a hand in everything that was for your good, for your
+comfort. I helped Jacintha make your soup and your chocolate every day.
+I had the delight of lining the dressing-gown you were to wear. I had
+always some little thing or other to do for you. These kept me up: I
+forgot in my selfishness that you had none of these supports, and that
+I was driving you to despair. I am a foolish, disingenuous woman: I have
+been very culpable. Forgive me!”
+
+“Forgive you, angel of purity and goodness? I alone am to blame.
+What right had I to doubt your heart? I knew the whole story of your
+marriage; I saw your sweet pale face; but I was not pure enough to
+comprehend angelic virtue and unselfishness. Well, I am brought to
+my senses. There is but one thing for me to do--you bade me leave you
+to-morrow.”
+
+“I was very cruel.”
+
+“No! not cruel, wise. But I will be wiser. I shall go to-night.”
+
+“To-night, Camille?” said Josephine, turning pale.
+
+“Ay! for to-night I am strong; to-morrow I may be weak. To-night
+everything thrusts me on the right path. To-morrow everything will draw
+me from it. Do not cry, beloved one; you and I have a hard fight. We
+must be true allies; whenever one is weak, then is the time for the
+other to be strong. I have been weaker than you, to my shame be it said;
+but this is my hour of strength. A light from heaven shows me my path.
+I am full of passion, but like you I have honor. You are Raynal’s wife,
+and--Raynal saved my life.”
+
+“Ah! is it possible? When? where? may Heaven bless him for it!”
+
+“Ask HIM; and say I told you of it--I have not strength to tell it you,
+but I will go to-night.”
+
+Then Josephine, who had resisted till all her strength was gone,
+whispered with a blush that it was too late to get a conveyance.
+
+“I need none to carry my sword, my epaulets, and my love for you. I
+shall go on foot.”
+
+Josephine said nothing, but she began to walk slower and slower. And
+so the unfortunate pair came along creeping slowly with drooping heads
+towards the gate of the Pleasaunce. There their last walk in this world
+must end. Many a man and woman have gone to the scaffold with hearts
+less heavy and more hopeful than theirs.
+
+“Dry your eyes, Josephine,” said Camille with a deep sigh. “They are all
+out on the Pleasaunce.”
+
+“No, I will not dry my eyes,” cried Josephine, almost violently. “I care
+for nothing now.”
+
+The baroness, the doctor, and Rose, were all in the Pleasaunce: and as
+the pair came in, lo! every eye was bent on Josephine.
+
+She felt this, and her eyes sought the ground: benumbed as she was with
+despondency, she began now to dread some fresh stroke or other.
+
+Camille felt doubly guilty and confused. How they all look at us, he
+thought. Do they know what a villain I have been? He determined to slip
+away, and pack up, and begone. However, nobody took any notice of him.
+The baroness drew Josephine apart. And Rose followed her mother and
+sister with eyes bent on the ground.
+
+There was a strange solemnity about them all.
+
+Aubertin remained behind. But even he took no notice of Camille, but
+walked up and down with his hands behind him, and a sad and troubled
+face. Camille felt his utter desolation. He was nothing to any of them.
+He resolved to go at once, and charge Aubertin with his last adieus to
+the family. It was a wise and manly resolve. He stopped Aubertin in
+the middle of his walk, and said in a faint voice of the deepest
+dejection,--
+
+“Doctor, the time is come that I must once more thank you for all your
+goodness to me, and bid you all farewell.”
+
+“What, going before your strength is re-established?” said the doctor
+politely, but not warmly.
+
+“I am out of all danger, thanks to your skill.”
+
+“Colonel, at another time I should insist upon your staying a day or two
+longer; but now I think it would be unadvisable to press you to stay.
+Ah, colonel, you came to a happy house, but you leave a sad one. Poor
+Madame Raynal!”
+
+“Sir!”
+
+“You saw the baroness draw her aside.”
+
+“Y-yes.”
+
+“By this time she knows it.”
+
+“In Heaven’s name what do you mean?” asked Camille.
+
+“I forgot; you are not aware of the calamity that has fallen upon our
+beloved Josephine; on the darling of the house.”
+
+Camille turned cold with vague apprehension. But he contrived to stammer
+out, “No; tell me! for Heaven’s sake tell me.”
+
+The doctor thus pressed revealed all in a very few words. “My poor
+friend,” said he solemnly, “her husband--is dead.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV.
+
+
+The baroness, as I have said, drew Josephine aside, and tried to break
+to her the sad news: but her own grief overcame her, and bursting into
+tears she bewailed the loss of her son. Josephine was greatly shocked.
+Death!--Raynal dead--her true, kind friend dead--her benefactor dead.
+She clung to her mother’s neck, and sobbed with her. Presently she
+withdrew her face and suddenly hid it in both her hands.
+
+She rose and kissed her mother once more: and went to her own room: and
+then, though there was none to see her, she hid her wet, but burning,
+cheeks in her hands.
+
+Josephine confined herself for some days to her own room, leaving it
+only to go to the chapel in the park, where she spent hours in prayers
+for the dead and in self-humiliation. Her “tender conscience” accused
+herself bitterly for not having loved this gallant spirit more than she
+had.
+
+Camille realized nothing at first; he looked all confused in the
+doctor’s face, and was silent. Then after awhile he said, “Dead? Raynal
+dead?”
+
+“Killed in action.”
+
+A red flush came to Camille’s face, and his eyes went down to the ground
+at his very feet, nor did he once raise them while the doctor told him
+how the sad news had come. “Picard the notary brought us the Moniteur,
+and there was Commandant Raynal among the killed in a cavalry skirmish.”
+ With this, he took the journal from his pocket, and Camille read it,
+with awe-struck, and other feelings he would have been sorry to see
+analyzed. He said not a word; and lowered his eyes to the ground.
+
+“And now,” said Aubertin, “you will excuse me. I must go to my poor
+friend the baroness. She had a mother’s love for him who is no more:
+well she might.”
+
+Aubertin went away, and left Dujardin standing there like a statue, his
+eyes still glued to the ground at his feet.
+
+The doctor was no sooner out of sight, than Camille raised his eyes
+furtively, like a guilty person, and looked irresolutely this way
+and that: at last he turned and went back to the place where he had
+meditated suicide and murder; looked down at it a long while, then
+looked up to heaven--then fell suddenly on his knees: and so remained
+till night-fall. Then he came back to the chateau.
+
+He whispered to himself, “And I am afraid it is too late to go away
+to-night.” He went softly into the saloon. Nobody was there but Rose and
+Aubertin. At sight of him Rose got up and left the room. But I suppose
+she went to Josephine; for she returned in a few minutes, and rang the
+bell, and ordered some supper to be brought up for Colonel Dujardin.
+
+“You have not dined, I hear,” said she, very coldly.
+
+“I was afraid you were gone altogether,” said the doctor: then turning
+to Rose, “He told me he was going this evening. You had better stay
+quiet another day or two,” added he, kindly.
+
+“Do you think so?” said Camille, timidly.
+
+He stayed upon these terms. And now he began to examine himself. “Did
+I wish him dead? I hope I never formed such a thought! I don’t remember
+ever wishing him dead.” And he went twice a day to that place by the
+stream, and thought very solemnly what a terrible thing ungoverned
+passion is; and repented--not eloquently, but silently, sincerely.
+
+But soon his impatient spirit began to torment itself again. Why did
+Josephine shun him now? Ah! she loved Raynal now that he was dead. Women
+love the thing they have lost; so he had heard say. In that case, the
+very sight of him would of course be odious to her: he could understand
+that. The absolute, unreasoning faith he once had in her had been
+so rudely shaken by her marriage with Raynal, that now he could only
+believe just so much as he saw, and he saw that she shunned him.
+
+He became moody, sad, and disconsolate: and as Josephine shunned him, so
+he avoided all the others, and wandered for hours by himself, perplexed
+and miserable. After awhile, he became conscious that he was under a
+sort of surveillance. Rose de Beaurepaire, who had been so kind to him
+when he was confined to his own room, but had taken little notice of him
+since he came down, now resumed her care of him, and evidently made it
+her business to keep up his heart. She used to meet him out walking in
+a mysterious way, and in short, be always falling in with him and trying
+to cheer him up: with tolerable success.
+
+Such was the state of affairs when the party was swelled and matters
+complicated by the arrival of one we have lost sight of.
+
+Edouard Riviere retarded his cure by an impatient spirit: but he got
+well at last, and his uncle drove him in the cabriolet to his own
+quarters. The news of the house had been told him by letter, but, of
+course, in so vague and general a way that, thinking he knew all, in
+reality he knew nothing.
+
+Josephine had married Raynal. The marriage was sudden, but no doubt
+there was an attachment: he had some reason to believe in sudden
+attachments. Colonel Dujardin, an old acquaintance, had come back
+to France wounded, and the good doctor had undertaken his cure: this
+incident appeared neither strange nor any way important. What affected
+him most deeply was the death of Raynal, his personal friend and patron.
+But when his tyrants, as he called the surgeon and his uncle, gave him
+leave to go home, all feelings were overpowered by his great joy at the
+prospect of seeing Rose. He walked over to Beaurepaire, his arm in a
+sling, his heart beating. He was coming to receive the reward of all he
+had done, and all he had attempted. “I will surprise them,” thought he.
+“I will see her face when I come in at the door: oh, happy hour! this
+pays for all.” He entered the house without announcing himself; he went
+softly up to the saloon; to his great disappointment he found no one
+but the baroness: she received him kindly, but not with the warmth he
+expected. She was absorbed in her new grief. He asked timidly after her
+daughters. “Madame Raynal bears up, for the sake of others. You will
+not, however, see her: she keeps her room. My daughter Rose is taking
+a walk, I believe.” After some polite inquiries, and sympathy with his
+accident, the baroness retired to indulge her grief, and Edouard thus
+liberated ran in search of his beloved.
+
+He met her at the gate of the Pleasaunce, but not alone. She was walking
+with an officer, a handsome, commanding, haughty, brilliant officer. She
+was walking by his side, talking earnestly to him.
+
+An arrow of ice shot through young Riviere; and then came a feeling of
+death at his heart, a new symptom in his young life.
+
+The next moment Rose caught sight of him. She flushed all over and
+uttered a little exclamation, and she bounded towards him like a little
+antelope, and put out both her hands at once. He could only give her
+one.
+
+“Ah!” she cried with an accent of heavenly pity, and took his hand with
+both hers.
+
+This was like the meridian sun coming suddenly on a cold place. He was
+all happiness.
+
+When Josephine heard he was come her eye flashed, and she said quickly,
+“I will come down to welcome him--dear Edouard!”
+
+The sisters looked at one another. Josephine blushed. Rose smiled and
+kissed her. She colored higher still, and said, “No, she was ashamed to
+go down.”
+
+“Why?”
+
+“Look at my face.”
+
+“I see nothing wrong with it, except that it eclipses other people’s,
+and I have long forgiven you that.”
+
+“Oh, yes, dear Rose: look what a color it has, and a fortnight ago it
+was pale as ashes.”
+
+“Never mind; do you expect me to regret that?”
+
+“Rose, I am a very bad woman.”
+
+“Are you, dear? then hook this for me.”
+
+“Yes, love. But I sometimes think you would forgive me if you knew how
+hard I pray to be better. Rose, I do try so to be as unhappy as I ought;
+but I can’t, I can’t. My cold heart seems as dead to unhappiness as once
+it was to happiness. Am I a heartless woman after all?”
+
+“Not altogether,” said Rose dryly. “Fasten my collar, dear, and don’t
+torment yourself. You have suffered much and nobly. It was Heaven’s
+will: you bowed to it. It was not Heaven’s will that you should be
+blighted altogether. Bow in this, too, to Heaven’s will: take things
+as they come, and do cease to try and reconcile feelings that are too
+opposite to live together.”
+
+“Ah! these are such comfortable words, Rose; but mamma will see this
+dreadful color in my cheek, and what can I say to her?”
+
+“Ten to one it will not be observed; and if it should, I will say it is
+the excitement of seeing Edouard. Leave all to me.”
+
+Josephine greeted Edouard most affectionately, drew from him his whole
+history, and petted him and sympathized with him deliciously, and made
+him the hero of the evening. Camille, who was not naturally of a jealous
+temper, bore this very well at first, but at last he looked so bitter
+at her neglect of him, that Rose took him aside to soothe him. Edouard,
+missing the auditor he most valued, and seeing her in secret conference
+with the brilliant colonel, felt a return of the jealous pangs that
+had seized him at first sight of the man; and so they played at cross
+purposes.
+
+At another period of the evening the conversation became more general;
+and Edouard took a dislike to Colonel Dujardin. A young man of
+twenty-eight nearly always looks on a boy of twenty-one with the air of
+a superior, and this assumption, not being an ill-natured one, is apt to
+be so easy and so undefined that the younger hardly knows how to resent
+or to resist it. But Edouard was a little vain as we know; and the
+Colonel jarred him terribly. His quick haughty eye jarred him. His
+regimentals jarred him: they fitted like a glove. His mustache and his
+manner jarred him, and, worst of all, his cool familiarity with Rose,
+who seemed to court him rather than be courted by him. He put this act
+of Rose’s to the colonel’s account, according to the custom of lovers,
+and revenged himself in a small way by telling Josephine in her ear
+“that the colonel produced on his mind the effect of an intolerable
+puppy.”
+
+Josephine colored up and looked at him with a momentary surprise. She
+said quietly, “Military men do give themselves some airs, but he is very
+amiable at bottom. You must make a better acquaintance with him, and
+then he will reveal to you his nobler qualities.”--“Oh! I have no
+particular desire,” sneered unlucky Edouard. Sweet as Josephine was,
+this was too much for her: she said nothing; but she quietly turned
+Edouard over to Aubertin, and joined Rose, and under cover of her had a
+sweet timid chat with her falsely accused.
+
+This occupied the two so entirely that Edouard was neglected. This hurt
+his foible, and seemed to be so unkind on the very first day of his
+return that he made his adieus to the baroness, and marched off in
+dudgeon unobserved.
+
+Rose missed him first, but said nothing.
+
+When Josephine saw he was gone, she uttered a little exclamation, and
+looked at Rose. Rose put on a mien of haughty indifference, but the
+water was in her eyes.
+
+Josephine looked sorrowful.
+
+When they talked over everything together at night, she reproached
+herself. “We behaved ill to poor Edouard: we neglected him.”
+
+“He is a little cross, ill-tempered fellow,” said Rose pettishly.
+
+“Oh, no! no!”
+
+“And as vain as a peacock.”
+
+“Has he not some right to be vain in this house?”
+
+“Yes,--no. I am very angry with him. I won’t hear a word in his favor,”
+ said Rose pouting: then she gave his defender a kiss. “Yes, dear,” said
+Josephine, answering the kiss, and ignoring the words, “he is a dear;
+and he is not cross, nor so very vain, poor boy! now don’t you see what
+it was?”
+
+“No.”
+
+“Yes, you do, you little cunning thing: you are too shrewd not to see
+everything.”
+
+“No, indeed, Josephine; do tell me, don’t keep me waiting: I can’t bear
+that.”
+
+“Well, then--jealous! A little.”
+
+“Jealous? Oh, what fun! Of Camille? Ha! ha! Little goose!”
+
+“And,” said Josephine very seriously, “I almost think he would be
+jealous of any one that occupied your attention. I watched him more or
+less all the evening.”
+
+“All the better. I’ll torment my lord.”
+
+“Heaven forbid you should be so cruel.”
+
+“Oh! I will not make him unhappy, but I’ll tease him a little; it is not
+in nature to abstain.”
+
+This foible detected in her lover, Rose was very gay at the prospect of
+amusement it afforded her.
+
+And I think I have many readers who at this moment are awaiting unmixed
+enjoyment and hilarity from the same source.
+
+I wish them joy of their prospect.
+
+Edouard called the next day: he wore a gloomy air. Rose met this with
+a particularly cheerful one; on this, Edouard’s face cleared up, and
+he was himself again; agreeable as this was, Rose felt a little
+disappointed. “I am afraid he is not very jealous after all,” thought
+she.
+
+Josephine left her room this day and mingled once more with the family.
+The bare sight of her was enough for Camille at first, but after awhile
+he wanted more. He wanted to be often alone with her; but several causes
+co-operated to make her shy of giving him many such opportunities:
+first, her natural delicacy, coupled with her habit of self-denial; then
+her fear of shocking her mother, and lastly her fear of her own heart,
+and of Camille, whose power over her she knew. For Camille, when he did
+get a sweet word alone with her, seemed to forget everything except that
+she was his betrothed, and that he had come back alive to marry her.
+He spoke to her of his love with an ardor and an urgency that made her
+thrill with happiness, but at the same time shrink with a certain fear
+and self-reproach. Possessed with a feeling no stronger than hers, but
+single, he did not comprehend the tumult, the trouble, the daily contest
+in her heart. The wind seemed to him to be always changing, and hot and
+cold the same hour. Since he did not even see that she was acting in
+hourly fear of her mother’s eye, he was little likely to penetrate
+her more hidden sentiments; and then he had not touched her
+key-note,--self-denial.
+
+Women are self-denying and uncandid. Men are self-indulgent and
+outspoken.
+
+And this is the key to a thousand double misunderstandings; for believe
+me, good women are just as stupid in misunderstanding men as honest men
+are in misunderstanding women.
+
+To Camille, Josephine’s fluctuations, joys, tremors, love, terror,
+modesty, seemed one grand total, caprice. The component parts of it he
+saw not; and her caprice tortured him almost to madness. Too penitent
+to give way again to violent passion, he gently fretted. His health
+retrograded and his temper began to sour. The eye of timid love that
+watched him with maternal anxiety from under its long lashes saw this
+with dismay, and Rose, who looked into her sister’s bosom, devoted
+herself once more to soothe him without compromising Josephine’s
+delicacy. Matters were not so bad but what a fine sprightly girl like
+Rose could cheer up a dejected but manly colonel; and Rose was generally
+successful.
+
+But then, unfortunately, this led to a fresh mystification. Riviere’s
+natural jealousy revived, and found constant food in the attention Rose
+paid Camille, a brilliant colonel living in the house while he, poor
+wretch, lived in lodgings. The false position of all the parties brought
+about some singular turns. I give from their number one that forms a
+link, though a small one, in my narrative.
+
+One day Edouard came to tell Rose she was making him unhappy; he had her
+alone in the Pleasaunce; she received him with a radiant smile, and they
+had a charming talk,--a talk all about HIM: what the family owed him,
+etc.
+
+On this, his late jealousy and sense of injury seemed a thing of three
+years ago, and never to return. So hard it is for the loving heart to
+resist its sun.
+
+Jacintha came with a message from the colonel: “Would it be agreeable to
+Mademoiselle Rose to walk with him at the usual hour?”
+
+“Certainly,” said Rose.
+
+As Jacintha was retiring Edouard called to her to stop a minute.
+
+Then, turning to Rose, he begged her very ceremoniously to reconsider
+that determination.
+
+“What determination?”
+
+“To sacrifice me to this Colonel Dujardin.” Still politely, only a
+little grimly.
+
+Rose opened her eyes. “Are you mad?” inquired she with quiet hauteur.
+
+“Neither mad nor a fool,” was the reply. “I love you too well to share
+your regard with any one, upon any terms; least of all upon these, that
+there is to be a man in the world at whose beck and call you are to
+be, and at whose orders you are to break off an interview with me.
+Perdition!”
+
+“Dear Edouard, what folly! Can you suspect me of discourtesy, as well as
+of--I know not what. Colonel Dujardin will join us, that is all, and we
+shall take a little walk with him.”
+
+“Not I. I decline the intrusion; you are engaged with me, and I have
+things to say to you that are not fit for that puppy to hear. So choose
+between me and him, and choose forever.”
+
+Rose colored. “I should be very sorry to choose either of you forever;
+but for this afternoon I choose you.”
+
+“Oh, thank you--my whole life shall prove my gratitude for this
+preference.”
+
+Rose beckoned Jacintha, and sent her with an excuse to Colonel Dujardin.
+She then turned with an air of mock submission to Edouard. “I am at
+monsieur’s ORDERS.”
+
+Then this unhappy novice, being naturally good-natured, thanked her
+again and again for her condescension in setting his heart at rest. He
+proposed a walk, since his interference had lost her one. She yielded
+a cold assent. This vexed him, but he took it for granted it would wear
+off before the end of the walk. Edouard’s heart bounded, but he loved
+her too sincerely to be happy unless he could see her happy too; the
+malicious thing saw this, or perhaps knew it by instinct, and by means
+of this good feeling of his she revenged herself for his tyranny. She
+tortured him as only a woman can torture, and as even she can torture
+only a worthy man, and one who loves her. In the course of that short
+walk this inexperienced girl, strong in the instincts and inborn arts
+of her sex, drove pins and needles, needles and pins, of all sorts and
+sizes, through her lover’s heart.
+
+She was everything by turns, except kind, and nothing for long together.
+She was peevish, she was ostentatiously patient and submissive, she was
+inattentive to her companion and seemingly wrapped up in contemplation
+of absent things and persons, the colonel to wit; she was dogged,
+repulsive, and cold; and she never was herself a single moment. They
+returned to the gate of the Pleasaunce. “Well, mademoiselle,” said
+Riviere very sadly, “that interloper might as well have been with us.”
+
+“Of course he might, and you would have lost nothing by permitting me
+to be courteous to a guest and an invalid. If you had not played the
+tyrant, and taken the matter into your own hands, I should have found
+means to soothe your jeal--I mean your vanity; but you preferred to have
+your own way. Well, you have had it.”
+
+“Yes, mademoiselle, you have given me a lesson; you have shown me how
+idle it is to attempt to force a young lady’s inclinations in anything.”
+
+He bade her good-day, and went away sorrowful.
+
+She cut Camille dead for the rest of the day.
+
+Next morning, early, Edouard called expressly to see her. “Mademoiselle
+Rose,” said he, humbly, “I called to apologize for the ungentlemanly
+tone of my remonstrances yesterday.”
+
+“Fiddle-dee,” said Rose. “Don’t do it again; that is the best apology.”
+
+“I am not likely to offend so again,” said he sadly. “I am going away. I
+am sorry to say I am promoted; my new post is ten leagues. HE WILL HAVE
+IT ALL HIS OWN WAY NOW. But perhaps it is best. Were I to stay here, I
+foresee you would soon lose whatever friendly feeling you have for me.”
+
+“Am I so changeable? I am not considered so,” remonstrated Rose, gently.
+
+Riviere explained; “I am not vain,” said he, with that self-knowledge
+which is so general an attribute of human beings; “no man less so, nor
+am I jealous; but I respect myself, and I could never be content to
+share your time and your regard with Colonel Dujardin, nor with a much
+better man. See now; he has made me arrogant. Was I ever so before?”
+
+“No! no! no! and I forgive you now, my poor Edouard.”
+
+“He has made you cold as ice to me.”
+
+“No! that was my own wickedness and spitefulness.”
+
+“Wickedness, spitefulness! they are not in your nature. It is all that
+wretch’s doing.”
+
+Rose sighed, but she said nothing; for she saw that to excuse Camille
+would only make the jealous one more bitter against him.
+
+“Will you deign to write to me at my new post? once a month? in answer
+to my letters?”
+
+“Yes, dear. But you will ride over sometimes to see us.”
+
+“Oh, yes; but for some little time I shall not be able. The duties of a
+new post.”
+
+“Perhaps in a month--a fortnight?”
+
+“Sooner perhaps; the moment I hear that man is out of the house.”
+
+Edouard went away, dogged and sad; Rose shut herself up in her room and
+had a good cry. In the afternoon Josephine came and remonstrated with
+her. “You have not walked with him at all to-day.”
+
+“No; you must pet him yourself for once. I hate the sight of him; it
+has made mischief between Edouard and me, my being so attentive to him.
+Edouard is jealous, and I cannot wonder. After all, what right have I to
+mystify him who honors me with his affection?”
+
+Then, being pressed with questions by Josephine, she related to her all
+that had passed between Edouard and her, word for word.
+
+“Poor Camille!” sighed Josephine the just.
+
+“Oh, dear, yes! poor Camille! who has the power to make us all
+miserable, and who does it, and will go on doing it until he is happy
+himself.”
+
+“Ah! would to Heaven I could make him as happy as he deserves to be.”
+
+“You could easily make him much happier than that. And why not do it?”
+
+“O Rose,” said Josephine, shocked, “how can you advise me so?”
+
+She then asked her if she thought it possible that Camille could be
+ignorant of her heart.
+
+“Josephine,” replied Rose, angrily, “these men are absurd: they believe
+only what they see. I have done what I can for you and Camille, but it
+is useless. Would you have him believe you love him, you must yourself
+be kind to him; and it would be a charitable action: you would make four
+unhappy people happy, or, at least, put them on the road; NOW they are
+off the road, and, by what I have seen to-day, I think, if we go on so
+much longer, it will be too late to try to return. Come, Josephine,
+for my sake! Let me go and tell him you will consent--to all our
+happinesses. There, the crime is mine.” And she ran off in spite of
+Josephine’s faint and hypocritical entreaties. She returns the next
+minute looking all aghast. “It is too late,” said she. “He is going
+away. I am sure he is, for he is packing up his things to go. I spied
+through the old place and saw him. He was sighing like a furnace as he
+strapped his portmanteau. I hate him, of course, but I was sorry for
+him. I could not help being. He sighed so all the time, piteously.”
+
+Josephine turned pale, and lifted her hands in surprise and dismay.
+
+“Depend on it, Josephine, we are wrong,” said Rose, firmly: “these
+wretches will not stand our nonsense above a certain time: they are not
+such fools. We are mismanaging: one gone, the other going; both losing
+faith in us.”
+
+Josephine’s color returned to her cheek, and then mounted high.
+Presently she smiled, a smile full of conscious power and furtive
+complacency, and said quietly, “He will not go.”
+
+Rose was pleased, but not surprised, to hear her sister speak so
+confidently, for she knew her power over Camille. “That is right,” said
+she, “go to him, and say two honest words: ‘I bid you stay.’”
+
+“O Rose! no!”
+
+“Poltroon! You know he would go down on his knees, and stay directly.”
+
+“No: I should blush all my life before you and him. I COULD not. I
+should let him go sooner, almost. Oh, no! I will never ask a man to stay
+who wishes to leave me. But just you go to him, and say Madame Raynal
+is going to take a little walk: will he do her the honor to be her
+companion? Not a word more, if you love me.”
+
+“I’ll go. Hypocrite!”
+
+
+Josephine received Camille with a bright smile. She seemed in unusually
+good spirits, and overflowing with kindness and innocent affection. On
+this his high gloomy brow relaxed, and all his prospects brightened as
+by magic. Then she communicated to him a number of little plans for next
+week and the week after. Among the rest he was to go with her and Rose
+to Frejus. “Such a sweet place: I want to show it you. You will come?”
+
+He hesitated a single moment: a moment of intense anxiety to the smiling
+Josephine.
+
+“Yes! he would come: it was a great temptation, he saw so little of
+her.”
+
+“Well, you will see more of me now.”
+
+“Shall I see you every day--alone, I mean?”
+
+“Oh, yes, if you wish it,” replied Josephine, in an off-hand,
+indifferent way.
+
+He seized her hand and devoured it with kisses. “Foolish thing!”
+ murmured she, looking down on him with ineffable tenderness. “Should I
+not be always with you if I consulted my inclination?--let me go.”
+
+“No! consult your inclination a little longer.”
+
+“Must I?”
+
+“Yes; that shall be your punishment.”
+
+“For what? What have I done?” asked she with an air of great innocence.
+
+“You have made me happy, me who adore you,” was the evasive reply.
+
+Josephine came in from her walk with a high color and beaming eyes, and
+screamed, “Run, Rose!”
+
+On this concise, and to us not very clear instruction, Rose slipped up
+the secret stair. She saw Camille come in and gravely unpack his little
+portmanteau, and dispose his things in the drawers with soldier-like
+neatness, and hum an agreeable march. She came and told Josephine.
+
+“Ah!” said Josephine with a little sigh of pleasure, and a gentle
+triumph in her eyes.
+
+She had not only got her desire, but had arrived at it her way,--woman’s
+way, round about.
+
+This adroit benevolence led to more than she bargained for. She and
+Camille were now together every day: and their hearts, being under
+restraint in public, melted together all the more in their stolen
+interviews.
+
+At the third delicious interview the modest Camille begged Josephine to
+be his wife directly.
+
+Have you noticed those half tame deer that come up to you in a park so
+lovingly, with great tender eyes, and, being now almost within reach,
+stop short, and with bodies fixed like statues on pedestals, crane
+out their graceful necks for sugar, or bread, or a chestnut, or a
+pocket-handkerchief? Do but offer to put your hand upon them, away they
+bound that moment twenty yards, and then stand quite still, and look at
+your hand and you, with great inquiring, suspicious, tender eyes.
+
+So Josephine started at Camille’s audacious proposal. “Never mention
+such a thing to me again: or--or, I will not walk with you any more:”
+ then she thrilled with pleasure at the obnoxious idea, “she Camille’s
+wife!” and colored all over--with rage, Camille thought. He promised
+submissively not to renew the topic: no more he did till next day.
+Josephine had spent nearly the whole interval in thinking of it; so she
+was prepared to put him down by calm reasons. She proceeded to do so,
+gently, but firmly.
+
+Lo and behold! what does he do, but meets her with just as many reasons,
+and just as calm ones: and urges them gently, but firmly.
+
+Heaven had been very kind to them: why should they be unkind to
+themselves? They had had a great escape: why not accept the happiness,
+as, being persons of honor, they had accepted the misery? with many
+other arguments, differing in other things, but agreeing in this, that
+they were all sober, grave, and full of common-sense.
+
+Finding him not defenceless on the score of reason, she shifted her
+ground and appealed to his delicacy. On this he appealed to her
+love, and then calm reason was jostled off the field, and passion and
+sentiment battled in her place.
+
+In these contests day by day renewed, Camille had many advantages.
+
+Rose, though she did not like him, had now declared on his side. She
+refused to show him the least attention. This threw him on Josephine:
+and when Josephine begged her to help reduce Camille to reason, her
+answer would be,--
+
+“Hypocrite!” with a kiss: or else she would say, with a half comic
+petulance, “No! no! I am on his side. Give him his own way, or he will
+make us all four miserable.”
+
+Thus Josephine’s ally went over to the enemy.
+
+And then this coy young lady’s very power of resistance began to give
+way. She had now battled for months against her own heart: first for her
+mother; then, in a far more terrible conflict for Raynal, for honor and
+purity; and of late she had been battling, still against her own heart,
+for delicacy, for etiquette, things very dear to her, but not so great,
+holy, and sustaining as honor and charity that were her very household
+gods: and so, just when the motives of resistance were lowered, the
+length of the resistance began to wear her out.
+
+For nothing is so hard to her sex as a long steady struggle. In matters
+physical, this is the thing the muscles of the fair cannot stand; in
+matters intellectual and moral, the long strain it is that beats them
+dead.
+
+Do not look for a Bacona, a Newtona, a Handella, a Victoria Huga.
+
+Some American ladies tell us education has stopped the growth of these.
+
+No! mesdames. These are not in nature.
+
+They can bubble letters in ten minutes that you could no more deliver
+to order in ten days than a river can play like a fountain. They can
+sparkle gems of stories: they can flash little diamonds of poems. The
+entire sex has never produced one opera nor one epic that mankind could
+tolerate: and why? these come by long, high-strung labor. But, weak as
+they are in the long run of everything but the affections (and there
+giants), they are all overpowering while their gallop lasts. Fragilla
+shall dance any two of you flat on the floor before four o’clock, and
+then dance on till the peep of day.
+
+Only you trundle off to your business as usual, and could dance again
+the next night, and so on through countless ages.
+
+She who danced you into nothing is in bed, a human jelly tipped with
+headache.
+
+What did Josephine say to Rose one day? “I am tired of saying ‘No! no!
+no! no! no!’ forever and ever to him I love.”
+
+But this was not all. She was not free from self-reproach. Camille’s
+faith in her had stood firm. Hers in him had not. She had wronged him,
+first by believing him false, then by marrying another. One day she
+asked his pardon for this. He replied that he had forgiven that; but
+would she be good enough to make him forget it?
+
+“I wish I could.”
+
+“You can. Marry me: then your relation to that man will seem but a
+hideous dream. I shall be able to say, looking at you, my wife, ‘I was
+faithful: I suffered something for her; I came home: she loved me still;
+the proof is, she was my wife within three months of my return.’”
+
+When he said that to her in the Pleasaunce, if there had been a priest
+at hand--. In a word, Josephine longed to show him her love, yet wished
+not to shock her mother, nor offend her own sense of delicacy; but
+Camille cared for nothing but his love. To sacrifice love and happiness,
+even for a time, to etiquette, seemed to him to be trifling with the
+substance of great things for the shadow of petty things; and he said
+so: sometimes sadly, sometimes almost bitterly.
+
+So Josephine was a beleagured fortress, attacked with one will, and
+defended by troops, one-third of which were hot on the side of the
+besiegers.
+
+When singleness attacks division, you know the result beforehand. Why
+then should I spin words? I will not trace so ill-matched a contest step
+by step, sentence by sentence: let me rather hasten to relate the one
+peculiarity that arose out of this trite contest, where, under the names
+of Camille and Josephine, the two great sexes may be seen acting the
+whole world-wide distich,--
+
+     “It’s a man’s part to try,
+     And a woman’s to deny [for a while?].”
+
+Finding her own resolutions oozing away, Josephine caught at another
+person.
+
+She said to Camille before Rose,--
+
+“Even if I could bring myself to snatch at happiness in this indelicate
+way--scarce a month after, oh!” And there ended the lady’s sentence.
+In the absence of a legitimate full stop, she put one hand before her
+lovely face to hide it, and so no more. But some two minutes after she
+delivered the rest in the form and with the tone of a distinct remark,
+“No: my mother would never consent.”
+
+“Yes, she would if you could be brought to implore her as earnestly as I
+implore you.”
+
+“Now would she?” asked Josephine, turning quickly to her sister.
+
+“No, never. Our mother would look with horror on such a proposal. A
+daughter of hers to marry within a twelvemonth of her widowhood!”
+
+“There, you see, Camille.”
+
+“And, besides, she loved Raynal so; she has not forgotten him as we
+have, almost.”
+
+“Ungrateful creature that I am!” sighed Josephine!
+
+“She mourns for him every day. Often I see her eyes suddenly fill; that
+is for him. Josephine’s influence with mamma is very great: it is double
+mine: but if we all went on our knees to her, the doctor and all, she
+would never consent.”
+
+“There you see, Camille: and I could not defy my mother, even for you.”
+
+Camille sighed.
+
+“I see everything is against me, even my love: for that love is too much
+akin to veneration to propose to you a clandestine marriage.”
+
+“Oh, thank you! bless you for respecting as well as loving me, dear
+Camille,” said Josephine.
+
+These words, uttered with gentle warmth, were some consolation to
+Camille, and confirmed him, as they were intended to do, in the above
+good resolution. He smiled.
+
+“Maladroit!” muttered Rose.
+
+“Why maladroit?” asked Camille, opening his eyes.
+
+“Let us talk of something else,” replied Rose, coolly.
+
+Camille turned red. He understood that he had done something very
+stupid, but he could not conceive what. He looked from one sister to the
+other alternately. Rose was smiling ironically, Josephine had her eyes
+bent demurely on a handkerchief she was embroidering.
+
+That evening Camille drew Rose aside, and asked for an explanation of
+her “maladroit.”
+
+“So it was,” replied Rose, sharply.
+
+But as this did not make the matter quite clear, Camille begged a little
+further explanation.
+
+“Was it your part to make difficulties?”
+
+“No, indeed.”
+
+“Was it for you to tell her a secret marriage would not be delicate?
+Do you think she will be behind you in delicacy? or that a love without
+respect will satisfy her? yet you must go and tell her you respected her
+too much to ask her to marry you secretly. In other words, situated as
+she is, you asked her not to marry you at all: she consented to that
+directly; what else could you expect?”
+
+“Maladroit! indeed,” said Camille, “but I would not have said it, only I
+thought”--
+
+“You thought nothing would induce her to marry secretly, so you said to
+yourself, ‘I will assume a virtue: I will do a bit of cheap self-denial:
+decline to the sound of trumpets what another will be sure to deny me if
+I don’t--ha! ha!’--well, for your comfort, I am by no means so sure she
+might not have been brought to do ANYTHING for you, except openly defy
+mamma: but now of course”--
+
+And here this young lady’s sentence ended: for the sisters, unlike in
+most things, were one in grammar.
+
+Camille was so disconcerted and sad at what he had done, that Rose began
+to pity him: so she rallied him a little longer in spite of her pity:
+and then all of a sudden gave him her hand, and said she would try and
+repair the mischief.
+
+He began to smother her hand with kisses.
+
+“Oh!” said she, “I don’t deserve all that: I have a motive of my own;
+let me alone, child, do. Your unlucky speech will be quoted to me a
+dozen times. Never mind.”
+
+Rose went and bribed Josephine to consent.
+
+“Come, mamma shall not know, and as for you, you shall scarcely move in
+the matter; only do not oppose me very violently, and all will be well.”
+
+“Ah, Rose!” said Josephine; “it is delightful--terrible, I mean--to have
+a little creature about one that reads one like this. What shall I do?
+What shall I do?”
+
+“Why, do the best you can under all the circumstances. His wound is
+healed, you know; he must go back to the army; you have both suffered to
+the limits of mortal endurance. Is he to go away unhappy, in any
+doubt of your affection? and you to remain behind with the misery of
+self-reproach added to the desolation of absence?--think.”
+
+“It is cruel. But to deceive my mother!”
+
+“Do not say deceive our mother; that is such a shocking phrase.”
+
+Rose then reminded Josephine that their confessor had told them a wise
+reticence was not the same thing as a moral deceit. She reminded her,
+too, how often they had acted on his advice and always with good effect;
+how many anxieties and worries they had saved their mother by reticence.
+Josephine assented warmly to this.
+
+Was there not some reason to think they had saved their mother’s very
+life by these reticences? Josephine assented. “And, Josephine, you are
+of age; you are your own mistress; you have a right to marry whom you
+please: and, sooner or later, you will certainly marry Camille. I doubt
+whether even our mother could prevail on you to refuse him altogether.
+So it is but a question of time, and of giving our mother pain, or
+sparing her pain. Dear mamma is old; she is prejudiced. Why shock her
+prejudices? She could not be brought to understand the case: these
+things never happened in her day. Everything seems to have gone by rule
+then. Let us do nothing to worry her for the short time she has to
+live. Let us take a course between pain to her and cruelty to you and
+Camille.”
+
+These arguments went far to convince Josephine: for her own heart
+supported them. She went from her solid objections to untenable ones--a
+great point gained. She urged the difficulty, the impossibility of a
+secret marriage.
+
+Camille burst in here: he undertook at once to overcome these imaginary
+difficulties. “They could be married at a distance.”
+
+“You will find no priest who will consent to do such a wicked thing as
+marry us without my mother’s knowledge,” objected Josephine.
+
+“Oh! as to that,” said Rose, “you know the mayor marries people
+nowadays.”
+
+“I will not be married again without a priest,” said Josephine, sharply.
+
+“Nor I,” said Camille. “I know a mayor who will do the civil forms for
+me, and a priest who will marry me in the sight of Heaven, and both will
+keep it secret for love of me till it shall please Josephine to throw
+off this disguise.”
+
+“Who is the priest?” inquired Josephine, keenly.
+
+“An old cure: he lives near Frejus: he was my tutor, and the mayor is
+the mayor of Frejus, also an old friend of mine.”
+
+“But what on earth will you say to them?”
+
+“That is my affair: I must give them some reasons which compel me to
+keep my marriage secret. Oh! I shall have to tell them some fibs, of
+course.”
+
+“There, I thought so! I will not have you telling fibs; it lowers you.”
+
+“Of course it does; but you can’t have secrecy without a fib or two.”
+
+“Fibs that will injure no one,” said Rose, majestically.
+
+From this day Camille began to act as well as to talk. He bought a
+light caleche and a powerful horse, and elected factotum Dard his groom.
+Camille rode over to Frejus and told a made-up story to the old cure and
+the mayor, and these his old friends believed every word he said, and
+readily promised their services and strict secrecy.
+
+He told the young ladies what he had done.
+
+Rose approved. Josephine shook her head, and seeing matters going as
+her heart desired and her conscience did not quite approve, she suddenly
+affected to be next to nobody in the business--to be resigned, passive,
+and disposed of to her surprise by Queen Rose and King Camille, without
+herself taking any actual part in their proceedings.
+
+At last the great day arrived on which Camille and Josephine were to be
+married at Frejus.
+
+The mayor awaited them at eleven o’clock. The cure at twelve. The family
+had been duly prepared for this excursion by several smaller ones.
+
+Rose announced their intention over night; a part of it.
+
+“Mamma,” said she, blushing a little, “Colonel Dujardin is good enough
+to take us to Frejus tomorrow. It is a long way, and we must breakfast
+early or we shall not be back to dinner.”
+
+“Do so, my child. I hope you will have a fine day: and mind you take
+plenty of wraps with you in case of a shower.”
+
+At seven o’clock the next morning Camille and the two ladies took a
+hasty cup of coffee together instead of breakfast, and then Dard brought
+the caleche round.
+
+The ladies got in, and Camille had just taken the reins in his hand,
+when Jacintha screamed to him from the hall, “Wait a moment, colonel,
+wait a moment! The doctor! don’t go without the doctor!” And the next
+moment Dr. Aubertin appeared with his cloak on his arm, and, saluting
+the ladies politely, seated himself quietly in the vehicle before the
+party had recovered their surprise.
+
+The ladies managed to keep their countenances, but Dujardin’s
+discomfiture was evident.
+
+He looked piteously at Josephine, and then asked Aubertin if they were
+to set him down anywhere in particular.
+
+“Oh, no; I am going with you to Frejus,” was the quiet reply.
+
+Josephine quaked. Camille was devoured with secret rage: he lashed the
+horse and away they went.
+
+It was a silent party. The doctor seemed in a reverie. The others did
+not know what to think, much less to say. Aubertin sat by Camille’s
+side; so the latter could hold no secret communication with either lady.
+
+Now it was not the doctor’s habit to rise at this time of the morning:
+yet there he was, going with them to Frejus uninvited.
+
+Josephine was in agony; had their intention transpired through some
+imprudence of Camille?
+
+Camille was terribly uneasy. He concluded the secret had transpired
+through female indiscretion. Then they all tortured themselves as to the
+old man’s intention. But what seemed most likely was, that he was with
+them to prevent a clandestine marriage by his bare presence, without
+making a scene and shocking Josephine’s pride: and if so, was he there
+by his own impulse? No, it was rather to be feared that all this was
+done by order of the baroness. There was a finesse about it that smacked
+of a feminine origin, and the baroness was very capable of adopting such
+a means as this, to spare her own pride and her favorite daughter’s.
+“The clandestine” is not all sugar. A more miserable party never went
+along, even to a wedding.
+
+After waiting a long time for the doctor to declare himself, they turned
+desperate, and began to chatter all manner of trifles. This had a good
+effect: it roused Aubertin from his reverie, and presently he gave them
+the following piece of information: “I told you the other day that a
+nephew of mine was just dead; a nephew I had not seen for many years.
+Well, my friends, I received last night a hasty summons to his funeral.”
+
+“At Frejus?”
+
+“No, at Paris. The invitation was so pressing, that I was obliged to go.
+The letter informed me, however, that a diligence passes through Frejus,
+at eleven o’clock, for Paris. I heard you say you were going to
+Frejus; so I packed up a few changes of linen, and my MS., my work on
+entomology, which at my last visit to the capital all the publishers
+were mad enough to refuse: here it is. Apropos, has Jacintha put my bag
+into the carriage?”
+
+On this a fierce foot-search, and the bag was found. Meantime, Josephine
+leaned back in her seat with a sigh of thankfulness. She was more intent
+on not being found out than on being married. But Camille, who was more
+intent on being married than on not being found out, was asking himself,
+with fury, how on earth they should get rid of Aubertin in time.
+
+Well, of course, under such circumstances as these the diligence did
+not come to its time, nor till long after; and all the while, they were
+waiting for it they were failing their rendezvous with the mayor, and
+making their rendezvous with the curate impossible. But, above all,
+there was the risk of one or other of those friends coming up and
+blurting all out, taking for granted that the doctor must be in their
+confidence, or why bring him.
+
+At last, at half-past eleven o’clock, to their great relief, up came the
+diligence. The doctor prepared to take his place in the interior, when
+the conductor politely informed him that the vehicle stopped there a
+quarter of an hour.
+
+“In that case I will not abandon my friends,” said the doctor,
+affectionately.
+
+One of his friends gnashed his teeth at this mark of affection. But
+Josephine smiled sweetly.
+
+At last he was gone; but it wanted ten minutes only to twelve.
+
+Josephine inquired amiably, whether it would not be as well to postpone
+matters to another day--meaning forever. “My ARDOR is chilled,” said
+she, and showed symptoms of crying at what she had gone through.
+
+Camille replied by half dragging them to the mayor. That worthy received
+them with profound, though somewhat demure respect, and invited them to
+a table sumptuously served. The ladies, out of politeness, were about to
+assent, but Camille begged permission to postpone that part until after
+the ceremony.
+
+At last, to their astonishment, they were married. Then, with a promise
+to return and dine with the mayor, they went to the cure. Lo and behold!
+he was gone to visit a sick person. “He had waited a long time for
+them,” said the servant.
+
+Josephine was much disconcerted, and showed a disposition to cry again.
+The servant, a good-natured girl, nosed a wedding, and offered to run
+and bring his reverence in a minute.
+
+Presently there came an old silvery-haired man, who addressed them all
+as his children. He took them to the church, and blessed their union;
+and for the first time Josephine felt as if Heaven consented. They took
+a gentle farewell of him, and went back to the mayor’s to dine; and
+at this stage of the business Rose and Josephine at last effected a
+downright simultaneous cry, apropos of nothing that was then occurring.
+
+This refreshed them mightily, and they glowed at the mayor’s table like
+roses washed with dew.
+
+But oh! how glad at heart they all were to find themselves in the
+carriage once more going home to Beaurepaire.
+
+Rose and Josephine sat intertwined on the back seat; Camille, the reins
+in his right hand, nearly turned his back on the horse, and leaned back
+over to them and purred to Rose and his wife with ineffable triumph and
+tenderness.
+
+The lovers were in Elysium, and Rose was not a little proud of her good
+management in ending all their troubles. Their mother received them
+back with great, and as they fancied, with singular, affection. She was
+beginning to be anxious about them, she said. Then her kindness gave
+these happy souls a pang it never gave them before.
+
+Since the above events scarce a fortnight had elapsed; but such
+a change! Camille sunburnt and healthy, and full of animation and
+confidence; Josephine beaming with suppressed happiness, and more
+beautiful than Rose could ever remember to have seen her. For a soft
+halo of love and happiness shone around her head; a new and indefinable
+attraction bloomed on her face. She was a wife. Her eye, that used to
+glance furtively on Camille, now dwelt demurely on him; dwelt with a
+sort of gentle wonder and admiration as well as affection, and, when
+he came or passed very near her, a keen observer might have seen her
+thrill.
+
+She kept a good deal out of her mother’s way; for she felt within that
+her face must be too happy. She feared to shock her mother’s grief with
+her radiance. She was ashamed of feeling unmixed heaven. But the flood
+of secret bliss she floated in bore all misgivings away. The pair were
+forever stealing away together for hours, and on these occasions Rose
+used to keep out of her mother’s sight, until they should return. So
+then the new-married couple could wander hand in hand through the thick
+woods of Beaurepaire, whose fresh green leaves were now just out, and
+hear the distant cuckoo, and sit on mossy banks, and pour love into
+one another’s eyes, and plan ages of happiness, and murmur their deep
+passion and their bliss almost more than mortal; could do all this and
+more, without shocking propriety. These sweet duets passed for trios:
+for on their return Rose would be out looking for them, or would go and
+meet them at some distance, and all three would go up together to the
+baroness, as from a joint excursion. And when they went up to their
+bedrooms, Josephine would throw her arms round her sister’s neck, and
+sigh, “It is not happiness, it is beatitude!”
+
+Meantime, the baroness mourned for Raynal. Her grief showed no decrease.
+Rose even fancied at times she wore a gloomy and discontented look as
+well; but on reflection she attributed that to her own fancy, or to the
+contrast that had now sprung up in her sister’s beaming complacency.
+
+Rose, when she found herself left day after day alone for hours, was sad
+and thought of Edouard. And this feeling gained on her day by day.
+
+At last, one afternoon, she locked herself in her own room, and, after a
+long contest with her pride, which, if not indomitable, was next door to
+it, she sat down to write him a little letter. Now, in this letter,
+in the place devoted by men to their after-thoughts, by women to their
+pretended after-thoughts; i. e., to what they have been thinking of
+all through the letter, she dropped a careless hint that all the party
+missed him very much, “even the obnoxious colonel, who, by-the-by, has
+transferred his services elsewhere. I have forgiven him that, because he
+has said civil things about you.”
+
+Rose was reading her letter over again, to make sure that all the
+principal expressions were indistinct, and that the composition
+generally, except the postscript, resembled a Delphic oracle, when
+there was a hasty footstep, and a tap at her door, and in came Jacintha,
+excited.
+
+“He is come, mademoiselle,” cried she, and nodded her head like a
+mandarin, only more knowingly; then she added, “So you may burn that.”
+ For her quick eye had glanced at the table.
+
+“Who is come?” inquired Rose, eagerly.
+
+“Why, your one?”
+
+“My one?” asked the young lady, reddening, “my what?”
+
+“The little one--Edouard--Monsieur Riviere.”
+
+“Oh, Monsieur Riviere,” said Rose, acting nonchalance. “Why could you
+not say so? you use such phrases, who can conjecture what you mean? I
+will come to Monsieur Riviere directly; mamma will be so glad.”
+
+Jacintha gone, Rose tore up the letter and locked up the pieces, then
+ran to the glass. Etc.
+
+Edouard had been so profoundly miserable he could stand it no longer; in
+spite of his determination not to visit Beaurepaire while it contained
+a rival, he rode over to see whether he had not tormented himself idly:
+above all, to see the beloved face.
+
+Jacintha put him into the salle a manger. “By that you will see her
+alone,” said the knowing Jacintha. He sat down, hat and whip in hand,
+and wondered how he should be received--if at all.
+
+In glides Rose all sprightliness and good-humor, and puts out her hand
+to him; the which he kisses.
+
+“How could I keep away so long?” asked he vaguely, and self-astonished.
+
+“How indeed, and we missing you so all the time!”
+
+“Have YOU missed me?” was the eager inquiry.
+
+“Oh, no!” was the cheerful reply; “but all the rest have.”
+
+Presently the malicious thing gave a sudden start.
+
+“Oh! such a piece of news; you remember Colonel Dujardin, the obnoxious
+colonel?”
+
+No answer.
+
+“Transferred his attentions. Fancy!”
+
+“Who to?”
+
+“To Josephine and mamma. But such are the military. He only wanted to
+get rid of you: this done (through your want of spirit), he scorns the
+rich prize; so now I scorn HIM. Will you come for a walk?”
+
+“Oh, yes!”
+
+“We will go and look for my deserter. I say, tell me now; cannot I write
+to the commander-in-chief about this? a soldier has no right to be a
+deserter, has he? tell me, you are a public man, and know everything
+except my heart.”
+
+“Is it not too bad to tease me to-day?”
+
+“Yes! but please! I have had few amusements of late. I find it so dull
+without you to tease.”
+
+Formal permission to tease being conceded, she went that instant on the
+opposite tack, and began to tell him how she had missed him, and how
+sorry she had been anything should have occurred to vex their kind good
+friend. In short, Edouard spent a delightful day, for Rose took him one
+way to meet Josephine, who, she knew, was coming another. At night the
+last embers of jealousy got quenched, for Josephine was a wife now, and
+had already begun to tell Camille all her little innocent secrets; and
+she told him all about Edouard and Rose, and gave him his orders; so he
+treated Rose with great respect before Edouard; but paid her no marked
+attention; also he was affable to Riviere, who, having ceased to
+suspect, began to like him.
+
+In the course of the evening, the colonel also informed the baroness
+that he expected every day an order to join the army of the Rhine.
+
+Edouard pricked his ears.
+
+The baroness said no more than politeness dictated. She did not press
+him to stay, but treated his departure as a matter of course. Riviere
+rode home late in the evening in high spirits.
+
+The next day Rose varied her late deportment; she sang snatches of
+melody, going about the house; it was for all the world like a bird
+chirping. In the middle of one chirp Jacintha interfered. “Hush,
+mademoiselle, your mamma! she is at the bottom of the corridor.”
+
+“What was I thinking of?” said Rose.
+
+“Oh! I dare say you know, mademoiselle,” replied the privileged
+domestic.
+
+A letter of good news came from Aubertin. That summons to his nephew’s
+funeral was an era in his harmless life.
+
+The said nephew was a rich man and an oddity; one of those who love to
+surprise folk. Moreover, he had no children, and detected his nephews
+and nieces being unnaturally civil to him. “Waiting to cut me up,” was
+his generous reading of them. So with this he made a will, and there
+defied, as far as in him lay, the laws of nature; for he set his wealth
+a-flowing backwards instead of forwards; he handed his property up to an
+ancestor, instead of down to posterity.
+
+All this the doctor’s pen set down with some humor, and in the calm
+spirit with which a genuine philosopher receives prosperity as well as
+adversity. Yet one natural regret escaped him; that all this wealth,
+since it was to come, had not come a year or two sooner.
+
+All at Beaurepaire knew what their dear old friend meant.
+
+His other news to them was that they might expect him any moment.
+
+So here was another cause of rejoicing.
+
+“I am so glad,” said Josephine. “Now, perhaps, he will be able to
+publish his poor dear entomology, that the booksellers were all so
+unkind, so unfeeling about.”
+
+I linger on the brink of painful scenes to observe that a sweet and
+loving friendship, such as this was between the good doctor and three
+persons of another sex, is one of the best treasures of the human heart.
+Poverty had strengthened it; yet now wealth could not weaken it. With
+no tie of blood it yet was filial, sisterly, brotherly, national,
+chivalrous; happy, unalloyed sentiment, free from ups and downs, from
+heats and chills, from rivalry, from caprice; and, indeed, from all
+mortal accidents but one--and why say one? methinks death itself does
+but suspend these gentle, rare, unselfish amities a moment, then waft
+them upward to their abiding home.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV.
+
+
+It was a fair morning in June: the sky was a bright, deep, lovely,
+speckless blue: the flowers and bushes poured perfume, and sprinkled
+song upon the balmy air. On such a day, so calm, so warm, so bright, so
+scented, so tuneful, to live and to be young is to be happy. With gentle
+hand it wipes all other days out of the memory; it smiles, it smells,
+it sings, and clouds and rain and biting wind seem as far off and
+impossible as grief and trouble.
+
+Camille and Josephine had stolen out, and strolled lazily up and down
+close under the house, drinking the sweet air, fragrant with perfume and
+melody; the blue sky, and love.
+
+Rose was in the house. She had missed them; but she thought they must be
+near; for they seldom took long walks early in the day. Meeting Jacintha
+on the landing of the great staircase, she asked her where her sister
+was.
+
+“Madame Raynal is gone for a walk. She has taken the colonel with her.
+You know she always takes the colonel out with her now.”
+
+“That will do. You can finish your work.”
+
+Jacintha went into Camille’s room.
+
+Rose, who had looked as grave as a judge while Jacintha was present,
+bubbled into laughter. She even repeated Jacintha’s words aloud, and
+chuckled over them. “You know she always takes the colonel out with her
+now--ha, ha, ha!”
+
+“Rose!” sighed a distant voice.
+
+She looked round, and saw the baroness at some distance in the corridor,
+coming slowly towards her, with eyes bent gloomily on the ground. Rose
+composed her features into a settled gravity, and went to meet her.
+
+“I wish to speak with you,” said the baroness; “let us sit down; it is
+cool here.”
+
+Rose ran and brought a seat without a back, but well stuffed, and set it
+against the wall. The old lady sat down and leaned back, and looked at
+Rose in silence a good while; then she said,--
+
+“There is room for you; sit down, for I want to speak seriously to you.”
+
+“Yes, mamma; what is it?”
+
+“Turn a little round, and let me see your face.”
+
+Rose complied; and began to feel a little uneasy.
+
+“Perhaps you can guess what I am going to say to you?”
+
+“I have no idea.”
+
+“Well, I am going to put a question to you.”
+
+“With all my heart, dear mamma.”
+
+“I invite you to explain to me the most singular, the most unaccountable
+thing that ever fell under my notice. Will you do this for your mother?”
+
+“O mamma! of course I will do anything to please you that I can; but,
+indeed, I don’t know what you mean.”
+
+“I am going to tell you.”
+
+The old lady paused. The young one, naturally enough, felt a chill of
+vague anxiety strike across her frame.
+
+“Rose,” said the old lady, speaking very gently but firmly, and leaning
+in a peculiar way on her words, while her eye worked like an ice gimlet
+on her daughter’s face, “a little while ago, when my poor Raynal--our
+benefactor--was alive--and I was happy--you all chilled my happiness by
+your gloom: the whole house seemed a house of mourning--tell me now why
+was this.”
+
+“Mamma!” said Rose, after a moment’s hesitation, “we could hardly be
+gay. Sickness in the house! And if Colonel Raynal was alive, still he
+was absent, and in danger.”
+
+“Oh! then it was out of regard for him we were all dispirited?”
+
+“Why, I suppose so,” said Rose, stoutly; but then colored high at her
+own want of candor. However, she congratulated herself that her mother’s
+suspicion was confined to past events.
+
+Her self-congratulation on that score was short; for the baroness, after
+eying her grimly for a second or two in silence, put her this awkward
+question plump.
+
+“If so, tell me why is it that ever since that black day when the news
+of his DEATH reached us, the whole house has gone into black, and has
+gone out of mourning?”
+
+“Mamma,” stammered Rose, “what DO you mean?”
+
+“Even poor Camille, who was so pale and wan, has recovered like magic.”
+
+“O mamma! is not that fancy?” said Rose, piteously. “Of what do you
+suspect me? Can you think I am unfeeling--ungrateful? I should not be
+YOUR daughter.”
+
+“No, no,” said the baroness, “to do you justice, you attempt sorrow;
+as you put on black. But, my poor child, you do it with so little skill
+that one sees a horrible gayety breaking through that thin disguise:
+you are no true mourners: you are like the mutes or the undertakers at
+a funeral, forced grief on the surface of your faces, and frightful
+complacency below.”
+
+“Tra la! lal! la! la! Tra la! la! Tra la! la!” carolled Jacintha, in the
+colonel’s room hard by.
+
+The ladies looked at one another: Rose in great confusion.
+
+“Tra la! la! la! Tra lal! lal! la! la! la!”
+
+“Jacintha!” screamed Rose angrily.
+
+“Hush! not a word,” said the baroness. “Why remonstrate with HER?
+Servants are but chameleons: they take the color of those they serve. Do
+not cry. I wanted your confidence, not your tears, love. There, I will
+not twice in one day ask you for your heart: it would be to lower the
+mother, and give the daughter the pain of refusing it, and the regret,
+sure to come one day, of having refused it. I will discover the meaning
+of it all by myself.” She went away with a gentle sigh; and Rose was cut
+to the heart by her words; she resolved, whatever it might cost her and
+Josephine, to make a clean breast this very day. As she was one of those
+who act promptly, she went instantly in search of her sister, to gain
+her consent, if possible.
+
+Now, the said Josephine was in the garden walking with Camille, and
+uttering a wife’s tender solicitudes.
+
+“And must you leave me? must you risk your life again so soon; the life
+on which mine depends?”
+
+“My dear, that letter I received from headquarters two days ago, that
+inquiry whether my wound was cured. A hint, Josephine--a hint too broad
+for any soldier not to take.”
+
+“Camille, you are very proud,” said Josephine, with an accent of
+reproach, and a look of approval.
+
+“I am obliged to be. I am the husband of the proudest woman in France.”
+
+“Hush! not so loud: there is Dard on the grass.”
+
+“Dard!” muttered the soldier with a word of meaning. “Josephine,” said
+he after a pause, and a little peevishly, “how much longer are we to
+lower our voices, and turn away our eyes from each other, and be ashamed
+of our happiness?”
+
+“Five months longer, is it not?” answered Josephine quietly.
+
+“Five months longer!”
+
+Josephine was hurt at this, and for once was betrayed into a serious and
+merited remonstrance.
+
+“Is this just?” said she. “Think of two months ago: yes, but two months
+ago, you were dying. You doubted my love, because it could not overcome
+my virtue and my gratitude: yet you might have seen it was destroying my
+life. Poor Raynal, my husband, my benefactor, died. Then I could do more
+for you, if not with delicacy, at least with honor; but no! words, and
+looks, and tender offices of love were not enough, I must give stronger
+proof. Dear Camille, I have been reared in a strict school: and perhaps
+none of your sex can know what it cost me to go to Frejus that day with
+him I love.”
+
+“My own Josephine!”
+
+“I made but one condition: that you would not rob me of my mother’s
+respect: to her our hasty marriage would appear monstrous, heartless.
+You consented to be secretly happy for six months. One fortnight has
+passed, and you are discontented again.”
+
+“Oh, no! do not think so. It is every word true. I am an ungrateful
+villain.”
+
+“How dare you say so? and to me! No! but you are a man.”
+
+“So I have been told; but my conduct to you, sweet one, has not been
+that of a man from first to last. Yet I could die for you, with a smile
+on my lips. But when I think that once I lifted this sacrilegious hand
+against your life--oh!”
+
+“Do not be silly, Camille. I love you all the better for loving me well
+enough to kill me. What woman would not? I tell you, you foolish thing,
+you are a man: monseigneur is one of the lordly sex, that is accustomed
+to have everything its own way. My love, in a world that is full of
+misery, here are two that are condemned to be secretly happy a few
+months longer: a hard fate for one of your sex, it seems: but it is so
+much sweeter than the usual lot of mine, that really I cannot share your
+misery,” and she smiled joyously.
+
+“Then share my happiness, my dear wife.”
+
+“I do; only mine is deep, not loud.”
+
+“Why, Dard is gone, and we are out of doors; will the little birds
+betray us?”
+
+“The lower windows are open, and I saw Jacintha in one of the rooms.”
+
+“Jacintha? we are in awe of the very servants. Well, if I must not
+say it loud I will say it often,” and putting his mouth to her ear, he
+poured a burning whisper of love into it--“My love! my angel! my wife!
+my wife! my wife!”
+
+She turned her swimming eyes on him.
+
+“My husband!” she whispered in return.
+
+Rose came out, and found them billing and cooing. “You MUST not be so
+happy, you two,” said she authoritatively.
+
+“How can we help it?” asked Camille.
+
+“You must and shall help it, somehow,” retorted this little tyrant.
+“Mamma suspects. She has given me such a cross-examination, my blood
+runs cold. No, on second thoughts, kiss her again, and you may both be
+as happy as you like; for I am going to tell mamma all, and no power on
+earth shall hinder me.”
+
+“Rose,” said Camille, “you are a sensible girl; and I always said so.”
+
+But Josephine was horrified. “What! tell my mother that within a month
+of my husband’s death?”--
+
+“Don’t say your husband,” put in Camille wincing; “the priest never
+confirmed that union; words spoken before a magistrate do not make a
+marriage in the sight of Heaven.”
+
+Josephine cut him short. “Amongst honorable men and women all oaths are
+alike sacred: and Heaven’s eye is in a magistrate’s room as in a church.
+A daughter of Beaurepaire gave her hand to him, and called herself
+his wife. Therefore, she was his wife: and is his widow. She owes him
+everything; the house you are all living in among the rest. She ought
+to be proud of her brief connection with that pure, heroic spirit, and,
+when she is so little noble as to disown him, then say that gratitude
+and justice have no longer a place among mankind.”
+
+“Come into the chapel,” said Camille, with a voice that showed he was
+hurt.
+
+They entered the chapel, and there they saw something that thoroughly
+surprised them: a marble monument to the memory of Raynal. It leaned
+at present against the wall below the place prepared to receive it.
+The inscription, short, but emphatic, and full of feeling, told of the
+battles he had fought in, including the last fatal skirmish, and his
+marriage with the heiress of Beaurepaire; and, in a few soldier-like
+words, the uprightness, simplicity, and generosity of his character.
+
+They were so touched by this unexpected trait in Camille that they both
+threw their arms round his neck by one impulse. “Am I wrong to be proud
+of him?” said Josephine, triumphantly.
+
+“Well, don’t say too much to me,” said Camille, looking down confused.
+“One tries to be good; but it is very hard--to some of us--not to you,
+Josephine; and, after all, it is only the truth that we have written on
+that stone. Poor Raynal! he was my old comrade; he saved me from death,
+and not a soldier’s death--drowning; and he was a better man than I am,
+or ever shall be. Now he is dead, I can say these things. If I had said
+them when he was alive, it would have been more to my credit.”
+
+They all three went back towards the house; and on the way Rose told
+them all that had passed between the baroness and her. When she came to
+the actual details of that conversation, to the words, and looks, and
+tones, Josephine’s uneasiness rose to an overpowering height; she even
+admitted that further concealment would be very difficult.
+
+“Better tell her than let her find out,” said Rose. “We must tell her
+some day.”
+
+At last, after a long and agitated discussion, Josephine consented;
+but Rose must be the one to tell. “So then, you at least will make
+your peace with mamma,” argued Josephine, “and let us go in and do
+this before our courage fails; besides, it is going to rain, and it has
+turned cold. Where have all these clouds come from? An hour ago there
+was not one in the sky.”
+
+They went, with hesitating steps and guilty looks, to the saloon. Their
+mother was not there. Here was a reprieve.
+
+Rose had an idea. She would take her to the chapel, and show her the
+monument, and that would please her with poor Camille. “After that,”
+ said Rose, “I will begin by telling her all the misery you have both
+gone through; and, when she pities you, then I will show her it was all
+my fault your misery ended in a secret marriage.”
+
+The confederates sat there in a chilly state, waiting for the baroness.
+At last, as she did not come, Rose got up to go to her. “When the mind
+is made up, it is no use being cowardly, and putting off,” said she,
+firmly. For all that, her cheek had but little color left in it, when
+she left her chair with this resolve.
+
+Now as Rose went down the long saloon to carry out their united resolve,
+Jacintha looked in; and, after a hasty glance to see who was present,
+she waited till Rose came up to her, and then whipped a letter from
+under her apron and gave it her.
+
+“For my mistress,” said she, with an air of mystery.
+
+“Why not take it to her, then?” inquired Rose.
+
+“I thought you might like to see it first, mademoiselle,” said Jacintha,
+with quiet meaning.
+
+“Is it from the dear doctor?” asked Josephine.
+
+“La, no, mademoiselle, don’t you know the doctor is come home? Why, he
+has been in the house near an hour. He is with my lady.”
+
+The doctor proved Jacintha correct by entering the room in person soon
+after; on this Rose threw down the letter, and she and the whole party
+were instantly occupied in greeting him.
+
+When the ladies had embraced him and Camille shaken hands with him, they
+plied him with a thousand questions. Indeed, he had not half satisfied
+their curiosity, when Rose happened to catch sight of the letter again,
+and took it up to carry to the baroness. She now, for the first time,
+eyed it attentively, and the consequence was she uttered an exclamation,
+and took the first opportunity to beckon Aubertin.
+
+He came to her; and she put the letter into his hand.
+
+He put up his glasses, and eyed it. “Yes!” whispered he, “it is from
+HIM.”
+
+Josephine and Camille saw something was going on; they joined the other
+two, with curiosity in their faces.
+
+Rose put her hand on a small table near her, and leaned a moment. She
+turned half sick at a letter coming from the dead. Josephine now came
+towards her with a face of concern, and asked what was the matter.
+
+The reply came from Aubertin. “My poor friends,” said he, solemnly,
+“this is one of those fearful things that you have not seen in your
+short lives, but it has been more than once my lot to witness it. The
+ships that carry letters from distant countries vary greatly in speed,
+and are subject to detaining accidents. Yes, this is the third time I
+have seen a letter come written by a hand known to be cold. The baroness
+is a little excited to-day, I don’t know from what cause. With your
+approbation, Madame Raynal, I will read this letter before I let her see
+it.”
+
+“Read it, if you please.”
+
+“Shall I read it out?”
+
+“Certainly. There may be some wish expressed in it; oh, I hope there
+is!”
+
+Camille, from delicacy, retired to some little distance, and the doctor
+read the letter in a low and solemn voice.
+
+
+“MY DEAR MOTHER,--I hope all are well at Beaurepaire, as I am, or I hope
+soon to be. I received a wound in our last skirmish; not a very severe
+one; but it put an end to my writing for some time.”
+
+
+“Poor fellow! it was his death wound. Why, when was this written?--why,”
+ and the doctor paused, and seemed stupefied: “why, my dears, has my
+memory gone, or”--and again he looked eagerly at the letter--“what was
+the date of the battle in which he was killed? for this letter is dated
+the 15th of May. Is it a dream? no! this was written since the date of
+his death.”
+
+“No, doctor,” said Rose, “you deceive yourself.”
+
+“Why, what was the date of the Moniteur, then?” asked Aubertin, in great
+agitation.
+
+“Considerably later than this,” said Camille.
+
+“I don’t think so; the journal! where is it?”
+
+“My mother has it locked up. I’ll run.”
+
+“No, Rose; no one but me. Now, Josephine, do not you go and give way to
+hopes that may be delusive. I must see that journal directly. I will go
+to the baroness. I shall excuse her less than you would.”
+
+He was scarcely gone when a cry of horror filled the room, a cry as of
+madness falling like a thunderbolt on a human mind. It was Josephine,
+who up to this had not uttered one word. But now she stood, white as
+a corpse, in the middle of the room, and wrung her hands. “What have
+I done? What shall I do? It was the 3d of May. I see it before me in
+letters of fire; the 3d of May! the 3d of May!--and he writes the 15th.”
+
+“No! no!” cried Camille wildly. “It was long, long after time 3d.”
+
+“It was the 3d of May,” repeated Josephine in a hoarse voice that none
+would have known for hers.
+
+Camille ran to her with words of comfort and hope; he did not share her
+fears. He remembered about when the Moniteur came, though not the very
+day. He threw his arm lovingly round her as if to protect her against
+these shadowy terrors. Her dilating eyes seemed fixed on something
+distant in space or time, at some horrible thing coming slowly towards
+her. She did not see Camille approach her, but the moment she felt him
+she turned upon him swiftly.
+
+“Do you love me?” still in the hoarse voice that had so little in it of
+Josephine. “I mean, does one grain of respect or virtue mingle in your
+love for me?”
+
+“What words are these, my wife?”
+
+“Then leave Raynal’s house upon the instant. You wonder I can be so
+cruel? I wonder too; and that I can see my duty so clear in one short
+moment. But I have lived twenty years since that letter came. Oh! my
+brain has whirled through a thousand agonies. And I have come back a
+thousand times to the same thing; you and I must see each other’s face
+no more.”
+
+“Oh!” cried Rose, “is there no way but this?”
+
+“Take care,” she screamed, wildly, to her and Camille, “I am on the
+verge of madness; is it for you two to thrust me over the precipice?
+Come, now, if you are a man of honor, if you have a spark of gratitude
+towards the poor woman who has given you all except her fair name--that
+she will take to the grave in spite of you all--promise that you will
+leave Raynal’s house this minute if he is alive, and let me die in honor
+as I have lived.”
+
+“No, no!” cried Camille, terror-stricken; “it cannot be. Heaven is
+merciful, and Heaven sees how happy we are. Be calm! these are idle
+fears; be calm! I say. For if it is so I will obey you. I will stay; I
+will go; I will die; I will live; I will obey you.”
+
+“Swear this to me by the thing you hold most sacred,” she almost
+shrieked.
+
+“I swear by my love for you,” was his touching reply.
+
+Ere they had recovered a miserable composure after this passionate
+outburst, all the more terrible as coming from a creature so tender
+as Josephine, agitated voices were heard at the door, and the baroness
+tottered in, followed by the doctor, who was trying in vain to put some
+bounds to her emotion and her hopes.
+
+“Oh, my children! my children!” cried she, trembling violently. “Here,
+Rose, my hands shake so; take this key, open the cabinet, there is the
+Moniteur. What is the date?”
+
+The journal was found, and rapidly examined. The date was the 20th of
+May.
+
+“There!” cried Camille. “I told you!”
+
+The baroness uttered a feeble moan. Her hopes died as suddenly as they
+had been born, and she sank drooping into a chair, with a bitter sigh.
+
+Camille stole a joyful look at Josephine. She was in the same attitude
+looking straight before her as at a coming horror. Presently Rose
+uttered a faint cry, “The battle was BEFORE.”
+
+“To be sure,” cried the doctor. “You forget, it is not the date of the
+paper we want, but of the battle it records. For Heaven’s sake, when was
+the battle?”
+
+“The 3d of May,” said Josephine, in a voice that seemed to come from the
+tomb.
+
+Rose’s hands that held the journal fell like a dead weight upon her
+knees, journal and all. She whispered, “It was the 3d of May.”
+
+“Ah!” cried the baroness, starting up, “he may yet be alive. He must be
+alive. Heaven is merciful! Heaven would not take my son from me, a poor
+old woman who has not long to live. There was a letter; where is the
+letter?”
+
+“Are we mad, not to read the letter?” said the doctor. “I had it; it has
+dropped from my old fingers when I went for the journal.”
+
+A short examination of the room showed the letter lying crumpled up near
+the door. Camille gave it to the baroness. She tried to read it, but
+could not.
+
+“I am old,” said she; “my hand shakes and my eyes are troubled. This
+young gentleman will read it to us. His eyes are not dim and troubled.
+Something tells me that when I hear this letter, I shall find out
+whether my son lives. Why do you not read it to me, Camille?” cried she,
+almost fiercely.
+
+Camille, thus pressed, obeyed mechanically, and began to read Raynal’s
+letter aloud, scarce knowing what he did, but urged and driven by the
+baroness.
+
+
+“MY DEAR MOTHER,--I hope all are well at Beaurepaire, as I am, or I hope
+soon to be. I received a wound in our last skirmish; not a very severe
+one, but it put an end to my writing for some time.”
+
+
+“Go on, dear Camille! go on.”
+
+“The page ends there, madame.”
+
+The paper was thin, and Camille, whose hand trembled, had some
+difficulty in detaching the leaves from one another. He succeeded,
+however, at last, and went on reading and writhing.
+
+
+“By the way, you must address your next letter to me as Colonel Raynal.
+I was promoted just before this last affair, but had not time to tell
+you; and my wound stopped my writing till now.”
+
+
+“There, there!” cried the baroness. “He was Colonel Raynal, and Colonel
+Raynal was not killed.”
+
+The doctor implored her not to interrupt.
+
+“Go on, Camille. Why do you hesitate? what is the matter? Do for pity’s
+sake go on, sir.”
+
+Camille cast a look of agony around, and put his hand to his brow,
+on which large drops of cold perspiration, like a death dew, were
+gathering; but driven to the stake on all sides, he gasped on rather
+than read, for his eye had gone down the page.
+
+“A namesake of mine, Commandant Raynal,”--
+
+“Ah!”
+
+“has not been--so fortunate. He”--
+
+“Go on! go on!”
+
+The wretched man could now scarcely utter Raynal’s words; they came from
+him in a choking groan.
+
+“he was killed, poor fellow! while heading a gallant charge upon the
+enemy’s flank.”
+
+He ground the letter convulsively in his hand, then it fell all crumpled
+on the floor.
+
+“Bless you, Camille!” cried the baroness, “bless you! bless you! I have
+a son still.”
+
+She stooped with difficulty, took up the letter, and, kissing it again
+and again, fell on her knees, and thanked Heaven aloud before them all.
+Then she rose and went hastily out, and her voice was heard crying very
+loud, “Jacintha! Jacintha!”
+
+The doctor followed in considerable anxiety for the effects of this
+violent joy on so aged a person. Three remained behind, panting and
+pale like those to whom dead Lazarus burst the tomb, and came forth in a
+moment, at a word. Then Camille half kneeled, half fell, at Josephine’s
+feet, and, in a voice choked with sobs, bade her dispose of him.
+
+She turned her head away. “Do not speak to me; do not look at me; if we
+look at one another, we are lost. Go! die at your post, and I at mine.”
+
+He bowed his head, and kissed her dress, then rose calm as despair, and
+white as death, and, with his knees knocking under him, tottered away
+like a corpse set moving.
+
+He disappeared from the house.
+
+The baroness soon came back, triumphant and gay.
+
+“I have sent her to bid them ring the bells in the village. The poor
+shall be feasted; all shall share our joy: my son was dead, and lives.
+Oh, joy! joy! joy!”
+
+“Mother!” shrieked Josephine.
+
+“Mad woman that I am, I am too boisterous. Help me, Rose! she is going
+to faint; her lips are white.”
+
+Dr. Aubertin and Rose brought a chair. They forced Josephine into it.
+She was not the least faint; yet her body obeyed their hands just like
+a dead body. The baroness melted into tears; tears streamed from Rose’s
+eyes. Josephine’s were dry and stony, and fixed on coming horror. The
+baroness looked at her with anxiety. “Thoughtless old woman! It was
+too sudden; it is too much for my dear child; too much for me,” and she
+kneeled, and laid her aged head on her daughter’s bosom, saying feebly
+through her tears, “too much joy, too much joy!”
+
+Josephine took no notice of her. She sat like one turned to stone
+looking far away over her mother’s head with rigid eyes fixed on the air
+and on coming horrors.
+
+Rose felt her arm seized. It was Aubertin. He too was pale now, though
+not before. He spoke in a terrible whisper to Rose, his eye fixed on the
+woman of stone that sat there.
+
+“IS THIS JOY?”
+
+Rose, by a mighty effort, raised her eyes and confronted his full. “What
+else should it be?” said she.
+
+And with these words this Spartan girl was her sister’s champion once
+more against all comers, friend or foe.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI.
+
+
+Dr. Aubertin received one day a note from a publishing bookseller, to
+inquire whether he still thought of giving the world his valuable work
+on insects. The doctor was amazed. “My valuable work! Why, Rose, they
+all refused it, and this person in particular recoiled from it as if my
+insects could sting on paper.”
+
+The above led to a correspondence, in which the convert to insects
+explained that the work must be published at the author’s expense, the
+publisher contenting himself with the profits. The author, thirsting for
+the public, consented. Then the publisher wrote again to say that the
+immortal treatise must be spiced; a little politics flung in: “Nothing
+goes down, else.” The author answered in some heat that he would not
+dilute things everlasting with the fleeting topics of the day, nor
+defile science with politics. On this his Mentor smoothed him down,
+despising him secretly for not seeing that a book is a matter of trade
+and nothing else. It ended in Aubertin going to Paris to hatch his
+Phoenix. He had not been there a week, when a small deputation called on
+him, and informed him he had been elected honorary member of a certain
+scientific society. The compliment was followed by others, till at last
+certain ladies, with the pliancy of their sex, find out they had always
+secretly cared for butterflies. Then the naturalist smelt a rat, or, in
+other words, began to scent that entomology, a form of idiocy in a poor
+man, is a graceful decoration of the intellect in a rich one.
+
+Philosopher without bile, he saw through this, and let it amuse, not
+shock him. His own species, a singularly interesting one in my opinion,
+had another trait in reserve for him.
+
+He took a world of trouble to find out the circumstances of his nephew’s
+nephews and nieces: then he made arrangements for distributing a large
+part of his legacy among them. His intentions and the proportions of his
+generosity transpired.
+
+Hitherto they had been silent, but now they all fell-to and abused him:
+each looking only to the amount of his individual share, not at the sum
+total the doctor was giving way to an ungrateful lot.
+
+The donor was greatly amused, and noted down the incident and some
+of the remarks in his commonplace book, under the general head of
+“Bestiarium;” and the particular head of “Homo.”
+
+Paris with its seductions netted the good doctor, and held him two or
+three months; would have detained him longer, but for alarming accounts
+the baroness sent of Josephine’s health. These determined him to return
+to Beaurepaire; and, must I own it, the announcement was no longer
+hailed at Beaurepaire with universal joy as heretofore.
+
+
+Josephine Raynal, late Dujardin, is by this time no stranger to my
+intelligent reader. I wish him to bring his knowledge of her character
+and her sensibility to my aid. Imagine, as the weary hours and days and
+weeks roll over her head, what this loving woman feels for her lover
+whom she has dismissed; what this grateful wife feels for the benefactor
+she has unwittingly wronged; but will never wrong with her eyes open;
+what this lady pure as snow, and proud as fire, feels at the seeming
+frailty into which a cruel combination of circumstances has entrapped
+her.
+
+Put down the book a moment: shut your eyes: and imagine this strange and
+complicated form of human suffering.
+
+Her mental sufferings were terrible; and for some time Rose feared for
+her reason. At last her agonies subsided into a listlessness and apathy
+little less alarming. She seemed a creature descending inch by inch into
+the tomb. Indeed, I fully believe she would have died of despair: but
+one of nature’s greatest forces stepped into the arena and fought on the
+side of life. She was affected with certain bilious symptoms that added
+to Rose’s uneasiness, but Jacintha assured her it was nothing, and would
+retire and leave the sufferer better. Jacintha, indeed, seemed now to
+take a particular interest in Josephine, and was always about her with
+looks of pity and interest.
+
+“Good creature!” thought Rose, “she sees my sister is unhappy: and that
+makes her more attentive and devoted to her than ever.”
+
+One day these three were together in Josephine’s room. Josephine was
+mechanically combing her long hair, when all of a sudden she stretched
+out her hand and cried, “Rose!”
+
+Rose ran to her, and coming behind her saw in the glass that her
+lips were colorless. She screamed to Jacintha, and between them they
+supported Josephine to the bed. She had hardly touched it when she
+fainted dead away. “Mamma! mamma!” cried Rose in her terror.
+
+“Hush!” cried Jacintha roughly, “hold your tongue: it is only a faint.
+Help me loosen her: don’t make any noise, whatever.” They loosened her
+stays, and applied the usual remedies, but it was some time before she
+came-to. At last the color came back to her lips, then to her cheek, and
+the light to her eye. She smiled feebly on Jacintha and Rose, and asked
+if she had not been insensible.
+
+“Yes, love, and frightened us--a little--not much--oh, dear! oh, dear!”
+
+“Don’t be alarmed, sweet one, I am better. And I will never do it again,
+since it frightens you.” Then Josephine said to her sister in a low
+voice, and in the Italian language, “I hoped it was death, my sister;
+but he comes not to the wretched.”
+
+“If you hoped that,” replied Rose in the same language, “you do not love
+your poor sister who so loves you.”
+
+While the Italian was going on, Jacintha’s dark eyes glanced
+suspiciously on each speaker in turn. But her suspicions were all wide
+of the mark.
+
+“Now may I go and tell mamma?” asked Rose.
+
+“No, mademoiselle, you shall not,” said Jacintha. “Madame Raynal, do
+take my side, and forbid her.”
+
+“Why, what is it to you?” said Rose, haughtily.
+
+“If it was not something to me, should I thwart my dear young lady?”
+
+“No. And you shall have your own way, if you will but condescend to give
+me a reason.”
+
+This to some of us might appear reasonable, but not to Jacintha: it even
+hurt her feelings.
+
+“Mademoiselle Rose,” she said, “when you were little and used to ask me
+for anything, did I ever say to you, ‘Give me a REASON first’?”
+
+“There! she is right,” said Josephine. “We should not make terms with
+tried friends. Come, we will pay her devotion this compliment. It is
+such a small favor. For my part I feel obliged to her for asking it.”
+
+Josephine’s health improved steadily from that day. Her hollow cheeks
+recovered their plump smoothness, and her beauty its bloom, and her
+person grew more noble and statue-like than ever, and within she felt
+a sense of indomitable vitality. Her appetite had for some time been
+excessively feeble and uncertain, and her food tasteless; but of late,
+by what she conceived to be a reaction such as is common after youth has
+shaken off a long sickness, her appetite had been not only healthy
+but eager. The baroness observed this, and it relieved her of a large
+portion of her anxiety. One day at dinner her maternal heart was so
+pleased with Josephine’s performance that she took it as a personal
+favor, “Well done, Josephine,” said she; “that gives your mother
+pleasure to see you eat again. Soup and bouillon: and now twice you
+have been to Rose for some of that pate, which does you so much credit,
+Jacintha.”
+
+Josephine colored high at this compliment.
+
+“It is true,” said she, “I eat like a pig;” and, with a furtive glance
+at the said pate, she laid down her knife and fork, and ate no more of
+anything. The baroness had now a droll misgiving.
+
+“The doctor will be angry with me,” said she: “he will find her as well
+as ever.”
+
+“Madame,” said Jacintha hastily, “when does the doctor come, if I may
+make so bold, that I may get his room ready, you know?”
+
+“Well thought of, Jacintha. He comes the day after to-morrow, in the
+afternoon.”
+
+At night when the young ladies went up to bed, what did they find but a
+little cloth laid on a little table in Josephine’s room, and the remains
+of the pate she had liked. Rose burst out laughing. “Look at that dear
+duck of a goose, Jacintha! Our mother’s flattery sank deep: she thinks
+we can eat her pates at all hours of the day and night. Shall I send it
+away?”
+
+“No,” said Josephine, “that would hurt her culinary pride, and perhaps
+her affection: only cover it up, dear, for just now I am not in the
+humor: it rather turns me.”
+
+It was covered up. The sisters retired to rest. In the morning Rose
+lifted the cover and found the plate cleared, polished. She was
+astounded.
+
+The large tapestried chamber, once occupied by Camille Dujardin, was
+now turned into a sitting-room, and it was a favorite on account of the
+beautiful view from the windows.
+
+One day Josephine sat there alone with some work in her hand; but the
+needle often stopped, and the fair head drooped. She heaved a deep sigh.
+To her surprise it was echoed by a sigh that, like her own, seemed to
+come from a heart full of sighs.
+
+She turned hastily round and saw Jacintha.
+
+Now Josephine had all a woman’s eye for reading faces, and she was
+instantly struck by a certain gravity in Jacintha’s gaze, and a flutter
+which the young woman was suppressing with tolerable but not complete
+success.
+
+Disguising the uneasiness this discovery gave her, she looked her
+visitor full in the face, and said mildly, but a little coldly, “Well,
+Jacintha?”
+
+Jacintha lowered her eyes and muttered slowly,--
+
+“The doctor--comes--to-day,” then raised her eyes all in a moment to
+take Josephine off her guard; but the calm face was impenetrable.
+So then Jacintha added, “to our misfortune,” throwing in still more
+meaning.
+
+“To our misfortune? A dear old friend--like him?”
+
+Jacintha explained. “That old man makes me shake. You are never safe
+with him. So long as his head is in the clouds, you might take his shoes
+off, and on he’d walk and never know it; but every now and then he comes
+out of the clouds all in one moment, without a word of warning, and when
+he does his eye is on everything, like a bird’s. Then he is so old: he
+has seen a heap. Take my word for it, the old are more knowing than the
+young, let them be as sharp as you like: the old have seen everything.
+WE have only heard talk of the most part, with here and there a glimpse.
+To know life to the bottom you must live it out, from the soup to the
+dessert; and that is what the doctor has done, and now he is coming
+here. And Mademoiselle Rose will go telling him everything; and if she
+tells him half what she has seen, your secret will be no secret to that
+old man.”
+
+“My secret!” gasped Josephine, turning pale.
+
+“Don’t look so, madame: don’t be frightened at poor Jacintha. Sooner or
+later you MUST trust somebody besides Mademoiselle Rose.”
+
+Josephine looked at her with inquiring, frightened eyes.
+
+Jacintha drew nearer to her.
+
+“Mademoiselle,--I beg pardon, madame,--I carried you in my arms when I
+was a child. When I was a girl you toddled at my side, and held my gown,
+and lisped my name, and used to put your little arms round my neck, and
+kissed me, you would; and if ever I had the least pain or sickness your
+dear little face would turn as sorrowful, and all the pretty color leave
+it for Jacintha; and now you are in trouble, in sore trouble, yet you
+turn away from me, you dare not trust me, that would be cut in pieces
+ere I would betray you. Ah, mademoiselle, you are wrong. The poor can
+feel: they have all seen trouble, and a servant is the best of friends
+where she has the heart to love her mistress; and do not I love you?
+Pray do not turn from her who has carried you in her arms, and laid you
+to sleep upon her bosom, many’s and many’s the time.”
+
+Josephine panted audibly. She held out her hand eloquently to Jacintha,
+but she turned her head away and trembled.
+
+Jacintha cast a hasty glance round the room. Then she trembled too at
+what she was going to say, and the effect it might have on the young
+lady. As for Josephine, terrible as the conversation had become, she
+made no attempt to evade it: she remained perfectly passive. It was the
+best way to learn how far Jacintha had penetrated her secret, if at all.
+
+Jacintha looked fearfully round and whispered in Josephine’s ear, “When
+the news of Colonel Raynal’s death came, you wept, but the color came
+back to your cheek. When the news of his life came, you turned to stone.
+Ah! my poor young lady, there has been more between you and THAT MAN
+than should be. Ever since one day you all went to Frejus together, you
+were a changed woman. I have seen you look at him as--as a wife looks at
+her man. I have seen HIM”--
+
+“Hush, Jacintha! Do not tell me what you have seen: oh! do not remind
+me of joys I pray God to help me forget. He was my husband, then!--oh,
+cruel Jacintha, to remind me of what I have been, of what I am! Ah me!
+ah me! ah me!”
+
+“Your husband!” cried Jacintha in utter amazement.
+
+Then Josephine drooped her head on this faithful creature’s shoulder,
+and told her with many sobs the story I have told you. She told it very
+briefly, for it was to a woman who, though little educated, was full of
+feeling and shrewdness, and needed but the bare facts: she could add the
+rest from her own heart and experience: could tell the storm of feelings
+through which these two unhappy lovers must have passed. Her frequent
+sighs of pity and sympathy drew Josephine on to pour out all her griefs.
+When the tale was ended she gave a sigh of relief.
+
+“It might have been worse: I thought it was worse the more fool I. I
+deserve to have my head cut off.” This was Jacintha’s only comment at
+that time.
+
+It was Josephine’s turn to be amazed. “It could have been worse?” said
+she. “How? tell me,” added she bitterly. “It would be a consolation to
+me, could I see that.”
+
+Jacintha colored and evaded this question, and begged her to go on, to
+keep nothing back from her. Josephine assured her she had revealed all.
+Jacintha looked at her a moment in silence.
+
+“It is then as I half suspected. You do not know all that is before you.
+You do not see why I am afraid of that old man.”
+
+“No, not of him in particular.”
+
+“Nor why I want to keep Mademoiselle Rose from prattling to him?”
+
+“No. I assure you Rose is to be trusted; she is wise--wiser than I am.”
+
+“You are neither of you wise. You neither of you know anything. My poor
+young mistress, you are but a child still. You have a deep water to wade
+through,” said Jacintha, so solemnly that Josephine trembled. “A deep
+water, and do not see it even. You have told me what is past, now I must
+tell you what is coming. Heaven help me! But is it possible you have no
+misgiving? Tell the truth, now.”
+
+“Alas! I am full of them; at your words, at your manner, they fly around
+me in crowds.”
+
+“Have you no ONE?”
+
+“No.”
+
+“Then turn your head from me a bit, my sweet young lady; I am an honest
+woman, though I am not so innocent as you, and I am forced against my
+will to speak my mind plainer than I am used to.”
+
+Then followed a conversation, to detail which might anticipate our
+story; suffice it to say, that Rose, coming into the room rather
+suddenly, found her sister weeping on Jacintha’s bosom, and Jacintha
+crying and sobbing over her.
+
+She stood and stared in utter amazement.
+
+
+Dr. Aubertin, on his arrival, was agreeably surprised at Madame Raynal’s
+appearance. He inquired after her appetite.
+
+“Oh, as to her appetite,” cried the baroness, “that is immense.”
+
+“Indeed!”
+
+“It was,” explained Josephine, “just when I began to get better, but
+now it is as much as usual.” This answer had been arranged beforehand by
+Jacintha. She added, “The fact is, we wanted to see you, doctor, and
+my ridiculous ailments were a good excuse for tearing you from
+Paris.”--“And now we have succeeded,” said Rose, “let us throw off the
+mask, and talk of other things; above all, of Paris, and your eclat.”
+
+“For all that,” persisted the baroness, “she was ill, when I first
+wrote, and very ill too.”
+
+“Madame Raynal,” said the doctor solemnly, “your conduct has been
+irregular; once ill, and your illness announced to your medical adviser,
+etiquette forbade you to get well but by his prescriptions. Since, then,
+you have shown yourself unfit to conduct a malady, it becomes my
+painful duty to forbid you henceforth ever to be ill at all, without my
+permission first obtained in writing.”
+
+This badinage was greatly relished by Rose, but not at all by the
+baroness, who was as humorless as a swan.
+
+He stayed a month at Beaurepaire, then off to Paris again: and being now
+a rich man, and not too old to enjoy innocent pleasures, he got a habit
+of running backwards and forwards between the two places, spending a
+month or so at each alternately. So the days rolled on. Josephine fell
+into a state that almost defies description; her heart was full of
+deadly wounds, yet it seemed, by some mysterious, half-healing balm,
+to throb and ache, but bleed no more. Beams of strange, unreasonable
+complacency would shoot across her; the next moment reflection would
+come, she would droop her head, and sigh piteously. Then all would merge
+in a wild terror of detection. She seemed on the borders of a river of
+bliss, new, divine, and inexhaustible: and on the other bank mocking
+malignant fiends dared her to enter that heavenly stream. The past to
+her was full of regrets; the future full of terrors, and empty of hope.
+Yet she did not, could not succumb. Instead of the listlessness and
+languor of a few months back, she had now more energy than ever; at
+times it mounted to irritation. An activity possessed her: it broke out
+in many feminine ways. Among the rest she was seized with what we men
+call a cacoethes of the needle: “a raging desire” for work. Her fingers
+itched for work. She was at it all day. As devotees retire to pray, so
+she to stitch. On a wet day she would often slip into the kitchen, and
+ply the needle beside Jacintha: on a dry day she would hide in the old
+oak-tree, and sit like a mouse, and ply the tools of her craft, and make
+things of no mortal use to man or woman; and she tried little fringes of
+muslin upon her white hand, and held it up in front of her, and smiled,
+and then moaned. It was winter, and Rose used sometimes to bring her out
+a thick shawl, as she sat in the old oak-tree stitching, but Josephine
+nearly always declined it. SHE WAS NEARLY IMPERVIOUS TO COLD.
+
+Then, her purse being better filled than formerly, she visited the
+poor more than ever, and above all the young couples; and took a warm
+interest in their household matters, and gave them muslin articles of
+her own making, and sometimes sniffed the soup in a young housewife’s
+pot, and took a fancy to it, and, if invited to taste it, paid her the
+compliment of eating a good plateful of it, and said it was much better
+soup than the chateau produced, and, what is stranger, thought so: and,
+whenever some peevish little brat set up a yell in its cradle and the
+father naturally enough shook his fist at the destroyer of his peace,
+Madame Raynal’s lovely face filled with concern not for the sufferer but
+the pest, and she flew to it and rocked it and coaxed it and consoled
+it, till the young housewife smiled and stopped its mouth by other
+means. And, besides the five-franc pieces she gave the infants to hold,
+these visits of Madame Raynal were always followed by one from Jacintha
+with a basket of provisions on her stalwart arm, and honest Sir John
+Burgoyne peeping out at the corner. Kind and beneficent as she was,
+her temper deteriorated considerably, for it came down from angelic
+to human. Rose and Jacintha were struck with the change, assented to
+everything she said, and encouraged her in everything it pleased her
+caprice to do. Meantime the baroness lived on her son Raynal’s letters
+(they came regularly twice a month). Rose too had a correspondence,
+a constant source of delight to her. Edouard Riviere was posted at a
+distance, and could not visit her; but their love advanced rapidly.
+Every day he wrote down for his Rose the acts of the day, and twice a
+week sent the budget to his sweetheart, and told her at the same time
+every feeling of his heart. She was less fortunate than he; she had to
+carry a heavy secret; but still she found plenty to tell him, and tender
+feelings too to vent on him in her own arch, shy, fitful way. Letters
+can enchain hearts; it was by letters that these two found themselves
+imperceptibly betrothed. Their union was looked forward to as certain,
+and not very distant. Rose was fairly in love.
+
+One day, Dr. Aubertin, coming back from Paris to Beaurepaire rather
+suddenly, found nobody at home but the baroness. Josephine and Rose were
+gone to Frejus; had been there more than a week. She was ailing again;
+so as Frejus had agreed with her once, Rose thought it might again. “She
+would send for them back directly.”
+
+“No,” said the doctor, “why do that? I will go over there and see them.”
+ Accordingly, a day or two after this, he hired a carriage, and went off
+early in the morning to Frejus. In so small a place he expected to find
+the young ladies at once; but, to his surprise, no one knew them nor had
+heard of them. He was at a nonplus, and just about to return home and
+laugh at himself and the baroness for this wild-goose chase, when he
+fell in with a face he knew, one Mivart, a surgeon, a young man of some
+talent, who had made his acquaintance in Paris. Mivart accosted him with
+great respect; and, after the first compliments, informed him that he
+had been settled some months in this little town, and was doing a fair
+stroke of business.
+
+“Killing some, and letting nature cure others, eh?” said the doctor;
+then, having had his joke, he told Mivart what had brought him to
+Frejus.
+
+“Are they pretty women, your friends? I think I know all the pretty
+women about,” said Mivart with levity. “They are not pretty,”
+ replied Aubertin. Mivart’s interest in them faded visibly out of his
+countenance. “But they are beautiful. The elder might pass for Venus,
+and the younger for Hebe.”
+
+“I know them then!” cried he; “they are patients of mine.”
+
+The doctor colored. “Ah, indeed!”
+
+“In the absence of your greater skill,” said Mivart, politely; “it is
+Madame Aubertin and her sister you are looking for, is it not?”
+
+Aubertin groaned. “I am rather too old to be looking for a Madame
+Aubertin,” said he; “no; it is Madame Raynal, and Mademoiselle de
+Beaurepaire.”
+
+Mivart became confidential. “Madame Aubertin and her sister,” said he,
+“are so lovely they make me ill to look at them: the deepest blue eyes
+you ever saw, both of them; high foreheads; teeth like ivory mixed with
+pearl; such aristocratic feet and hands; and their arms--oh!” and by way
+of general summary the young surgeon kissed the tips of his fingers,
+and was silent; language succumbed under the theme. The doctor smiled
+coldly.
+
+Mivart added, “If you had come an hour sooner, you might have seen
+Mademoiselle Rose; she was in the town.”
+
+“Mademoiselle Rose? who is that?”
+
+“Why, Madame Aubertin’s sister.”
+
+At this Dr. Aubertin looked first very puzzled, then very grave.
+
+“Hum!” said he, after a little reflection, “where do these paragons
+live?”
+
+“They lodge at a small farm; it belongs to a widow; her name is Roth.”
+ They parted. Dr. Aubertin walked slowly towards his carriage, his hands
+behind him, his eyes on the ground. He bade the driver inquire where
+the Widow Roth lived, and learned it was about half a league out of the
+town. He drove to the farmhouse; when the carriage drove up, a young
+lady looked out of the window on the first floor. It was Rose de
+Beaurepaire. She caught the doctor’s eye, and he hers. She came down and
+welcomed him with a great appearance of cordiality, and asked him, with
+a smile, how he found them out.
+
+“From your medical attendant,” said the doctor, dryly.
+
+Rose looked keenly in his face.
+
+“He said he was in attendance on two paragons of beauty, blue eyes,
+white teeth and arms.”
+
+“And you found us out by that?” inquired Rose, looking still more keenly
+at him.
+
+“Hardly; but it was my last chance of finding you, so I came. Where is
+Madame Raynal?”
+
+“Come into this room, dear friend. I will go and find her.”
+
+Full twenty minutes was the doctor kept waiting, and then in came Rose,
+gayly crying, “I have hunted her high and low, and where do you think my
+lady was? sitting out in the garden--come.”
+
+Sure enough, they found Josephine in the garden, seated on a low chair.
+She smiled when the doctor came up to her, and asked after her mother.
+There was an air of languor about her; her color was clear, delicate,
+and beautiful.
+
+“You have been unwell, my child.”
+
+“A little, dear friend; you know me; always ailing, and tormenting those
+I love.”
+
+“Well! but, Josephine, you know this place and this sweet air always set
+you up. Look at her now, doctor; did you ever see her look better? See
+what a color. I never saw her look more lovely.”
+
+“I never saw her look SO lovely; but I have seen her look better. Your
+pulse. A little languid?”
+
+“Yes, I am a little.”
+
+“Do you stay at Beaurepaire?” inquired Rose; “if so, we will come home.”
+
+“On the contrary, you will stay here another fortnight,” said the
+doctor, authoritatively.
+
+“Prescribe some of your nice tonics for me, doctor,” said Josephine,
+coaxingly.
+
+“No! I can’t do that; you are in the hands of another practitioner.”
+
+“What does that matter? You were at Paris.”
+
+“It is not the etiquette in our profession to interfere with another
+man’s patients.”
+
+“Oh, dear! I am so sorry,” began Josephine.
+
+“I see nothing here that my good friend Mivart is not competent to deal
+with,” said the doctor, coldly.
+
+Then followed some general conversation, at the end of which the doctor
+once more laid his commands on them to stay another fortnight where they
+were, and bade them good-by.
+
+He was no sooner gone than Rose went to the door of the kitchen, and
+called out, “Madame Jouvenel! Madame Jouvenel! you may come into the
+garden again.”
+
+The doctor drove away; but, instead of going straight to Beaurepaire,
+he ordered the driver to return to the town. He then walked to Mivart’s
+house.
+
+In about a quarter of an hour he came out of it, looking singularly
+grave, sad, and stern.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII.
+
+
+Edouard Riviere contrived one Saturday to work off all arrears of
+business, and start for Beaurepaire. He had received a very kind letter
+from Rose, and his longing to see her overpowered him. On the road his
+eyes often glittered, and his cheek flushed with expectation. At last he
+got there. His heart beat: for four months he had not seen her. He
+ran up into the drawing-room, and there found the baroness alone; she
+welcomed him cordially, but soon let him know Rose and her sister were
+at Frejus. His heart sank. Frejus was a long way off. But this was not
+all. Rose’s last letter was dated from Beaurepaire, yet it must have
+been written at Frejus. He went to Jacintha, and demanded an explanation
+of this. The ready Jacintha said it looked as if she meant to be home
+directly; and added, with cool cunning, “That is a hint for me to get
+their rooms ready.”
+
+“This letter must have come here enclosed in another,” said Edouard,
+sternly.
+
+“Like enough,” replied Jacintha, with an appearance of sovereign
+indifference.
+
+Edouard looked at her, and said, grimly, “I will go to Frejus.”
+
+“So I would,” said Jacintha, faltering a little, but not perceptibly;
+“you might meet them on the road, if so be they come the same road;
+there are two roads, you know.”
+
+Edouard hesitated; but he ended by sending Dard to the town on his own
+horse, with orders to leave him at the inn, and borrow a fresh horse. “I
+shall just have time,” said he. He rode to Frejus, and inquired at the
+inns and post-office for Mademoiselle de Beaurepaire. They did not know
+her; then he inquired for Madame Raynal. No such name known. He rode by
+the seaside upon the chance of their seeing him. He paraded on horseback
+throughout the place, in hopes every moment that a window would open,
+and a fair face shine at it, and call him. At last his time was up, and
+he was obliged to ride back, sick at heart, to Beaurepaire. He told the
+baroness, with some natural irritation, what had happened. She was as
+much surprised as he was.
+
+“I write to Madame Raynal at the post-office, Frejus,” said she.
+
+“And Madame Raynal gets your letters?”
+
+“Of course she does, since she answers them; you cannot have inquired at
+the post.”
+
+“Why, it was the first place I inquired at, and neither Mademoiselle de
+Beaurepaire nor Madame Raynal were known there.”
+
+Jacintha, who could have given the clew, seemed so puzzled herself, that
+they did not even apply to her. Edouard took a sorrowful leave of the
+baroness, and set out on his journey home.
+
+Oh! how sad and weary that ride seemed now by what it had been coming.
+His disappointment was deep and irritating; and ere he had ridden half
+way a torturer fastened on his heart. That torture is suspicion; a vague
+and shadowy, but gigantic phantom that oppresses and rends the mind more
+terribly than certainty. In this state of vague, sickening suspicion, he
+remained some days: then came an affectionate letter from Rose, who
+had actually returned home. In this she expressed her regret and
+disappointment at having missed him; blamed herself for misleading him,
+but explained that their stay at Frejus had been prolonged from day to
+day far beyond her expectation. “The stupidity of the post-office was
+more than she could account for,” said she. But, what went farthest to
+console Edouard, was, that after this contretemps she never ceased to
+invite him to come to Beaurepaire. Now, before this, though she said
+many kind and pretty things in her letters, she had never invited him to
+visit the chateau; he had noticed this. “Sweet soul,” thought he, “she
+really is vexed. I must be a brute to think any more about it. Still”--
+
+So this wound was skinned over.
+
+At last, what he called his lucky star ordained that he should be
+transferred to the very post his Commandant Raynal had once occupied. He
+sought and obtained permission to fix his quarters in the little village
+near Beaurepaire, and though this plan could not be carried out for
+three months, yet the prospect of it was joyful all that time--joyful to
+both lovers. Rose needed this consolation, for she was very unhappy: her
+beloved sister, since their return from Frejus, had gone back. The flush
+of health was faded, and so was her late energy. She fell into
+deep depression and languor, broken occasionally by fits of nervous
+irritation.
+
+She would sit for hours together at one window languishing and fretting.
+Can the female reader guess which way that window looked?
+
+Now, Edouard was a favorite of Josephine’s; so Rose hoped he would help
+to distract her attention from those sorrows which a lapse of years
+alone could cure.
+
+On every account, then, his visit was looked forward to with hope and
+joy.
+
+He came. He was received with open arms. He took up his quarters at
+his old lodgings, but spent his evenings and every leisure hour at the
+chateau.
+
+He was very much in love, and showed it. He adhered to Rose like a
+leech, and followed her about like a little dog.
+
+This would have made her very happy if there had been nothing great to
+distract her attention and her heart; but she had Josephine, whose deep
+depression and fits of irritation and terror filled her with anxiety;
+and so Edouard was in the way now and then. On these occasions he was
+too vain to see what she was too polite to show him offensively.
+
+But on this she became vexed at his obtuseness.
+
+“Does he think I can be always at his beck and call?” thought she.
+
+“She is always after her sister,” said he.
+
+He was just beginning to be jealous of Josephine when the following
+incident occurred:--
+
+Rose and the doctor were discussing Josephine. Edouard pretended to be
+reading a book, but he listened to every word.
+
+Dr. Aubertin gave it as his opinion that Madame Raynal did not make
+enough blood.
+
+“Oh! if I thought that!” cried Rose.
+
+“Well, then, it is so, I assure you.”
+
+“Doctor,” said Rose, “do you remember, one day you said healthy blood
+could be drawn from robust veins and poured into a sick person’s?”
+
+“It is a well-known fact,” said Aubertin.
+
+“I don’t believe it,” said Rose, dryly.
+
+“Then you place a very narrow limit to science,” said the doctor,
+coldly.
+
+“Did you ever see it done?” asked Rose, slyly.
+
+“I have not only seen it done, but have done it myself.”
+
+“Then do it for us. There’s my arm; take blood from that for dear
+Josephine!” and she thrust a white arm out under his eye with such a
+bold movement and such a look of fire and love as never beamed from
+common eyes.
+
+A keen, cold pang shot through the human heart of Edouard Riviere.
+
+The doctor started and gazed at her with admiration: then he hung his
+head. “I could not do it. I love you both too well to drain either of
+life’s current.”
+
+Rose veiled her fire, and began to coax. “Once a week; just once a week,
+dear, dear doctor; you know I should never miss it. I am so full of that
+health, which Heaven denies to her I love.”
+
+“Let us try milder measures first,” said the doctor. “I have most faith
+in time.”
+
+“What if I were to take her to Frejus? hitherto, the sea has always done
+wonders for her.”
+
+“Frejus, by all means,” said Edouard, mingling suddenly in the
+conversation; “and this time I will go with you, and then I shall find
+out where you lodged before, and how the boobies came to say they did
+not know you.”
+
+Rose bit her lip. She could not help seeing then how much dear Edouard
+was in her way and Josephine’s. Their best friends are in the way of all
+who have secrets. Presently the doctor went to his study. Then Edouard
+let fall a mock soliloquy. “I wonder,” said he, dropping out his words
+one by one, “whether any one will ever love me well enough to give a
+drop of their blood for me.”
+
+“If you were in sickness and sorrow, who knows?” said Rose, coloring up.
+
+“I would soon be in sickness and sorrow if I thought that.”
+
+“Don’t jest with such matters, monsieur.”
+
+“I am serious. I wish I was as ill as Madame Raynal is, to be loved as
+she is.”
+
+“You must resemble her in some other things to be loved as she is.
+
+“You have often made me feel that of late, dear Rose.”
+
+This touched her. But she fought down the kindly feeling. “I am glad of
+it,” said she, out of perverseness. She added after a while, “Edouard,
+you are naturally jealous.”
+
+“Not the least in the world, Rose, I assure you. I have many faults, but
+jealous I am not.”
+
+“Oh, yes, you are, and suspicious, too; there is something in your
+character that alarms me for our happiness.”
+
+“Well, if you come to that, there are things in YOUR conduct I could
+wish explained.”
+
+“There! I said so. You have not confidence in me.”
+
+“Pray don’t say that, dear Rose. I have every confidence in you; only
+please don’t ask me to divest myself of my senses and my reason.”
+
+“I don’t ask you to do that or anything else for me; good-by, for the
+present.”
+
+“Where are you going now? tic! tic! I never can get a word in peace with
+you.”
+
+“I am not going to commit murder. I’m only going up-stairs to my
+sister.”
+
+“Poor Madame Raynal, she makes it very hard for me not to dislike her.”
+
+“Dislike my Josephine?” and Rose bristled visibly.
+
+“She is an angel, but I should hate an angel if it came forever between
+you and me.”
+
+“Excuse me, she was here long before you. It is you that came between
+her and me.”
+
+“I came because I was told I should be welcome,” said Edouard bitterly,
+and equivocating a little; he added, “and I dare say I shall go when I
+am told I am one too many.”
+
+“Bad heart! who says you are one too many in the house? But you are
+too exigent, monsieur; you assume the husband, and you tease me. It is
+selfish; can you not see I am anxious and worried? you ought to be kind
+to me, and soothe me; that is what I look for from you, and, instead of
+that, I declare you are getting to be quite a worry.”
+
+“I should not be if you loved me as I love you. I give YOU no rival.
+Shall I tell you the cause of all this? you have secrets.”
+
+“What secrets?”
+
+“Is it me you ask? am I trusted with them? Secrets are a bond that not
+even love can overcome. It is to talk secrets you run away from me
+to Madame Raynal. Where did you lodge at Frejus, Mademoiselle the
+Reticent?”
+
+“In a grotto, dry at low water, Monsieur the Inquisitive.”
+
+“That is enough: since you will not tell me, I will find it out before I
+am a week older.”
+
+This alarmed Rose terribly, and drove her to extremities. She decided to
+quarrel.
+
+“Sir,” said she, “I thank you for playing the tyrant a little
+prematurely; it has put me on my guard. Let us part; you and I are not
+suited to each other, Edouard Riviere.”
+
+He took this more humbly than she expected. “Part!” said he, in
+consternation; “that is a terrible word to pass between you and me.
+Forgive me! I suppose I am jealous.”
+
+“You are; you are actually jealous of my sister. Well, I tell you
+plainly I love you, but I love my sister better. I never could love any
+man as I do her; it is ridiculous to expect such a thing.”
+
+“And do you think I could bear to play second fiddle to her all my
+life?”
+
+“I don’t ask you. Go and play first trumpet to some other lady.”
+
+“You speak your wishes so plainly now, I have nothing to do but to
+obey.”
+
+He kissed her hand and went away disconsolately.
+
+Rose, instead of going to Josephine, her determination to do which had
+mainly caused the quarrel, sat sadly down, and leaned her head on her
+hand. “I am cruel. I am ungrateful. He has gone away broken-hearted.
+And what shall I do without him?--little fool! I love him better than he
+loves me. He will never forgive me. I have wounded his vanity; and they
+are vainer than we are. If we meet at dinner I will be so kind to him,
+he will forget it all. No! Edouard will not come to dinner. He is not a
+spaniel that you can beat, and then whistle back again. Something tells
+me I have lost him, and if I have, what shall I do? I will write him a
+note. I will ask him to forgive me.”
+
+She sat down at the table, and took a sheet of notepaper and began to
+write a few conciliatory words. She was so occupied in making these kind
+enough, and not too kind, that a light step approached her unobserved.
+She looked up and there was Edouard. She whipped the paper off the
+table.
+
+A look of suspicion and misery crossed Edouard’s face.
+
+Rose caught it, and said, “Well, am I to be affronted any more?”
+
+“No, Rose. I came back to beg you to forget what passed just now,” said
+he.
+
+Rose’s eye flashed; his return showed her her power. She abused it
+directly.
+
+“How can I forget it if you come reminding me?”
+
+“Dear Rose, now don’t be so unkind, so cruel--I have not come back to
+tease you, sweet one. I come to know what I can do to please you; to
+make you love me again?” and he was about to kneel graciously on one
+knee.
+
+“I’ll tell you. Don’t come near me for a month.”
+
+Edouard started up, white as ashes with mortification and wounded love.
+
+“This is how you treat me for humbling myself, when it is you that ought
+to ask forgiveness.”
+
+“Why should I ask what I don’t care about?”
+
+“What DO you care about?--except that sister of yours? You have no
+heart. And on this cold-blooded creature I have wasted a love an empress
+might have been proud of inspiring. I pray Heaven some man may sport
+with your affections, you heartless creature, as you have played with
+mine, and make you suffer what I suffer now!”
+
+And with a burst of inarticulate grief and rage he flung out of the
+room.
+
+Rose sank trembling on the sofa a little while: then with a mighty
+effort rose and went to comfort her sister.
+
+Edouard came no more to Beaurepaire.
+
+
+There is an old French proverb, and a wise one, “Rien n’est certain que
+l’imprevu;” it means you can make sure of nothing but this, that matters
+will not turn as you feel sure they will. And, even for this reason,
+you, who are thinking of suicide because trade is declining, speculation
+failing, bankruptcy impending, or your life going to be blighted forever
+by unrequited love--DON’T DO IT. Whether you are English, American,
+French, or German, listen to a man that knows what is what, and DON’T DO
+IT. I tell you none of those horrors, when they really come, will affect
+you as you fancy they will. The joys we expect are not a quarter
+so bright, nor the troubles half so dark as we think they will be.
+Bankruptcy coming is one thing, come is quite another: and no heart
+or life was ever really blighted at twenty years of age. The love-sick
+girls that are picked out of the canal alive, all, without exception,
+marry another man, have brats, and get to screech with laughter when
+they think of sweetheart No. 1, generally a blockhead, or else a
+blackguard, whom they were fools enough to wet their clothes for, let
+alone kill their souls. This happens INVARIABLY. The love-sick girls
+that are picked out of the canal dead have fled from a year’s misery
+to eternal pain, from grief that time never failed to cure, to anguish
+incurable. In this world “Rien n’est certain que l’imprevu.”
+
+Edouard and Rose were tender lovers, at a distance. How much happier and
+more loving they thought they should be beneath the same roof. They came
+together: their prominent faults of character rubbed: the secret
+that was in the house did its work: and altogether, they quarrelled.
+L’imprevu.
+
+Dard had been saying to Jacintha for ever so long, “When granny dies, I
+will marry you.”
+
+Granny died. Dard took possession of her little property. Up came a
+glittering official, and turned him out; he was not her heir. Perrin,
+the notary, was. He had bought the inheritance of her two sons, long
+since dead.
+
+Dard had not only looked on the cottage and cow, as his, but had spoken
+of them as such for years. The disappointment and the irony of comrades
+ate into him.
+
+“I will leave this cursed place,” said he.
+
+Josephine instantly sent for him to Beaurepaire. He came, and was
+factotum with the novelty of a fixed salary. Jacintha accommodated him
+with a new little odd job or two. She set him to dance on the oak floors
+with a brush fastened to his right foot; and, after a rehearsal or two,
+she made him wait at table. Didn’t he bang the things about: and when
+he brought a lady a dish, and she did not instantly attend, he gave her
+elbow a poke to attract attention: then she squeaked; and he grinned
+at her double absurdity in minding a touch, and not minding the real
+business of the table.
+
+But his wrongs rankled in him. He vented antique phrases such as, “I
+want a change;” “This village is the last place the Almighty made,” etc.
+
+Then he was attacked with a moral disease: affected the company of
+soldiers. He spent his weekly salary carousing with the military, a
+class of men so brilliant that they are not expected to pay for their
+share of the drink; they contribute the anecdotes and the familiar
+appeals to Heaven: and is not that enough?
+
+Present at many recitals, the heroes of which lost nothing by being
+their own historians, Dard imbibed a taste for military adventure. His
+very talk, which used to be so homely, began now to be tinselled with
+big swelling words of vanity imported from the army. I need hardly say
+these bombastical phrases did not elevate his general dialect: they lay
+fearfully distinct upon the surface, “like lumps of marl upon a barren
+soil, encumbering the ground they could not fertilize.”
+
+Jacintha took leave to remind him of an incident connected with
+warfare--wounds.
+
+“Do you remember how you were down upon your luck when you did but cut
+your foot? Why, that is nothing in the army. They never go out to fight
+but some come back with arms off, and some with legs off and some with
+heads; and the rest don’t come back at all: and how would you like
+that?”
+
+This intrusion of statistics into warfare at first cooled Dard’s
+impatience for the field. But presently the fighting half of his heart
+received an ally in one Sergeant La Croix (not a bad name for a military
+aspirant). This sergeant was at the village waiting to march with the
+new recruits to the Rhine. Sergeant La Croix was a man who, by force of
+eloquence, could make soldiering appear the most delightful as well as
+glorious of human pursuits. His tongue fired the inexperienced soul with
+a love of arms, as do the drums and trumpets and tramp of soldiers,
+and their bayonets glittering in the sun. He would have been worth his
+weight in fustian here, where we recruit by that and jargon; he was
+superfluous in France, where they recruited by force: but he was
+ornamental: and he set Dard and one or two more on fire. Indeed, so
+absorbing was his sense of military glory, that there was no room left
+in him for that mere verbal honor civilians call veracity.
+
+To speak plainly, the sergeant was a fluent, fertile, interesting,
+sonorous, prompt, audacious liar: and such was his success, that Dard
+and one or two more became mere human fiction pipes--of comparatively
+small diameter--irrigating a rural district with false views of military
+life, derived from that inexhaustible reservoir, La Croix.
+
+At last the long-threatened conscription was levied: every person fit to
+bear arms, and not coming under the allowed exceptions, drew a number:
+and at a certain hour the numbers corresponding to these were deposited
+in an urn, and one-third of them were drawn in presence of the
+authorities. Those men whose numbers were drawn had to go for soldiers.
+Jacintha awaited the result in great anxiety. She could not sit at home
+for it; so she went down the road to meet Dard, who had promised to
+come and tell her the result as soon as known. At last she saw him
+approaching in a disconsolate way. “O Dard! speak! are we undone? are
+you a dead man?” cried she. “Have they made a soldier of you?”
+
+“No such luck: I shall die a man of all work,” grunted Dard.
+
+“And you are sorry? you unnatural little monster! you have no feeling
+for me, then.”
+
+“Oh, yes, I have; but glory is No. 1 with me now.”
+
+“How loud the bantams crow! You leave glory to fools that be six feet
+high.”
+
+“General Bonaparte isn’t much higher than I am, and glory sits upon his
+brow. Why shouldn’t glory sit upon my brow?”
+
+“Because it would weigh you down, and smother you, you little fool.”
+ She added, “And think of me, that couldn’t bear you to be killed at any
+price, glory or no glory.”
+
+Then, to appease her fears, Dard showed her his number, 99; and assured
+her he had seen the last number in the functionary’s hand before he came
+away, and it was sixty something.
+
+This ocular demonstration satisfied Jacintha; and she ordered Dard to
+help her draw the water.
+
+“All right,” said he, “there is no immortal glory to be picked up
+to-day, so I’ll go in for odd jobs.”
+
+While they were at this job a voice was heard hallooing. Dard looked
+up, and there was a rigid military figure, with a tremendous
+mustache, peering about. Dard was overjoyed. It was his friend, his
+boon-companion. “Come here, old fellow,” cried he, “ain’t I glad to
+see you, that is all?” La Croix marched towards the pair. “What are you
+skulking here for, recruit ninety-nine?” said he, sternly, dropping the
+boon-companion in the sergeant; “the rest are on the road.”
+
+“The rest, old fellow! what do you mean? why, I was not drawn.”
+
+“Yes, you were.”
+
+“No, I wasn’t.”
+
+“Thunder of war, but I say you were. Yours was the last number.”
+
+“That is an unlucky guess of yours, for I saw the last number. Look
+here,” and he fumbled in his pocket, and produced his number.
+
+La Croix instantly fished out a corresponding number.
+
+“Well, and here you are; this was the last number drawn.”
+
+Dard burst out laughing.
+
+“You goose!” said he, “that is sixty-six--look at it.”
+
+“Sixty-six!” roared the sergeant; “no more than yours is--they are both
+sixty-sixes when you play tricks with them, and turn them up like that;
+but they are both ninety-nines when you look at them fair.”
+
+Dard scratched his head.
+
+“Come,” said the corporal, briskly, “make up his bundle, girl, and let
+us be off; we have got our marching orders; going to the Rhine.”
+
+“And do you think that I will let him go?” screamed Jacintha. “No! I
+will say one word to Madame Raynal, and she will buy him a substitute
+directly.”
+
+Dard stopped her sullenly. “No! I have told all in the village that I
+would go the first chance: it is come, and I’ll go. I won’t stay to be
+laughed at about this too. If I was sure to be cut in pieces, I’d go.
+Give over blubbering, girl, and get us a bottle of the best wine, and
+while we are drinking it, the sergeant and I, you make up my bundle. I
+shall never do any good here.”
+
+Jacintha knew the obstinate toad. She did as she was bid, and soon
+the little bundle was ready, and the two men faced the wine; La Croix,
+radiant and bellicose; Dard, crestfallen but dogged (for there was a
+little bit of good stuff at the bottom of the creature); and Jacintha
+rocking herself, with her apron over her head.
+
+“I’ll give you a toast,” said La Croix. “Here’s gunpowder.”
+
+Jacintha promptly honored the toast with a flood of tears.
+
+“Drop that, Jacintha,” said Dard, angrily; “do you think that is
+encouraging? Sergeant, I told this poor girl all about glory before you
+came, but she was not ripe for it: say something to cheer her up, for I
+can’t.”
+
+“I can,” cried this trumpet of battle, emptying its glass. “Attention,
+young woman.”
+
+“Oh, dear! oh, dear! yes, sir.”
+
+“A French soldier is a man who carries France in his heart”--
+
+“But if the cruel foreign soldiers kill him? Oh!”
+
+“Why, in that case, he does not care a straw. Every man must die; horses
+likewise, and dogs, and donkeys, when they come to the end of
+their troubles; but dogs and donkeys and chaps in blouses can’t die
+gloriously; as Dard may, if he has any luck at all: so, from this hour,
+if there was twice as little of him, be proud of him, for from this
+time he is a part of France and her renown. Come, recruit ninety-nine,
+shoulder your traps at duty’s call, and let us go forth in form.
+Attention! Quick--march! Halt! is that the way I showed you to march?
+Didn’t I tell you to start from the left? Now try again. QUICK--march!
+left--right--left--right--left--right--NOW you’ve--GOT it--DRAT
+ye,--KEEP it--left--right--left--right--left--right.” And with no more
+ado the sergeant marched the little odd-job man to the wars.
+
+VIVE LA FRANCE!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII.
+
+
+Edouard, the moment his temper cooled, became very sad. He longed to be
+friends again with Rose, but did not know how. His own pride held
+him back, and so did his fear that he had gone too far, and that his
+offended mistress would not listen to an offer of reconciliation from
+him. He sat down alone now to all his little meals. No sweet, mellow
+voices in his ear after the fatigues of the day. It was a dismal change
+in his life.
+
+At last, one day, he received three lines from Josephine, requesting him
+to come and speak to her. He went over directly, full of vague hopes. He
+found her seated pale and languid in a small room on the ground floor.
+
+“What has she been doing to you, dear?” began she kindly.
+
+“Has she not told you, Madame Raynal?”
+
+“No; she is refractory. She will tell me nothing, and that makes me fear
+she is the one in fault.”
+
+“Oh! if she does not accuse me, I am sure I will not accuse her. I dare
+say I am to blame; it is not her fault that I cannot make her love me.”
+
+“But you can. She does.”
+
+“Yes; but she loves others better, and she holds me out no hope it will
+ever be otherwise. On this one point how can I hope for your sympathy;
+unfortunately for me you are one of my rivals. She told me plainly she
+never could love me as she loves you.”
+
+“And you believed her?”
+
+“I had good reason to believe her.”
+
+Josephine smiled sadly. “Dear Edouard,” said she, “you must not attach
+so much importance to every word we say. Does Rose at her age know
+everything? Is she a prophet? Perhaps she really fancies she will always
+love her sister as she does now; but you are a man of sense; you ought
+to smile and let her talk. When you marry her you will take her to your
+own house; she will only see me now and then; she will have you and your
+affection always present. Each day some new tie between you and her. You
+two will share every joy, every sorrow. Your children playing at your
+feet, and reflecting the features of both parents, will make you one.
+Your hearts will melt together in that blessed union which raises earth
+so near to heaven; and then you will wonder you could ever be jealous of
+poor Josephine, who must never hope--ah, me!”
+
+Edouard, wrapped up in himself, mistook Josephine’s emotion at the
+picture she had drawn of conjugal love. He soothed her, and vowed upon
+his honor he never would separate Rose from her.
+
+“Madame Raynal,” said he, “you are an angel, and I am a fiend. Jealousy
+must be the meanest of all sentiments. I never will be jealous again,
+above all, of you, sweet angel. Why, you are my sister as well as hers,
+and she has a right to love you, for I love you myself.”
+
+“You make me very happy when you talk so,” sighed Josephine. “Peace is
+made?”
+
+“Never again to be broken. I will go and ask her pardon. What is the
+matter now?”
+
+For Jacintha was cackling very loud, and dismissing with ignominy two
+beggars, male and female.
+
+She was industry personified, and had no sympathy with mendicity. In
+vain the couple protested, Heaven knows with what truth, that they were
+not beggars, but mechanics out of work. “March! tramp!” was Jacintha’s
+least word. She added, giving the rein to her imagination, “I’ll loose
+the dog.” The man moved away, the woman turned appealingly to Edouard.
+He and Josephine came towards the group. She had got a sort of large
+hood, and in that hood she carried an infant on her shoulders. Josephine
+inspected it. “It looks sickly, poor little thing,” said she.
+
+“What can you expect, young lady?” said the woman. “Its mother had to
+rise and go about when she ought to have been in her bed, and now she
+has not enough to give it.”
+
+“Oh, dear!” cried Josephine. “Jacintha, give them some food and a nice
+bottle of wine.”
+
+“That I will,” cried Jacintha, changing her tone with courtier-like
+alacrity. “I did not see she was nursing.”
+
+Josephine put a franc into the infant’s hand; the little fingers closed
+on it with that instinct of appropriation, which is our first and often
+our last sentiment. Josephine smiled lovingly on the child, and the
+child seeing that gave a small crow.
+
+“Bless it,” said Josephine, and thereupon her lovely head reared itself
+like a snake’s, and then darted down on the child; and the young noble
+kissed the beggar’s brat as if she would eat it.
+
+This won the mother’s heart more than even the gifts.
+
+“Blessings on you, my lady!” she cried. “I pray the Lord not to forget
+this when a woman’s trouble comes on you in your turn! It is a small
+child, mademoiselle, but it is not an unhealthy one. See.” Inspection
+was offered, and eagerly accepted.
+
+Edouard stood looking on at some distance in amazement, mingled with
+disgust.
+
+“Ugh!” said he, when she rejoined him, “how could you kiss that nasty
+little brat?”
+
+“Dear Edouard, don’t speak so of a poor little innocent. Who would pity
+them if we women did not? It had lovely eyes.”
+
+“Like saucers.”
+
+“Yes.”
+
+“It is no compliment when you are affectionate to anybody; you overflow
+with benevolence on all creation, like the rose which sheds its perfume
+on the first-comer.”
+
+“If he is not going to be jealous of me next,” whined Josephine.
+
+She took him to Rose, and she said, “There, whenever good friends
+quarrel, it is understood they were both in the wrong. Bygones are to be
+bygones; and when your time comes round to quarrel again, please consult
+me first, since it is me you will afflict.” She left them together, and
+went and tapped timidly at the doctor’s study.
+
+Aubertin received her with none of that reserve she had seen in him. He
+appeared both surprised and pleased at her visit to his little sanctum.
+He even showed an emotion Josephine was at a loss to account for. But
+that wore off during the conversation, and, indeed, gave place to a sort
+of coldness.
+
+“Dear friend,” said she, “I come to consult you about Rose and Edouard.”
+ She then told him what had happened, and hinted at Edouard’s one fault.
+The doctor smiled. “It is curious. You have come to draw my attention to
+a point on which it has been fixed for some days past. I am preparing a
+cure for the two young fools; a severe remedy, but in their case a sure
+one.”
+
+He then showed her a deed, wherein he had settled sixty thousand francs
+on Rose and her children. “Edouard,” said he, “has a good place. He is
+active and rising, and with my sixty thousand francs, and a little purse
+of ten thousand more for furniture and nonsense, they can marry next
+week, if they like. Yes, marriage is a sovereign medicine for both of
+these patients. She does not love him quite enough. Cure: marriage. He
+loves her a little too much. Cure: marriage.”
+
+“O doctor!”
+
+“Can’t help it. I did not make men and women. We must take human nature
+as we find it, and thank God for it on the whole. Have you nothing else
+to confide to me?”
+
+“No, doctor.”
+
+“Are you sure?”
+
+“No, dear friend. But this is very near my heart,” faltered Josephine.
+
+The doctor sighed; then said gently, “They shall be happy: as happy as
+you wish them.”
+
+Meantime, in another room, a reconciliation scene was taking place, and
+the mutual concessions of two impetuous but generous spirits.
+
+
+The baroness noticed the change in Josephine’s appearance.
+
+She asked Rose what could be the matter.
+
+“Some passing ailment,” was the reply.
+
+“Passing? She has been so, on and off, a long time. She makes me very
+anxious.”
+
+Rose made light of it to her mother, but in her own heart she grew more
+and more anxious day by day. She held secret conferences with Jacintha;
+that sagacious personage had a plan to wake Josephine from her deathly
+languor, and even soothe her nerves, and check those pitiable fits
+of nervous irritation to which she had become subject. Unfortunately,
+Jacintha’s plan was so difficult and so dangerous, that at first even
+the courageous Rose recoiled from it; but there are dangers that seem to
+diminish when you look them long in the face.
+
+The whole party was seated in the tapestried room: Jacintha was there,
+sewing a pair of sheets, at a respectful distance from the gentlefolks,
+absorbed in her work; but with both ears on full cock.
+
+The doctor, holding his glasses to his eye, had just begun to read out
+the Moniteur.
+
+The baroness sat close to him, Edouard opposite; and the young ladies
+each in her corner of a large luxurious sofa, at some little distance.
+
+
+“‘The Austrians left seventy cannon, eight thousand men, and three
+colors upon the field. Army of the North: General Menard defeated the
+enemy after a severe engagement, taking thirteen field-pieces and a
+quantity of ammunition.’”
+
+
+The baroness made a narrow-minded renmark. “That is always the way with
+these journals,” said she. “Austrians! Prussians! when it’s Egypt one
+wants to hear about.”--“No, not a word about Egypt,” said the doctor;
+“but there is a whole column about the Rhine, where Colonel Dujardin
+is--and Dard. If I was dictator, the first nuisance I would put down
+is small type.” He then spelled out a sanguinary engagement: “eight
+thousand of the enemy killed. We have some losses to lament. Colonel
+Dujardin”--
+
+“Only wounded, I hope,” said the baroness.
+
+The doctor went coolly on. “At the head of the 24th brigade made a
+brilliant charge on the enemy’s flank, that is described in the general
+order as having decided the fate of the battle.”
+
+“How badly you do read,” said the old lady, sharply. “I thought he was
+gone; instead of that he has covered himself with glory; but it is all
+our doing, is it not, young ladies? We saved his life.”
+
+“We saved it amongst us, madame.”
+
+“What is the matter, Rose?” said Edouard.
+
+“Nothing: give me the salts, quick.”
+
+She only passed them, as it were, under her own nostrils; then held
+them to Josephine, who was now observed to be trembling all over. Rose
+contrived to make it appear that this was mere sympathy on Josephine’s
+part.
+
+“Don’t be silly, girls,” cried the baroness, cheerfully; “there is
+nobody killed that we care about.”
+
+Dr. Aubertin read the rest to himself.
+
+Edouard fell into a gloomy silence and tortured himself about Camille,
+and Rose’s anxiety and agitation.
+
+By and by the new servant brought in a letter. It was the long-expected
+one from Egypt.
+
+“Here is something better than salts for you. A long letter, Josephine,
+and all in his own hand; so he is safe, thank Heaven! I was beginning
+to be uneasy again. You frightened me for that poor Camille: but this
+is worth a dozen Camilles; this is my son; I would give my old life
+for him.”--“My dear Mother--[‘Bless him!’), my dear wife, and my dear
+sister--[‘Well! you sit there like two rocks!’)--We have just gained
+a battle--fifty colors. [‘What do you think of that?’) All the enemy’s
+baggage and ammunition are in our hands. [‘This is something like
+a battle, this one.’) Also the Pasha of Natolie. [‘Ah! the Pasha of
+Natolie; an important personage, no doubt, though I never had the honor
+of hearing of him. Do you hear?--you on the sofa. My son has captured
+the Pasha of Natolie. He is as brave as Caesar.’) But this success is
+not one of those that lead to important results [‘Never mind, a victory
+is a victory’), and I should not wonder if Bonaparte was to dash home
+any day. If so, I shall go with him, and perhaps spend a whole day with
+you, on my way to the Rhine.”
+
+At this prospect a ghastly look passed quick as lightning between Rose
+and Josephine.
+
+The baroness beckoned Josephine to come close to her, and read her what
+followed in a lower tone of voice.
+
+“Tell my wife I love her more and more every day. I don’t expect as much
+from her, but she will make me very happy if she can make shift to like
+me as well as her family do.”--“No danger! What husband deserves to be
+loved as he does? I long for his return, that his wife, his mother, and
+his sister may all combine to teach this poor soldier what happiness
+means. We owe him everything, Josephine, and if we did not love him, and
+make him happy, we should be monsters; now should we not?”
+
+Josephine stammered an assent.
+
+“NOW you may read his letter: Jacintha and all,” said the baroness
+graciously.
+
+The letter circulated. Meantime, the baroness conversed with Aubertin in
+quite an undertone.
+
+“My friend, look at Josephine. That girl is ill, or else she is going to
+be ill.”
+
+“Neither the one nor the other, madame,” said Aubertin, looking her
+coolly in the face.
+
+“But I say she is. Is a doctor’s eye keener than a mother’s?”
+
+“Considerably,” replied the doctor with cool and enviable effrontery.
+
+The baroness rose. “Now, children, for our evening walk. We shall enjoy
+it now.”
+
+“I trust you may: but for all that I must forbid the evening air to one
+of the party--to Madame Raynal.”
+
+The baroness came to him and whispered, “That is right. Thank you. See
+what is the matter with her, and tell me.” And she carried off the rest
+of the party.
+
+At the same time Jacintha asked permission to pass the rest of the
+evening with her relations in the village. But why that swift, quivering
+glance of intelligence between Jacintha and Rose de Beaurepaire when the
+baroness said, “Yes, certainly”?
+
+Time will show.
+
+Josephine and the doctor were left alone. Now Josephine had noticed the
+old people whisper and her mother glance her way, and the whole woman
+was on her guard. She assumed a languid complacency, and by way of
+shield, if necessary, took some work, and bent her eyes and apparently
+her attention on it.
+
+The doctor was silent and ill at ease.
+
+She saw he had something weighty on his mind. “The air would have done
+me no harm,” said she.
+
+“Neither will a few words with me.”
+
+“Oh, no, dear friend. Only I think I should have liked a little walk
+this evening.”
+
+“Josephine,” said the doctor quietly, “when you were a child I saved
+your life.”
+
+“I have often heard my mother speak of it. I was choked by the croup,
+and you had the courage to lance my windpipe.”
+
+“Had I?” said the doctor, with a smile. He added gravely, “It seems then
+that to be cruel is sometimes kindness. It is the nature of men to love
+those whose life they save.”
+
+“And they love you.”
+
+“Well, our affection is not perfect. I don’t know which is most to
+blame, but after all these years I have failed to inspire you with
+confidence.” The doctor’s voice was sad, and Josephine’s bosom panted.
+
+“Pray do not say so,” she cried. “I would trust you with my life.”
+
+“But not with your secret.”
+
+“My secret! What secret? I have no secrets.”
+
+“Josephine, you have now for full twelve months suffered in body and
+mind, yet you have never come to me for counsel, for comfort, for an old
+man’s experience and advice, nor even for medical aid.”
+
+“But, dear friend, I assure you”--
+
+“We DO NOT deceive our friend. We CANNOT deceive our doctor.”
+
+Josephine trembled, but defended herself after the manner of her sex.
+“Dear doctor,” said she, “I love you all the better for this. Your
+regard for me has for once blinded your science. I am not so robust as
+you have known me, but there is nothing serious the matter with me. Let
+us talk of something else. Besides, it is not interesting to talk about
+one’s self.”
+
+“Very well; since there is nothing serious or interesting in your case,
+we will talk about something that is both serious and interesting.”
+
+“With all my heart;” and she smiled with a sense of relief.
+
+But the doctor leaned over the table to her, and said in a cautious and
+most emphatic whisper, “We will talk about YOUR CHILD.”
+
+The work dropped from Josephine’s hands: she turned her face wildly on
+Aubertin, and faltered out, “M--my child?”
+
+“My words are plain,” replied he gravely. “YOUR CHILD.”
+
+When the doctor repeated these words, when Josephine looking in his face
+saw he spoke from knowledge, however acquired, and not from guess, she
+glided down slowly off the sofa and clasped his knees as he stood before
+her, and hid her face in an agony of shame and terror on his knees.
+
+“Forgive me,” she sobbed. “Pray do not expose me! Do not destroy me.”
+
+“Unhappy young lady,” said he, “did you think you had deceived me, or
+that you are fit to deceive any but the blind? Your face, your anguish
+after Colonel Dujardin’s departure, your languor, and then your sudden
+robustness, your appetite, your caprices, your strange sojourn at
+Frejus, your changed looks and loss of health on your return! Josephine,
+your old friend has passed many an hour thinking of you, divining your
+folly, following your trouble step by step. Yet you never invited him to
+aid you.”
+
+Josephine faltered out a lame excuse. If she had revered him less she
+could have borne to confess to him. She added it would be a relief to
+her to confide in him.
+
+“Then tell me all,” said he.
+
+She consented almost eagerly, and told him--nearly all. The old man was
+deeply affected. He murmured in a broken voice, “Your story is the story
+of your sex, self-sacrifice, first to your mother, then to Camille, now
+to your husband.”
+
+“And he is well worthy of any sacrifice I can make,” said Josephine.
+“But oh, how hard it is to live!”
+
+“I hope to make it less hard to you ere long,” said the doctor quietly.
+He then congratulated himself on having forced Josephine to confide in
+him. “For,” said he, “you never needed an experienced friend more than
+at this moment. Your mother will not always be so blind as of late.
+Edouard is suspicious. Jacintha is a shrewd young woman, and very
+inquisitive.”
+
+Josephine was not at the end of her concealments: she was ashamed to let
+him know she had made a confidant of Jacintha and not of him. She held
+her peace.
+
+“Then,” continued Aubertin, “there is the terrible chance of Raynal’s
+return. But ere I take on me to advise you, what are your own plans?”
+
+“I don’t know,” said Josephine helplessly.
+
+“You--don’t--know!” cried the doctor, looking at her in utter amazement.
+
+“It is the answer of a mad woman, is it not? Doctor, I am little better.
+My foot has slipped on the edge of a precipice. I close my eyes, and let
+myself glide down it. What will become of me?”
+
+“All shall be well,” said Aubertin, “provided you do not still love that
+man.”
+
+Josephine did not immediately reply: her thoughts turned inwards. The
+good doctor was proceeding to congratulate her on being cured of a fatal
+passion, when she stopped him with wonder in her face. “Not love him!
+How can I help loving him? I was his betrothed. I wronged him in my
+thoughts. War, prison, anguish, could not kill him; he loved me so. He
+struggled bleeding to my feet; and could I let him die, after all? Could
+I be crueller than prison, and torture, and despair?”
+
+The doctor sighed deeply; but, arming himself with the necessary
+resolution, he sternly replied, “A woman of your name cannot vacillate
+between love and honor; such vacillations have but one end. I will not
+let you drift a moral wreck between passion and virtue; and that is what
+it will come to if you hesitate now.”
+
+“Hesitate! Who can say I have hesitated where my honor was concerned?
+You can read our bodies then, but not our hearts. What! you see me so
+pale, forlorn, and dead, and that does not tell you I have bid Camille
+farewell forever? That we might be safer still I have not even told him
+he is a father: was ever woman so cruel as I am? I have written him but
+one letter, and in that I must deceive him. I told him I thought I might
+one day be happy, if I could hear that he did not give way to despair. I
+told him we must never meet again in this world. So now come what will:
+show me my duty and I will do it. This endless deceit burns my heart.
+Shall I tell my husband? It will be but one pang more, one blush more
+for me. But my mother!” and, thus appealed to, Dr. Aubertin felt, for
+the first time, all the difficulty of the situation he had undertaken to
+cure. He hesitated, he was embarrassed.
+
+“Ah,” said Josephine, “you see.” Then, after a short silence, she said
+despairingly, “This is my only hope: that poor Raynal will be long
+absent, and that ere he returns mamma will lie safe from sorrow and
+shame in the little chapel. Doctor, when a woman of my age forms
+such wishes as these, I think you might pity her, and forgive her
+ill-treatment of you, for she cannot be very happy. Ah me! ah me! ah
+me!”
+
+“Courage, poor soul! All is now in my hands, and I will save you,” said
+the doctor, his voice trembling in spite of him. “Guilt lies in the
+intention. A more innocent woman than you does not breathe. Two courses
+lay open to you: to leave this house with Camille Dujardin, or to
+dismiss him, and live for your hard duty till it shall please Heaven to
+make that duty easy (no middle course was tenable for a day); of these
+two paths you chose the right one, and, having chosen, I really think
+you are not called on to reveal your misfortune, and make those unhappy
+to whose happiness you have sacrificed your own for years to come.”
+
+“Forever,” said Josephine quietly.
+
+“The young use that word lightly. The old have almost ceased to use it.
+They have seen how few earthly things can conquer time.”
+
+He resumed, “You think only of others, Josephine, but I shall think
+of you as well. I shall not allow your life to be wasted in a needless
+struggle against nature.” Then turning to Rose, who had glided into the
+room, and stood amazed, “Her griefs were as many before her child was
+born, yet her health stood firm. Why? because nature was on her side.
+Now she is sinking into the grave. Why? because she is defying nature.
+Nature intended her to be pressing her child to her bosom day and night;
+instead of that, a peasant woman at Frejus nurses the child, and the
+mother pines at Beaurepaire.”
+
+At this, Josephine leaned her face on her hands on the doctor’s
+shoulder. In this attitude she murmured to him, “I have never seen him
+since I left Frejus.” Dr. Aubertin sighed for her. Emboldened by this,
+she announced her intention of going to Frejus the very next day to
+see her little Henri. But to this Dr. Aubertin demurred. “What,
+another journey to Frejus?” said he, “when the first has already roused
+Edouard’s suspicions; I can never consent to that.”
+
+Then Josephine surprised them both. She dropped her coaxing voice and
+pecked the doctor like an irritated pigeon. “Take care,” said she,
+“don’t be too cruel to me. You see I am obedient, resigned. I have given
+up all I lived for: but if I am never to have my little boy’s arms round
+me to console me, then--why torment me any longer? Why not say to me,
+‘Josephine, you have offended Heaven; pray for pardon, and die’?”
+
+Then the doctor was angry in his turn. “Oh, go then,” said he, “go to
+Frejus; you will have Edouard Riviere for a companion this time. Your
+first visit roused his suspicions. So before you go tell your mother
+all; for since she is sure to find it out, she had better hear it from
+you than from another.”
+
+“Doctor, have pity on me,” said Josephine.
+
+“You have no heart,” said Rose. “She shall see him though, in spite of
+you.”
+
+“Oh, yes! he has a heart,” said Josephine: “he is my best friend. He
+will let me see my boy.”
+
+All this, and the tearful eyes and coaxing yet trembling voice, was
+hard to resist. But Aubertin saw clearly, and stood firm. He put his
+handkerchief to his eyes a moment: then took the pining young mother’s
+hand. “And, do you think,” said he, “I do not pity you and love your
+boy? Ah! he will never want a father whilst I live; and from this moment
+he is under my care. I will go to see him; I will bring you news, and
+all in good time; I will place him where you shall visit him without
+imprudence; but, for the present, trust a wiser head than yours or
+Rose’s; and give me your sacred promise not to go to Frejus.”
+
+Weighed down by his good-sense and kindness, Josephine resisted no
+longer in words. She just lifted her hands in despair and began to cry.
+It was so piteous, Aubertin was ready to yield in turn, and consent to
+any imprudence, when he met with an unexpected ally.
+
+“Promise,” said Rose, doggedly.
+
+Josephine looked at her calmly through her tears.
+
+“Promise, dear,” repeated Rose, and this time with an intonation so
+fine that it attracted Josephine’s notice, but not the doctor’s. It was
+followed by a glance equally subtle.
+
+“I promise,” said Josephine, with her eye fixed inquiringly on her
+sister.
+
+For once she could not make the telegraph out: but she could see it was
+playing, and that was enough. She did what Rose bid her; she promised
+not to go to Frejus without leave.
+
+Finding her so submissive all of a sudden, he went on to suggest that
+she must not go kissing every child she saw. “Edouard tells me he saw
+you kissing a beggar’s brat. The young rogue was going to quiz you about
+it at the dinner-table; luckily, he told me his intention, and I
+would not let him. I said the baroness would be annoyed with you
+for descending from your dignity--and exposing a noble family to
+fleas--hush! here he is.”
+
+“Tiresome!” muttered Rose, “just when”--
+
+Edouard came forward with a half-vexed face.
+
+However, he turned it off into play. “What have you been saying to her,
+monsieur, to interest her so? Give me a leaf out of your book. I need
+it.”
+
+The doctor was taken aback for a moment, but at last he said slyly, “I
+have been proposing to her to name the day. She says she must consult
+you before she decides that.”
+
+“Oh, you wicked doctor!--and consult HIM of all people!”
+
+“So be off, both of you, and don’t reappear before me till it is
+settled.”
+
+Edouard’s eyes sparkled. Rose went out with a face as red as fire.
+
+It was a balmy evening. Edouard was to leave them for a week the next
+day. They were alone: Rose was determined he should go away quite happy.
+Everything was in Edouard’s favor: he pleaded his cause warmly: she
+listened tenderly: this happy evening her piquancy and archness seemed
+to dissolve into tenderness as she and Edouard walked hand in hand under
+the moon: a tenderness all the more heavenly to her devoted lover, that
+she was not one of those angels who cloy a man by invariable sweetness.
+
+For a little while she forgot everything but her companion. In that soft
+hour he won her to name the day, after her fashion.
+
+“Josephine goes to Paris with the doctor in about three weeks,” murmured
+she.
+
+“And you will stay behind, all alone?”
+
+“Alone? that shall depend on you, monsieur.”
+
+On this Edouard caught her for the first time in his arms.
+
+She made a faint resistance.
+
+“Seal me that promise, sweet one!”
+
+“No! no!--there!”
+
+He pressed a delicious first kiss upon two velvet lips that in their
+innocence scarcely shunned the sweet attack.
+
+For all that, the bond was no sooner sealed after this fashion, than the
+lady’s cheek began to burn.
+
+“Suppose we go in NOW?” said she, dryly.
+
+“Ah, not yet.”
+
+“It is late, dear Edouard.”
+
+And with these words something returned to her mind with its full force:
+something that Edouard had actually made her forget. She wanted to get
+rid of him now.
+
+“Edouard,” said she, “can you get up early in the morning? If you can,
+meet me here to-morrow before any of them are up; then we can talk
+without interruption.”
+
+Edouard was delighted.
+
+“Eight o’clock?”
+
+“Sooner if you like. Mamma bade me come and read to her in her room
+to-night. She will be waiting for me. Is it not tiresome?”
+
+“Yes, it is.”
+
+“Well, we must not mind that, dear; in three weeks’ time we are to have
+too much of one another, you know, instead of too little.”
+
+“Too much! I shall never have enough of you. I shall hate the night
+which will rob me of the sight of you for so many hours in the
+twenty-four.”
+
+“If you can’t see me, perhaps you may hear me; my tongue runs by night
+as well as by day.”
+
+“Well, that is a comfort,” said Edouard, gravely. “Yes, little quizzer,
+I would rather hear you scold than an angel sing. Judge, then, what
+music it is when you say you love me!”
+
+“I love you, Edouard.”
+
+Edouard kissed her hand warmly, and then looked irresolutely at her
+face.
+
+“No, no!” said she, laughing and blushing. “How rude you are. Next time
+we meet.”
+
+“That is a bargain. But I won’t go till you say you love me again.
+
+“Edouard, don’t be silly. I am ashamed of saying the same thing so
+often--I won’t say it any more. What is the use? You know I love you.
+There, I HAVE said it: how stupid!”
+
+“Adieu, then, my wife that is to be.”
+
+“Adieu! dear Edouard.”
+
+“My hus--go on--my hus--”
+
+“My huswife that shall be.”
+
+Then they walked very slowly towards the house, and once more Rose left
+quizzing, and was all tenderness.
+
+“Will you not come in, and bid them ‘good-night’?”
+
+“No, my own; I am in heaven. Common faces--common voices would bring me
+down to earth. Let me be alone;--your sweet words ringing in my ear. I
+will dilute you with nothing meaner than the stars. See how bright they
+shine in heaven; but not so bright as you shine in my heart.”
+
+“Dear Edouard, you flatter me, you spoil me. Alas! why am I not more
+worthy of your love?”
+
+“More worthy! How can that be?”
+
+Rose sighed.
+
+“But I will atone for all. I will make you a better--(here she
+substituted a full stop for a substantive)--than you expect. You will
+see else.”
+
+She lingered at the door: a proof that if Edouard, at that particular
+moment, had seized another kiss, there would have been no very violent
+opposition or offence.
+
+But he was not so impudent as some. He had been told to wait till
+the next meeting for that. He prayed Heaven to bless her, and so the
+affianced lovers parted for the night.
+
+It was about nine o’clock. Edouard, instead of returning to his
+lodgings, started down towards the town, to conclude a bargain with the
+innkeeper for an English mare he was in treaty for. He wanted her
+for to-morrow’s work; so that decided him to make the purchase. In
+purchases, as in other matters, a feather turns the balanced scale. He
+sauntered leisurely down. It was a very clear night; the full moon and
+the stars shining silvery and vivid. Edouard’s heart swelled with joy.
+He was loved after all, deeply loved; and in three short weeks he was
+actually to be Rose’s husband: her lord and master. How like a heavenly
+dream it all seemed--the first hopeless courtship, and now the wedding
+fixed! But it was no dream; he felt her soft words still murmur music at
+his heart, and the shadow of her velvet lips slept upon his own.
+
+He had strolled about a league when he heard the ring of a horse’s hoofs
+coming towards him, accompanied by a clanking noise; it came nearer and
+nearer, till it reached a hill that lay a little ahead of Edouard; then
+the sounds ceased; the cavalier was walking his horse up the hill.
+
+Presently, as if they had started from the earth, up popped between
+Edouard and the sky, first a cocked hat that seemed in that light to be
+cut with a razor out of flint; then the wearer, phosphorescent here and
+there; so brightly the keen moonlight played on his epaulets and steel
+scabbard. A step or two nearer, and Edouard gave a great shout; it was
+Colonel Raynal.
+
+After the first warm greeting, and questions and answers, Raynal told
+him he was on his way to the Rhine with despatches.
+
+“To the Rhine?”
+
+“I am allowed six days to get there. I made a calculation, and found I
+could give Beaurepaire half a day. I shall have to make up for it by
+hard riding. You know me; always in a hurry. It is Bonaparte’s fault
+this time. He is always in a hurry too.”
+
+“Why, colonel,” said Edouard, “let us make haste then. Mind they go
+early to rest at the chateau.”
+
+“But you are not coming my way, youngster?”
+
+“Not coming your way? Yes, but I am. Yours is a face I don’t see every
+day, colonel; besides I would not miss THEIR faces, especially the
+baroness’s and Madame Raynal’s, at sight of you; and, besides,”--and the
+young gentleman chuckled to himself, and thought of Rose’s words, “the
+next time we meet;” well, this will be the next time. “May I jump up
+behind?”
+
+Colonel Raynal nodded assent. Edouard took a run, and lighted like a
+monkey on the horse’s crupper. He pranced and kicked at this unexpected
+addition; but the spur being promptly applied to his flanks, he bounded
+off with a snort that betrayed more astonishment than satisfaction, and
+away they cantered to Beaurepaire, without drawing rein.
+
+“There,” said Edouard, “I was afraid they would be gone to bed; and they
+are. The very house seems asleep--fancy--at half-past ten.”
+
+“That is a pity,” said Raynal, “for this chateau is the stronghold of
+etiquette. They will be two hours dressing before they will come out and
+shake hands. I must put my horse into the stable. Go you and give the
+alarm.”
+
+“I will, colonel. Stop, first let me see whether none of them are up,
+after all.”
+
+And Edouard walked round the chateau, and soon discovered a light at one
+window, the window of the tapestried room. Running round the other
+way he came slap upon another light: this one was nearer the ground. A
+narrow but massive door, which he had always seen not only locked but
+screwed up, was wide open; and through the aperture the light of a
+candle streamed out and met the moonlight streaming in.
+
+“Hallo!” cried Edouard.
+
+He stopped, turned, and looked in.
+
+“Hallo!” he cried again much louder.
+
+A young woman was sleeping with her feet in the silvery moonlight, and
+her head in the orange-colored blaze of a flat candle, which rested on
+the next step above of a fine stone staircase, whose existence was now
+first revealed to the inquisitive Edouard.
+
+Coming plump upon all this so unexpectedly, he quite started.
+
+“Why, Jacintha!”
+
+He touched her on the shoulder to wake her. No. Jacintha was sleeping as
+only tired domestics can sleep. He might have taken the candle and burnt
+her gown off her back. She had found a step that fitted into the small
+of her back, and another that supported her head, and there she was fast
+as a door.
+
+At this moment Raynal’s voice was heard calling him.
+
+“There is a light in that bedroom.”
+
+“It is not a bedroom, colonel; it is our sitting-room now. We shall find
+them all there, or at least the young ladies; and perhaps the doctor.
+The baroness goes to bed early. Meantime I can show you one of our
+dramatis personae, and an important one too. She rules the roost.”
+
+He took him mysteriously and showed him Jacintha.
+
+Moonlight by itself seems white, and candlelight by itself seems yellow;
+but when the two come into close contrast at night, candle turns a
+reddish flame, and moonlight a bluish gleam.
+
+So Jacintha, with her shoes in this celestial sheen, and her face in
+that demoniacal glare, was enough to knock the gazer’s eye out.
+
+“Make a good sentinel--this one,” said Raynal--“an outlying picket for
+instance, on rough ground, in front of the enemy’s riflemen.”
+
+“Ha! ha! colonel! Let us see where this staircase leads. I have an idea
+it will prove a short cut.”
+
+“Where to?”
+
+“To the saloon, or somewhere, or else to some of Jacintha’s haunts.
+Serve her right for going to sleep at the mouth of her den.”
+
+“Forward then--no, halt! Suppose it leads to the bedrooms? Mind this
+is a thundering place for ceremony. We shall get drummed out of the
+barracks if we don’t mind our etiquette.”
+
+At this they hesitated; and Edouard himself thought, on the whole, it
+would be better to go and hammer at the front door.
+
+Now while they hesitated, a soft delicious harmony of female voices
+suddenly rose, and seemed to come and run round the walls. The men
+looked at one another in astonishment; for the effect was magical. The
+staircase being enclosed on all sides with stone walls and floored with
+stone, they were like flies inside a violoncello; the voices rang above,
+below, and on every side of the vibrating walls. In some epochs spirits
+as hardy as Raynal’s, and wits as quick as Riviere’s, would have fled
+then and there to the nearest public, and told over cups how they had
+heard the dames of Beaurepaire, long since dead, holding their revel,
+and the conscious old devil’s nest of a chateau quivering to the ghostly
+strains.
+
+But this was an incredulous age. They listened, and listened, and
+decided the sounds came from up-stairs.
+
+“Let us mount, and surprise these singing witches,” said Edouard.
+
+“Surprise them! what for? It is not the enemy--for once. What is the
+good of surprising our friends?”
+
+Storming parties and surprises were no novelty and therefore no treat to
+Raynal.
+
+“It will be so delightful to see their faces at first sight of you. O
+colonel, for my sake! Don’t spoil it by going tamely in at the front
+door, after coming at night from Egypt for half an hour.”
+
+Raynal grumbled something about its being a childish trick; but to
+please Edouard consented at last; only stipulated for a light: “or
+else,” said he, “we shall surprise ourselves instead with a broken neck,
+going over ground we don’t know to surprise the natives--our skirmishers
+got nicked that way now and then in Egypt.”
+
+“Yes, colonel, I will go first with Jacintha’s candle.” Edouard mounted
+the stairs on tiptoe. Raynal followed. The solid stone steps did not
+prate. The men had mounted a considerable way, when puff a blast of wind
+came through a hole, and out went Edouard’s candle. He turned sharply
+round to Raynal. “Peste!” said he in a vicious whisper. But the other
+laid his hand on his shoulder and whispered, “Look to the front.” He
+looked, and, his own candle being out, saw a glimmer on ahead. He
+crept towards it. It was a taper shooting a feeble light across a small
+aperture. They caught a glimpse of what seemed to be a small apartment.
+Yet Edouard recognized the carpet of the tapestried room--which was a
+very large room. Creeping a yard nearer, he discovered that it was the
+tapestried room, and that what had seemed the further wall was only the
+screen, behind which were lights, and two women singing a duet.
+
+He whispered to Raynal, “It is the tapestried room.”
+
+“Is it a sitting-room?” whispered Raynal.
+
+“Yes! yes! Mind and not knock your foot against the wood.”
+
+And Raynal went softly up and put his foot quietly through the aperture,
+which he now saw was made by a panel drawn back close to the ground;
+and stood in the tapestried chamber. The carpet was thick; the voices
+favored the stealthy advance; the floor of the old house was like a
+rock; and Edouard put his face through the aperture, glowing all over
+with anticipation of the little scream of joy that would welcome his
+friend dropping in so nice and suddenly from Egypt.
+
+The feeling was rendered still more piquant by a sharp curiosity that
+had been growing on him for some minutes past. For why was this passage
+opened to-night?--he had never seen it opened before. And why was
+Jacintha lying sentinel at the foot of the stairs?
+
+But this was not all. Now that they were in the room both men became
+conscious of another sound besides the ladies’ voices--a very peculiar
+sound. It also came from behind the screen. They both heard it, and
+showed, by the puzzled looks they cast at one another, that neither
+could make out what on earth it was. It consisted of a succession of
+little rustles, followed by little thumps on the floor.
+
+But what was curious, too, this rustle, thump--rustle, thump--fell
+exactly into the time of the music; so that, clearly, either the rustle
+thump was being played to the tune, or the tune sung to the rustle
+thump.
+
+This last touch of mystery inflamed Edouard’s impatience beyond bearing:
+he pointed eagerly and merrily to the corner of the screen. Raynal
+obeyed, and stepped very slowly and cautiously towards it.
+
+Rustle, thump! rustle, thump! rustle, thump! with the rhythm of
+harmonious voices.
+
+Edouard got his head and foot into the room without taking his eye off
+Raynal.
+
+Rustle, thump! rustle, thump! rustle, thump!
+
+Raynal was now at the screen, and quietly put his head round it, and his
+hand upon it.
+
+Edouard was bursting with expectation.
+
+No result. What is this? Don’t they see him? Why does he not speak to
+them? He seems transfixed.
+
+Rustle, thump! rustle, thump; accompanied now for a few notes by one
+voice only, Rose’s.
+
+Suddenly there burst a shriek from Josephine, so loud, so fearful, that
+it made even Raynal stagger back a step, the screen in his hand.
+
+Then another scream of terror and anguish from Rose. Then a fainter cry,
+and the heavy helpless fall of a human body.
+
+Raynal sprang forward whirling the screen to the earth in terrible
+agitation, and Edouard bounded over it as it fell at his feet. He did
+not take a second step. The scene that caught his eye stupefied and
+paralyzed him in full career, and froze him to the spot with amazement
+and strange misgivings.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX.
+
+
+To return for a moment to Rose. She parted from Edouard, and went in at
+the front door: but the next moment she opened it softly and watched her
+lover unseen. “Dear Edouard!” she murmured: and then she thought, “how
+sad it is that I must deceive him, even to-night: must make up an excuse
+to get him from me, when we were so happy together. Ah! he little knows
+how I shall welcome our wedding-day. When once I can see my poor martyr
+on the road to peace and content under the good doctor’s care. And oh!
+the happiness of having no more secrets from him I love! Dear Edouard!
+when once we are married, I never, never, will have a secret from you
+again--I swear it.”
+
+As a comment on these words she now stepped cautiously out, and peered
+in every direction.
+
+“St--st!” she whispered. No answer came to this signal.
+
+Rose returned into the house and bolted the door inside. She went up
+to the tapestried room, and found the doctor in the act of wishing
+Josephine good-night. The baroness, fatigued a little by her walk, had
+mounted no higher than her own bedroom, which was on the first floor
+just under the tapestried room. Rose followed the doctor out. “Dear
+friend, one word. Josephine talked of telling Raynal. You have not
+encouraged her to do that?”
+
+“Certainly not, while he is in Egypt.”
+
+“Still less on his return. Doctor, you don’t know that man. Josephine
+does not know him. But I do. He would kill her if he knew. He would kill
+her that minute. He would not wait: he would not listen to excuses: he
+is a man of iron. Or if he spared her he would kill Camille: and that
+would destroy her by the cruellest of all deaths! My friend, I am a
+wicked, miserable girl. I am the cause of all this misery!”
+
+She then told Aubertin all about the anonymous letter, and what Raynal
+had said to her in consequence.
+
+“He never would have married her had he known she loved another. He
+asked me was it so. I told him a falsehood. At least I equivocated, and
+to equivocate with one so loyal and simple was to deceive him. I am the
+only sinner: that sweet angel is the only sufferer. Is this the justice
+of Heaven? Doctor, my remorse is great. No one knows what I feel when I
+look at my work. Edouard thinks I love her so much better than I do
+him. He is wrong: it is not love only, it is pity: it is remorse for the
+sorrow I have brought on her, and the wrong I have done poor Raynal.”
+
+The high-spirited girl was greatly agitated: and Aubertin, though he did
+not acquit her of all blame, soothed her, and made excuses for her.
+
+“We must not always judge by results,” said he. “Things turned
+unfortunately. You did for the best. I forgive you for one. That is, I
+will forgive you if you promise not to act again without my advice.”
+
+“Oh, never! never!”
+
+“And, above all, no imprudence about that child. In three little weeks
+they will be together without risk of discovery. Well, you don’t answer
+me.”
+
+Rose’s blood turned cold. “Dear friend,” she stammered, “I quite agree
+with you.”
+
+“Promise, then.”
+
+“Not to let Josephine go to Frejus?” said Rose hastily. “Oh, yes! I
+promise.”
+
+“You are a good girl,” said Aubertin. “You have a will of your own. But
+you can submit to age and experience.” The doctor then kissed her, and
+bade her farewell.
+
+“I leave for Paris at six in the morning,” he said. “I will not try your
+patience or hers unnecessarily. Perhaps it will not be three weeks ere
+she sees her child under her friend’s roof.”
+
+The moment Rose was alone, she sat down and sighed bitterly. “There
+is no end to it,” she sobbed despairingly. “It is like a spider’s web:
+every struggle to be free but multiplies the fine yet irresistible
+thread that seems to bind me. And to-night I thought to be so happy;
+instead of that, he has left me scarce the heart to do what I have to
+do.”
+
+She went back to the room, opened a window, and put out a white
+handkerchief, then closed the window down on it.
+
+Then she went to Josephine’s bedroom-door: it opened on the tapestried
+room.
+
+“Josephine,” she cried, “don’t go to bed just yet.”
+
+“No, love. What are you doing? I want to talk to you. Why did you say
+promise? and what did you mean by looking at me so? Shall I come out to
+you?”
+
+“Not just yet,” said Rose; she then glided into the corridor, and passed
+her mother’s room and the doctor’s, and listened to see if all was
+quiet. While she was gone Josephine opened her door; but not seeing Rose
+in the sitting-room, retired again.
+
+Rose returned softly, and sat down with her head in her hand, in a calm
+attitude belied by her glancing eye, and the quick tapping of her other
+hand upon the table.
+
+Presently she raised her head quickly; a sound had reached her ear,--a
+sound so slight that none but a high-strung ear could have caught it. It
+was like a mouse giving a single scratch against a stone wall.
+
+Rose coughed slightly.
+
+On this a clearer sound was heard, as of a person scratching wood with
+the finger-nail. Rose darted to the side of the room, pressed against
+the wall, and at the same time put her other hand against the rim of one
+of the panels and pushed it laterally; it yielded, and at the opening
+stood Jacintha in her cloak and bonnet.
+
+“Yes,” said Jacintha, “under my cloak--look!”
+
+“Ah! you found the things on the steps?”
+
+“Yes! I nearly tumbled over them. Have you locked that door?”
+
+“No, but I will.” And Rose glided to the door and locked it. Then she
+put the screen up between Josephine’s room and the open panel: then she
+and Jacintha were wonderfully busy on the other side the screen, but
+presently Rose said, “This is imprudent; you must go down to the foot of
+the stairs and wait till I call you.”
+
+Jacintha pleaded hard against this arrangement, and represented that
+there was no earthly chance of any one coming to that part of the
+chateau.
+
+“No matter; I will be guarded on every side.”
+
+“Mustn’t I stop and just see her happy for once?”
+
+“No, my poor Jacintha, you must hear it from my lips.”
+
+Jacintha retired to keep watch as she was bid. Rose went to Josephine’s
+room, and threw her arms round her neck and kissed her vehemently.
+Josephine returned her embrace, then held her out at arm’s length and
+looked at her.
+
+“Your eyes are red, yet your little face is full of joy. There, you
+smile.”
+
+“I can’t help that; I am so happy.”
+
+“I am glad of it. Are you coming to bed?”
+
+“Not yet. I invite you to take a little walk with me first. Come!”
+ and she led the way slowly, looking back with infinite archness and
+tenderness.
+
+“You almost frighten me,” said Josephine; “it is not like you to be all
+joy when I am sad. Three whole weeks more!”
+
+“That is it. Why are you sad? because the doctor would not let you go to
+Frejus. And why am I not sad? because I had already thought of a way to
+let you see Edouard without going so far.”
+
+“Rose! O Rose! O Rose!”
+
+“This way--come!” and she smiled and beckoned with her finger, while
+Josephine followed like one under a spell, her bosom heaving, her eye
+glancing on every side, hoping some strange joy, yet scarce daring to
+hope.
+
+Rose drew back the screen, and there was a sweet little berceau that had
+once been Josephine’s own, and in it, sunk deep in snow-white lawn, was
+a sleeping child, that lay there looking as a rose might look could it
+fall upon new-fallen snow.
+
+At sight of it Josephine uttered a little cry, not loud but deep--ay, a
+cry to bring tears into the eye of the hearer, and she stood trembling
+from head to foot, her hands clasped, and her eye fascinated and fixed
+on the cradle.
+
+“My child under this roof! What have you done?” but her eye, fascinated
+and fixed, never left the cradle.
+
+“I saw you languishing, dying, for want of him.”
+
+“Oh, if anybody should come?” But her eye never stirred an inch from the
+cradle.
+
+“No, no, no! the door is locked. Jacintha watches below; there is no
+dan--Ah, oh, poor sister!”
+
+For, as Rose was speaking, the young mother sprang silently upon her
+child. You would have thought she was going to kill him; her head reared
+itself again and again like a crested snake’s, and again and again and
+again and again plunged down upon the child, and she kissed his little
+body from head to foot with soft violence, and murmured, through her
+streaming tears, “My child! my darling! my angel! oh, my poor boy! my
+child! my child!”
+
+I will ask my female readers of every degree to tell their brothers and
+husbands all the young noble did: how she sat on the floor, and had her
+child on her bosom; how she smiled over it through her tears; how she
+purred over it; how she, the stately one, lisped and prattled over it;
+and how life came pouring into her heart from it.
+
+Before she had had it in her arms five minutes, her pale cheek was as
+red as a rose, and her eyes brighter than diamonds.
+
+“Bless you, Rose! bless you! bless you! in one moment you have made me
+forget all I ever suffered in my life.”
+
+“There is a cold draught,” cried she presently, with maternal anxiety;
+“close the panel, Rose.”
+
+“No, dear; or I could not call to Jacintha, or she to me; but I will
+shift the screen round between him and the draught. There, now, come to
+his aunt--a darling!”
+
+Then Rose sat on the floor too, and Josephine put her boy on aunt’s
+lap, and took a distant view of him. But she could not bear so vast a
+separation long. She must have him to her bosom again.
+
+Presently my lord, finding himself hugged, opened his eyes, and, as a
+natural consequence, his mouth.
+
+“Oh, that will never do,” cried Rose, and they put him back in the
+cradle with all expedition, and began to rock it. Young master was
+not to be altogether appeased even by that. So Rose began singing an
+old-fashioned Breton chant or lullaby.
+
+Josephine sang with her, and, singing, watched with a smile her boy drop
+off by degrees to sleep under the gentle motion and the lulling song.
+They sang and rocked till the lids came creeping down, and hid the
+great blue eyes; but still they sang and rocked, lulling the boy, and
+gladdening their own hearts; for the quaint old Breton ditty was tunable
+as the lark that carols over the green wheat in April; and the words so
+simple and motherly, that a nation had taken them to heart. Such songs
+bind ages together and make the lofty and the low akin by the great ties
+of music and the heart. Many a Breton peasant’s bosom in the olden time
+had gushed over her sleeping boy as the young dame’s of Beaurepaire
+gushed now--in this quaint, tuneful lullaby.
+
+Now, as they kneeled over the cradle, one on each side, and rocked it,
+and sang that ancient chant, Josephine, who was opposite the screen,
+happening to raise her eyes, saw a strange thing.
+
+There was the face of a man set close against the side of the screen,
+and peeping and peering out of the gloom. The light of her candle fell
+full on this face; it glared at her, set pale, wonder-struck, and vivid
+in the surrounding gloom.
+
+Horror! It was her husband’s face.
+
+At first she was quite stupefied, and looked at it with soul and senses
+benumbed. Then she trembled, and put her hand to her eyes; for she
+thought it a phantom or a delusion of the mind. No: there it glared
+still. Then she trembled violently, and held out her left hand, the
+fingers working convulsively, to Rose, who was still singing.
+
+But, at the same moment, the mouth of this face suddenly opened in a
+long-drawn breath. At this, Josephine uttered a violent shriek, and
+sprang to her feet, with her right hand quivering and pointing at that
+pale face set in the dark.
+
+Rose started up, and, wheeling her head round, saw Raynal’s gloomy
+face looking over her shoulder. She fell screaming upon her knees, and,
+almost out of her senses, began to pray wildly and piteously for mercy.
+
+Josephine uttered one more cry, but this was the faint cry of nature,
+sinking under the shock of terror. She swooned dead away, and fell
+senseless on the floor ere Raynal could debarrass himself of the screen,
+and get to her.
+
+This, then, was the scene that met Edouard’s eyes. His affianced bride
+on her knees, white as a ghost, trembling, and screaming, rather than
+crying, for mercy. And Raynal standing over his wife, showing by the
+working of his iron features that he doubted whether she was worthy he
+should raise her.
+
+One would have thought nothing could add to the terror of this scene.
+Yet it was added to. The baroness rang her bell violently in the room
+below. She had heard Josephine’s scream and fall.
+
+At the ringing of this shrill bell Rose shuddered like a maniac, and
+grovelled on her knees to Raynal, and seized his very knees and implored
+him to show some pity.
+
+“O sir! kill us! we are culpable”--
+
+Dring! dring! dring! dring! dring! pealed the baroness’s bell again.
+
+“But do not tell our mother. Oh, if you are a man! do not! do not! Show
+us some pity. We are but women. Mercy! mercy! mercy!”
+
+“Speak out then,” groaned Raynal. “What does this mean? Why has my wife
+swooned at sight of me?--whose is this child?”
+
+“Whose?” stammered Rose. Till he said that, she never thought there
+COULD be a doubt whose child.
+
+Dring! dring! dring! dring! dring!
+
+“Oh, my God!” cried the poor girl, and her scared eyes glanced every way
+like some wild creature looking for a hole, however small, to escape by.
+
+Edouard, seeing her hesitation, came down on her other side. “Whose is
+the child, Rose?” said he sternly.
+
+“You, too? Why were we born? mercy! oh! pray let me go to my sister.”
+
+Dring! dring! dring! dring! dring! went the terrible bell.
+
+The men were excited to fury by Rose’s hesitation; they each seized an
+arm, and tore her screaming with fear at their violence, from her knees
+up to her feet between them with a single gesture.
+
+“Whose is the child?”
+
+“You hurt me!” said she bitterly to Edouard, and she left crying and was
+terribly calm and sullen all in a moment.
+
+“Whose is the child?” roared Edouard and Raynal, in one raging breath.
+“Whose is the child?”
+
+“It is mine.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX.
+
+
+These were not words; they were electric shocks.
+
+The two arms that gripped Rose’s arms were paralyzed, and dropped off
+them; and there was silence.
+
+Then first the thought of all she had done with those three words
+began to rise and grow and surge over her. She stood, her eyes turned
+downwards, yet inwards, and dilating with horror.
+
+Silence.
+
+Now a mist began to spread over her eyes, and in it she saw indistinctly
+the figure of Raynal darting to her sister’s side, and raising her head.
+
+She dared not look round on the other side. She heard feet stagger on
+the floor. She heard a groan, too; but not a word.
+
+Horrible silence.
+
+With nerves strung to frenzy, and quivering ears, that magnified every
+sound, she waited for a reproach, a curse; either would have been some
+little relief. But no! a silence far more terrible.
+
+Then a step wavered across the room. Her soul was in her ear. She could
+hear and feel the step totter, and it shook her as it went. All sounds
+were trebled to her. Then it struck on the stone step of the staircase,
+not like a step, but a knell; another step, another and another; down to
+the very bottom. Each slow step made her head ring and her heart freeze.
+
+At last she heard no more. Then a scream of anguish and recall rose
+to her lips. She fought it down, for Josephine and Raynal. Edouard
+was gone. She had but her sister now, the sister she loved better than
+herself; the sister to save whose life and honor she had this moment
+sacrificed her own, and all a woman lives for.
+
+She turned, with a wild cry of love and pity, to that sister’s side to
+help her; and when she kneeled down beside her, an iron arm was promptly
+thrust out between the beloved one and her.
+
+“This is my care, madame,” said Raynal, coldly.
+
+There was no mistaking his manner. The stained one was not to touch his
+wife.
+
+She looked at him in piteous amazement at his ingratitude. “It is well,”
+ said she. “It is just. I deserve this from you.”
+
+She said no more, but drooped gently down beside the cradle, and hid her
+forehead in the clothes beside the child that had brought all this woe,
+and sobbed bitterly.
+
+Then honest Raynal began to be sorry for her, in spite of himself. But
+there was no time for this. Josephine stirred; and, at the same moment,
+a violent knocking came at the door of the apartment, and the new
+servant’s voice, crying, “Ladies, for Heaven’s sake, what is the matter?
+The baroness heard a fall--she is getting up--she will be here. What
+shall I tell her is the matter?”
+
+Raynal was going to answer, but Rose, who had started up at the
+knocking, put her hand in a moment right before his mouth, and ran to
+the door. “There is nothing the matter; tell mamma I am coming down to
+her directly.” She flew back to Raynal in an excitement little short of
+frenzy. “Help me carry her into her own room,” cried she imperiously.
+Raynal obeyed by instinct; for the fiery girl spoke like a general,
+giving the word of command, with the enemy in front. He carried the true
+culprit in his arms, and laid her gently on her bed.
+
+“Now put IT out of sight--take this, quick, man! quick!” cried Rose.
+
+Raynal went to the cradle. “Ah! my poor girl,” said he, as he lifted it
+in his arms, “this is a sorry business; to have to hide your own child
+from your own mother!”
+
+“Colonel Raynal,” said Rose, “do not insult a poor, despairing girl.
+C’est lache.”
+
+“I am silent, young woman,” said Raynal, sternly. “What is to be done?”
+
+“Take it down the steps, and give it to Jacintha. Stay, here is a
+candle; I go to tell mamma you are come; and, Colonel Raynal, I never
+injured YOU: if you tell my mother you will stab her to the heart, and
+me, and may the curse of cowards light on you!--may”--
+
+“Enough!” said Raynal, sternly. “Do you take me for a babbling girl? I
+love your mother better than you do, or this brat of yours would not be
+here. I shall not bring her gray hairs down with sorrow to the grave. I
+shall speak of this villany to but one person; and to him I shall talk
+with this, and not with the idle tongue.” And he tapped his sword-hilt
+with a sombre look of terrible significance.
+
+He carried out the cradle. The child slept sweetly through it all.
+
+Rose darted into Josephine’s room, took the key from the inside to the
+outside, locked the door, put the key in her pocket, and ran down to her
+mother’s room; her knees trembled under her as she went.
+
+Meantime, Jacintha, sleeping tranquilly, suddenly felt her throat
+griped, and heard a loud voice ring in her ear; then she was lifted, and
+wrenched, and dropped. She found herself lying clear of the steps in the
+moonlight; her head was where her feet had been, and her candle out.
+
+She uttered shriek upon shriek, and was too frightened to get up. She
+thought it was supernatural; some old De Beaurepaire had served her thus
+for sleeping on her post. A struggle took place between her fidelity and
+her superstitious fears. Fidelity conquered. Quaking in every limb, she
+groped up the staircase for her candle.
+
+It was gone.
+
+Then a still more sickening fear came over her.
+
+What if this was no spirit’s work, but a human arm--a strong one--some
+man’s arm?
+
+Her first impulse was to dart up the stairs, and make sure that no
+calamity had befallen through her mistimed drowsiness. But, when she
+came to try, her dread of the supernatural revived. She could not
+venture without a light up those stairs, thronged perhaps with angry
+spirits. She ran to the kitchen. She found the tinderbox, and with
+trembling hands struck a light. She came back shading it with her shaky
+hands; and, committing her soul to the care of Heaven, she crept quaking
+up the stairs. Then she heard voices above, and that restored her more;
+she mounted more steadily. Presently she stopped, for a heavy step was
+coming down. It did not sound like a woman’s step. It came further down;
+she turned to fly.
+
+“Jacintha!” said a deep voice, that in this stone cylinder rang like
+thunder from a tomb.
+
+“Oh! saints and angels save me!” yelled Jacintha; and fell on her knees,
+and hid her head for security; and down went her candlestick clattering
+on the stone.
+
+“Don’t be a fool!” said the iron voice. “Get up and take this.”
+
+She raised her head by slow degrees, shuddering. A man was holding out a
+cradle to her; the candle he carried lighted up his face; it was Colonel
+Raynal.
+
+She stared at him stupidly, but never moved from her knees, and the
+candle began to shake violently in her hand, as she herself trembled
+from head to foot.
+
+Then Raynal concluded she was in the plot; but, scorning to reproach a
+servant, he merely said, “Well, what do you kneel there for, gaping at
+me like that? Take this, I tell you, and carry it out of the house.”
+
+He shoved the cradle roughly down into her hands, then turned on his
+heel without a word.
+
+Jacintha collapsed on the stairs, and the cradle beside her, for all
+the power was driven out of her body; she could hardly support her own
+weight, much less the cradle.
+
+She rocked herself, and moaned out, “Oh, what’s this? oh, what’s this?”
+
+A cold perspiration came over her whole frame.
+
+“What could this mean? What on earth had happened?”
+
+She took up the candle, for it was lying burning and guttering on the
+stairs; scraped up the grease with the snuffers, and by force of habit
+tried to polish it clean with a bit of paper that shook between her
+fingers; she did not know what she was doing. When she recovered her
+wits, she took the child out of the cradle, and wrapped it carefully in
+her shawl; then went slowly down the stairs; and holding him close to
+her bosom, with a furtive eye, and brain confused, and a heart like
+lead, stole away to the tenantless cottage, where Madame Jouvenel
+awaited her.
+
+Meantime, Rose, with quaking heart, had encountered the baroness. She
+found her pale and agitated, and her first question was, “What is the
+matter? what have you been all doing over my head?”
+
+“Darling mother,” replied Rose, evasively, “something has happened that
+will rejoice your heart. Somebody has come home.”
+
+“My son? eh, no! impossible! We cannot be so happy.”
+
+“He will be with you directly.”
+
+The old lady now trembled with joyful agitation.
+
+“In five minutes I will bring him to you. Shall you be dressed? I will
+ring for the girl to help you.”
+
+“But, Rose, the scream, and that terrible fall. Ah! where is Josephine?”
+
+“Can’t you guess, mamma? Oh, the fall was only the screen; they stumbled
+over it in the dark.”
+
+“They! who?”
+
+“Colonel Raynal, and--and Edouard. I will tell you, mamma, but don’t be
+angry, or even mention it; they wanted to surprise us. They saw a light
+burning, and they crept on tiptoe up to the tapestried room, where
+Josephine and I were, and they did give us a great fright.”
+
+“What madness!” cried the baroness, angrily; “and in Josephine’s weak
+state! Such a surprise might have driven her into a fit.”
+
+“Yes, it was foolish, but let it pass, mamma. Don’t speak of it, for he
+is so sorry about it.”
+
+Then Rose slipped out, ordered a fire in the salon, and not in the
+tapestried room, and the next minute was at her sister’s door. There she
+found Raynal knocking, and asking Josephine how she was.
+
+“Pray leave her to me a moment,” said she. “I will bring her down to
+you. Mamma is waiting for you in the salon.”
+
+Raynal went down. Rose unlocked the bedroom-door, went in, and, to her
+horror, found Josephine lying on the floor. She dashed water in her
+face, and applied every remedy; and at last she came back to life, and
+its terrors.
+
+“Save me, Rose! save me--he is coming to kill me--I heard him at the
+door,” and she clung trembling piteously to Rose.
+
+Then Rose, seeing her terror, was almost glad at the suicidal falsehood
+she had told. She comforted and encouraged Josephine and--deceived her.
+(This was the climax.)
+
+“All is well, my poor coward,” she cried; “your fears are all imaginary;
+another has owned the child, and the story is believed.”
+
+“Another! impossible! He would not believe it.”
+
+“He does believe it--he shall believe it.”
+
+Rose then, feeling by no means sure that Josephine, terrified as she
+was, would consent to let her sister come to shame to screen her, told
+her boldly that Jacintha had owned herself the mother of the child, and
+that Raynal’s only feeling towards HER was pity, and regret at having
+so foolishly frightened her, weakened as she was by illness. “I told him
+you had been ill, dear. But how came you on the ground?”
+
+“I had come to myself; I was on my knees praying. He tapped. I heard his
+voice. I remember no more. I must have fainted again directly.”
+
+Rose had hard work to make her believe that her guilt, as she called
+it, was not known; and even then she could not prevail on her to come
+down-stairs, until she said, “If you don’t, he will come to you.” On
+that Josephine consented eagerly, and with trembling fingers began to
+adjust her hair and her dress for the interview.
+
+All this terrible night Rose fought for her sister. She took her
+down-stairs to the salon; she put her on the sofa; she sat by her and
+pressed her hand constantly to give her courage. She told the story of
+the surprise her own way, before the whole party, including the doctor,
+to prevent Raynal from being called on to tell it his way. She laughed
+at Josephine’s absurdity, but excused it on account of her feeble
+health. In short, she threw more and more dust in all their eyes.
+
+But by the time when the rising sun came faintly in and lighted the
+haggard party, where the deceived were happy, the deceivers wretched,
+the supernatural strength this young girl had shown was almost
+exhausted. She felt an hysterical impulse to scream and weep: each
+minute it became more and more ungovernable. Then came an unexpected
+turn. Raynal after a long and tiring talk with his mother, as he called
+her, looked at his watch, and in a characteristic way coolly announced
+his immediate departure, this being the first hint he had given them
+that he was not come back for good.
+
+The baroness was thunderstruck.
+
+Rose and Josephine pressed one another’s hands, and had much ado not to
+utter a loud cry of joy.
+
+Raynal explained that he was the bearer of despatches. “I must be off:
+not an hour to lose. Don’t fret, mother, I shall soon be back again, if
+I am not knocked on the head.”
+
+Raynal took leave of them all. When it came to Rose’s turn, he drew her
+aside and whispered into her ear, “Who is the man?”
+
+She started, and seemed dumfounded.
+
+“Tell me, or I ask my wife.”
+
+“She has promised me not to betray me: I made her swear. Spare me now,
+brother; I will tell you all when you come back.”
+
+“That is a bargain: now hear ME swear: he shall marry you, or he shall
+die by my hand.”
+
+He confirmed this by a tremendous oath.
+
+Rose shuddered, but said nothing, only she thought to herself, “I am
+forewarned. Never shall you know who is the father of that child.”
+
+He was no sooner gone than the baroness insisted on knowing what this
+private communication between him and Rose was about.
+
+“Oh,” said Rose, “he was only telling me to keep up your courage and
+Josephine’s till he comes back.”
+
+This was the last lie the poor entangled wretch had to tell that
+morning. The next minute the sisters, exhausted by their terrible
+struggle, went feebly, with downcast eyes, along the corridor and up the
+staircase to Josephine’s room.
+
+They went hand in hand. They sank down, dressed as they were, on
+Josephine’s bed, and clung to one another and trembled together, till
+their exhausted natures sank into uneasy slumbers, from which each in
+turn would wake ever and anon with a convulsive start, and clasp her
+sister tighter to her breast.
+
+Theirs was a marvellous love. Even a course of deceit had not yet
+prevailed to separate or chill their sister bosoms. But still in this
+deep and wonderful love there were degrees: one went a shade deeper than
+the other now--ay, since last night. Which? why, she who had sacrificed
+herself for the other, and dared not tell her, lest the sacrifice should
+be refused.
+
+
+It was the gray of the morning, and foggy, when Raynal, after taking
+leave, went to the stable for his horse. At the stable-door he came upon
+a man sitting doubled up on the very stones of the yard, with his head
+on his knees. The figure lifted his head, and showed him the face of
+Edouard Riviere, white and ghastly: his hair lank with the mist, his
+teeth chattering with cold and misery. The poor wretch had walked
+frantically all night round and round the chateau, waiting till Raynal
+should come out. He told him so.
+
+“But why didn’t you?--Ah! I see. No! you could not go into the house
+after that. My poor fellow, there is but one thing for you to do. Turn
+your back on her, and forget she ever lived; she is dead to you.”
+
+“There is something to be done besides that,” said Edouard, gloomily.
+
+“What?”
+
+“Vengeance.”
+
+“That is my affair, young man. When I come back from the Rhine, she will
+tell me who her seducer is. She has promised.”
+
+“And don’t you see through that?” said Edouard, gnashing his teeth;
+“that is only to gain time: she will never tell you. She is young in
+years, but old in treachery.”
+
+He groaned and was silent a moment, then laying his hand on Raynal’s arm
+said grimly, “Thank Heaven, we don’t depend on her for information! I
+know the villain.”
+
+Raynal’s eyes flashed: “Ah! then tell me this moment.”
+
+“It is that scoundrel Dujardin.”
+
+“Dujardin! What do you mean?”
+
+“I mean that, while you were fighting for France, your house was turned
+into a hospital for wounded soldiers.”
+
+“And pray, sir, to what more honorable use could they put it?”
+
+“Well, this Dujardin was housed by you, was nursed by your wife and all
+the family; and in return has seduced your sister, my affianced.”
+
+“I can hardly believe that. Camille Dujardin was always a man of honor,
+and a good soldier.”
+
+“Colonel, there has been no man near the place but this Dujardin. I tell
+you it is he. Don’t make me tear my bleeding heart out: must I tell you
+how often I caught them together, how I suspected, and how she gulled
+me? blind fool that I was, to believe a woman’s words before my own
+eyes. I swear to you he is the villain; the only question is, which of
+us two is to kill him.”
+
+“Where is the man?”
+
+“In the army of the Rhine.”
+
+“Ah! all the better.”
+
+“Covered with glory and honor. Curse him! oh, curse him! curse him!”
+
+“I am in luck. I am going to the Rhine.”
+
+“I know it. That is why I waited here all through this night of misery.
+Yes, you are in luck. But you will send me a line when you have killed
+him; will you not? Then I shall know joy again. Should he escape you, he
+shall not escape me.”
+
+“Young man,” said Raynal, with dignity, “this rage is unmanly. Besides,
+we have not heard his side of the story. He is a good soldier; perhaps
+he is not all to blame: or perhaps passion has betrayed him into a sin
+that his conscience and honor disapprove: if so, he must not die. You
+think only of your wrong: it is natural: but I am the girl’s brother;
+guardian of her honor and my own. His life is precious as gold. I shall
+make him marry her.”
+
+“What! reward him for his villany?” cried Edouard, frantically.
+
+“A mighty reward,” replied Raynal, with a sneer.
+
+“You leave one thing out of the calculation, monsieur,” said Edouard,
+trembling with anger, “that I will kill your brother-in-law at the
+altar, before her eyes.”
+
+“YOU leave one thing out of the calculation: that you will first have to
+cross swords, at the altar, with me.”
+
+“So be it. I will not draw on my old commandant. I could not; but be
+sure I will catch him and her alone some day, and the bride shall be a
+widow in her honeymoon.”
+
+“As you please,” said Raynal, coolly. “That is all fair, as you have
+been wronged. I shall make her an honest wife, and then you may make
+her an honest widow. (This is what they call LOVE, and sneer at me for
+keeping clear of it.) But neither he nor you shall keep MY SISTER what
+she is now, a ----,” and he used a word out of camp.
+
+Edouard winced and groaned. “Oh! don’t call her by such a name. There
+is some mystery. She loved me once. There must have been some strange
+seduction.”
+
+“Now you deceive yourself,” said Raynal. “I never saw a girl that could
+take her own part better than she can; she is not like her sister at
+all in character. Not that I excuse him; it was a dishonorable act, an
+ungrateful act to my wife and my mother.”
+
+“And to you.”
+
+“Now listen to me: in four days I shall stand before him. I shall not
+go into a pet like you; I am in earnest. I shall just say to him,
+‘Dujardin, I know all!’ Then if he is guilty his face will show it
+directly. Then I shall say, ‘Comrade, you must marry her whom you have
+dishonored.’”
+
+“He will not. He is a libertine, a rascal.”
+
+“You are speaking of a man you don’t know. He WILL marry her and repair
+the wrong he has done.”
+
+“Suppose he refuses?”
+
+“Why should he refuse? The girl is not ugly nor old, and if she has done
+a folly, he was her partner in it.”
+
+“But SUPPOSE he refuses?”
+
+Raynal ground his teeth. “Refuse? If he does, I’ll run my sword through
+his carcass then and there, and the hussy shall go into a convent.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI.
+
+
+The French army lay before a fortified place near the Rhine, which we
+will call Philipsburg.
+
+This army knew Bonaparte by report only; it was commanded by generals of
+the old school.
+
+Philipsburg was defended on three sides by the nature of the ground; but
+on the side that faced the French line of march there was only a zigzag
+wall, pierced, and a low tower or two at each of the salient angles.
+
+There were evidences of a tardy attempt to improve the defences. In
+particular there was a large round bastion, about three times the height
+of the wall; but the masonry was new, and the very embrasures were not
+yet cut.
+
+Young blood was for assaulting these equivocal fortifications at the end
+of the day’s march that brought the French advanced guard in sight of
+the place; but the old generals would not hear of it; the soldiers’
+lives must not be flung away assaulting a place that could be reduced in
+twenty-one days with mathematical certainty. For at this epoch a siege
+was looked on as a process with a certain result, the only problem was
+in how many days would the place be taken; and even this they used to
+settle to a day or two on paper by arithmetic; so many feet of wall, and
+so many guns on the one side; so many guns, so many men, and such and
+such a soil to cut the trenches in on the other: result, two figures
+varying from fourteen to forty. These two figures represented the
+duration of the siege.
+
+For all that, siege arithmetic, right in general, has often been
+terribly disturbed by one little incident, that occurs from time to
+time; viz., Genius INside. And, indeed, this is one of the sins of
+genius; it goes and puts out calculations that have stood the brunt of
+years. Archimedes and Todleben were, no doubt, clever men in their way
+and good citizens, yet one characteristic of delicate men’s minds they
+lacked--veneration; they showed a sad disrespect for the wisdom of the
+ancients, deranged the calculations which so much learning and patient
+thought had hallowed, disturbed the minds of white-haired veterans, took
+sieges out of the grasp of science, and plunged them back into the field
+of wild conjecture.
+
+Our generals then sat down at fourteen hundred yards’ distance, and
+planned the trenches artistically, and directed them to be cut at
+artful angles, and so creep nearer and nearer the devoted town. Then the
+Prussians, whose hearts had been in their shoes at first sight of the
+French shakos, plucked up, and turned not the garrison only but the
+population of the town into engineers and masons. Their fortifications
+grew almost as fast as the French trenches.
+
+The first day of the siege, a young but distinguished brigadier in the
+French army rode to the quarters of General Raimbaut, who commanded
+his division, and was his personal friend, and respectfully but firmly
+entreated the general to represent to the commander-in-chief the
+propriety of assaulting that new bastion before it should become
+dangerous. “My brigade shall carry it in fifteen minutes, general,” said
+he.
+
+“What! cross all that open under fire? One-half your brigade would never
+reach the bastion.”
+
+“But the other half would take it.”
+
+“That is not so certain.”
+
+General Raimbaut refused to forward the young colonel’s proposal to
+headquarters. “I will not subject you to TWO refusals in one matter,”
+ said he, kindly.
+
+The young colonel lingered. He said, respectfully, “One question,
+general, when that bastion cuts its teeth will it be any easier to take
+than now?”
+
+“Certainly; it will always be easier to take it from the sap than to
+cross the open under fire to it, and take it. Come, colonel, to your
+trenches; and if your friend should cut its teeth, you shall have a
+battery in your attack that will set its teeth on edge. Ha! ha!”
+
+The young colonel did not echo his chief’s humor; he saluted gravely,
+and returned to the trenches.
+
+The next morning three fresh tiers of embrasures grinned one above
+another at the besiegers. The besieged had been up all night, and not
+idle. In half these apertures black muzzles showed themselves.
+
+The bastion had cut its front teeth.
+
+Thirteenth day of the siege.
+
+The trenches were within four hundred yards of the enemy’s guns, and
+it was hot work in them. The enemy had three tiers of guns in the round
+bastion, and on the top they had got a long 48-pounder, which they
+worked with a swivel joint, or the like, and threw a great roaring shot
+into any part of the French lines.
+
+As to the commander-in-chief and his generals, they were dotted about
+a long way in the rear, and no shot came as far as them; but in the
+trenches the men began now to fall fast, especially on the left attack,
+which faced the round bastion. Our young colonel had got his heavy
+battery, and every now and then he would divert the general efforts
+of the bastion, and compel it to concentrate its attention on him, by
+pounding away at it till it was all in sore places. But he meant it
+worse mischief than that. Still, as heretofore, regarding it as the key
+to Philipsburg, he had got a large force of engineers at work driving a
+mine towards it, and to this he trusted more than to breaching it; for
+the bigger holes he made in it by day were all stopped at night by the
+townspeople.
+
+This colonel was not a favorite in the division to which his brigade
+belonged. He was a good soldier, but a dull companion. He was also
+accused of hauteur and of an unsoldierly reserve with his brother
+officers.
+
+Some loose-tongued ones even called him a milk-sop, because he was
+constantly seen conversing with the priest--he who had nothing to say to
+an honest soldier.
+
+Others said, “No, hang it, he is not a milk-sop: he is a tried soldier:
+he is a sulky beggar all the same.” Those under his immediate command
+were divided in opinion about him. There was something about him they
+could not understand. Why was his sallow face so stern, so sad? and why
+with all that was his voice so gentle? somehow the few words that did
+fall from his mouth were prized. One old soldier used to say, “I would
+rather have a word from our brigadier than from the commander-in-chief.”
+ Others thought he must at some part of his career have pillaged a
+church, taken the altar-piece, and sold it to a picture-dealer in Paris,
+or whipped the earrings out of the Madonna’s ears, or admitted the
+female enemy to quarter upon ungenerous conditions: this, or some such
+crime to which we poor soldiers are liable: and now was committing the
+mistake of remording himself about it. “Always alongside the chaplain,
+you see!”
+
+This cold and silent man had won the heart of the most talkative
+sergeant in the French army. Sergeant La Croix protested with many oaths
+that all the best generals of the day had commanded him in turn, and
+that his present colonel was the first that had succeeded in inspiring
+him with unlimited confidence. “He knows every point of war--this
+one,” said La Croix, “I heard him beg and pray for leave to storm this
+thundering bastion before it was armed: but no, the old muffs would be
+wiser than our colonel. So now here we are kept at bay by a place that
+Julius Caesar and Cannibal wouldn’t have made two bites at apiece; no
+more would I if I was the old boy out there behind the hill.” In such
+terms do sergeants denote commanders-in-chief--at a distance. A voluble
+sergeant has more influence with the men than the minister of war is
+perhaps aware: on the whole, the 24th brigade would have followed its
+gloomy colonel to grim death and a foot farther. One thing gave these
+men a touch of superstitious reverence for their commander. He seemed
+to them free from physical weakness. He never SAT DOWN to dinner, and
+seemed never to sleep. At no hour of the day or night were the sentries
+safe from his visits.
+
+Very annoying. But, after awhile, it led to keen watchfulness: the more
+so that the sad and gloomy colonel showed by his manner he appreciated
+it. Indeed, one night he even opened his marble jaws, and told Sergeant
+La Croix that a watchful sentry was an important soldier, not to his
+brigade only, but to the whole army. Judge whether the maxim and the
+implied encomium did not circulate next morning, with additions.
+
+Sixteenth day of the siege. The round bastion opened fire at eight
+o’clock, not on the opposing battery, but on the right of the French
+attack. Its advanced position enabled a portion of its guns to rake
+these trenches slant-wise: and depressing its guns it made the round
+shot strike the ground first and ricochet over.
+
+On this our colonel opened on them with all his guns: one of these
+he served himself. Among his other warlike accomplishments, he was
+a wonderful shot with a cannon. He showed them capital practice this
+morning: drove two embrasures into one, and knocked about a ton of
+masonry off the parapet. Then taking advantage of this, he served two of
+his guns with grape, and swept the enemy off the top of the bastion,
+and kept it clear. He made it so hot they could not work the upper guns.
+Then they turned the other two tiers all upon him, and at it both
+sides went ding, dong, till the guns were too hot to be worked. So then
+Sergeant La Croix popped his head up from the battery, and showed
+the enemy a great white plate. This was meant to convey to them an
+invitation to dine with the French army: the other side of the table of
+course.
+
+To the credit of Prussian intelligence be it recorded, that this
+pantomimic hint was at once taken and both sides went to dinner.
+
+The fighting colonel, however, remained in the battery, and kept a
+detachment of his gunners employed cooling the guns and repairing the
+touch-holes. He ordered his two cutlets and his glass of water into the
+battery.
+
+Meantime, the enemy fired a single gun at long intervals, as much as to
+say, “We had the last word.”
+
+Let trenches be cut ever so artfully, there will be a little space
+exposed here and there at the angles. These spaces the men are ordered
+to avoid, or whip quickly across them into cover.
+
+Now the enemy had just got the range of one of these places with their
+solitary gun, and had already dropped a couple of shot right on to it.
+A camp follower with a tray, two cutlets, and a glass of water, came to
+this open space just as a puff of white smoke burst from the bastion.
+Instead of instantly seeking shelter till the shot had struck, he, in
+his inexperience, thought the shot must have struck, and all danger be
+over. He stayed there mooning instead of pelting under cover: the
+shot (eighteen-pound) struck him right on the breast, knocked him into
+spilikins, and sent the mutton cutlets flying.
+
+The human fragments lay quiet, ten yards off. But a soldier that was
+eating his dinner kicked it over, and jumped up at the side of “Death’s
+Alley” (as it was christened next minute), and danced and yelled with
+pain.
+
+“Haw! haw! haw!” roared a soldier from the other side of the alley.
+
+“What is that?” cried Sergeant La Croix. “What do you laugh at, Private
+Cadel?” said he sternly, for, though he was too far in the trench to
+see, he had heard that horrible sound a soldier knows from every other,
+the “thud” of a round shot striking man or horse.
+
+“Sergeant,” said Cadel, respectfully, “I laugh to see Private Dard, that
+got the wind of the shot, dance and sing, when the man that got the shot
+itself does not say a word.”
+
+“The wind of the shot, you rascal!” roared Private Dard: “look here!”
+ and he showed the blood running down his face.
+
+The shot had actually driven a splinter of bone out of the sutler into
+Dard’s temple.
+
+“I am the unluckiest fellow in the army,” remonstrated Dard: and he
+stamped in a circle.
+
+“Seems to me you are only the second unluckiest this time,” said a young
+soldier with his mouth full; and, with a certain dry humor, he pointed
+vaguely over his shoulder with the fork towards the corpse.
+
+The trenches laughed and assented.
+
+This want of sympathy and justice irritated Dard. “You cursed fools!”
+ cried he. “He is gone where we must all go--without any trouble. But
+look at me. I am always getting barked. Dogs of Prussians! they pick me
+out among a thousand. I shall have a headache all the afternoon, you see
+else.”
+
+Some of our heads would never have ached again: but Dard had a good
+thick skull.
+
+Dard pulled out his spilikin savagely.
+
+“I’ll wrap it up in paper for Jacintha,” said he. “Then that will learn
+her what a poor soldier has to go through.”
+
+Even this consolation was denied Private Dard.
+
+Corporal Coriolanus Gand, a bit of an infidel from Lyons, who sometimes
+amused himself with the Breton’s superstition, told him with a grave
+face, that the splinter belonged not to him, but to the sutler, and,
+though so small, was doubtless a necessary part of his frame.
+
+“If you keep that, it will be a bone of contention between you two,”
+ said he; “especially at midnight. HE WILL BE ALWAYS COMING BACK TO YOU
+FOR IT.”
+
+“There, take it away!” said the Breton hastily, “and bury it with the
+poor fellow.”
+
+Sergeant La Croix presented himself before the colonel with a rueful
+face and saluted him and said, “Colonel, I beg a thousand pardons; your
+dinner has been spilt--a shot from the bastion.”
+
+“No matter,” said the colonel. “Give me a piece of bread instead.”
+
+La Croix went for it himself, and on his return found Cadel sitting on
+one side of Death’s Alley, and Dard with his head bound up on the other.
+They had got a bottle which each put up in turn wherever he fancied
+the next round shot would strike, and they were betting their afternoon
+rations which would get the Prussians to hit the bottle first.
+
+La Croix pulled both their ears playfully.
+
+“Time is up for playing marbles,” said he. “Be off, and play at duty,”
+ and he bundled them into the battery.
+
+
+It was an hour past midnight: a cloudy night. The moon was up, but seen
+only by fitful gleams. A calm, peaceful silence reigned.
+
+Dard was sentinel in the battery.
+
+An officer going his rounds found the said sentinel flat instead of
+vertical. He stirred him with his scabbard, and up jumped Dard.
+
+“It’s all right, sergeant. O Lord! it’s the colonel. I wasn’t asleep,
+colonel.”
+
+“I have not accused you. But you will explain what you were doing.”
+
+“Colonel,” said Dard, all in a flutter, “I was taking a squint at them,
+because I saw something. The beggars are building a wall, now.”
+
+“Where?”
+
+“Between us and the bastion.”
+
+“Show me.”
+
+“I can’t, colonel; the moon has gone in; but I did see it.”
+
+“How long was it?”
+
+“About a hundred yards.”
+
+“How high?”
+
+“Colonel, it was ten feet high if it was an inch.”
+
+“Have you good sight?”
+
+“La! colonel, wasn’t I a bit of a poacher before I took to the bayonet?”
+
+“Good! Now reflect. If you persist in this statement, I turn out the
+brigade on your information.”
+
+“I’ll stand the fire of a corporal’s guard at break of day if I make a
+mistake now,” said Dard.
+
+The colonel glided away, called his captain and first lieutenants, and
+said two words in each ear, that made them spring off their backs.
+
+Dard, marching to an fro, musket on shoulder, found himself suddenly
+surrounded by grim, silent, but deadly eager soldiers, that came pouring
+like bees into the open space behind the battery. The officers came
+round the colonel.
+
+“Attend to two things,” said he to the captains. “Don’t fire till they
+are within ten yards: and don’t follow them unless I lead you.”
+
+The men were then told off by companies, some to the battery, some to
+the trenches, some were kept on each side Death’s Alley, ready for a
+rush.
+
+They were not all of them in position, when those behind the parapet
+saw, as it were, something deepen the gloom of night, some fourscore
+yards to the front: it was like a line of black ink suddenly drawn upon
+a sheet covered with Indian ink.
+
+It seems quite stationary. The novices wondered what it was. The
+veterans muttered--“Three deep.”
+
+Though it looked stationary, it got blacker and blacker. The soldiers of
+the 24th brigade griped their muskets hard, and set their teeth, and the
+sergeants had much ado to keep them quiet.
+
+All of a sudden, a loud yell on the right of the brigade, two or three
+single shots from the trenches in that direction, followed by a volley,
+the cries of wounded men, and the fierce hurrahs of an attacking party.
+
+Our colonel knew too well those sounds: the next parallel had been
+surprised, and the Prussian bayonet was now silently at work.
+
+Disguise was now impossible. At the first shot, a guttural voice in
+front of Dujardin’s men was heard to give a word of command. There was
+a sharp rattle and in a moment the thick black line was tipped with
+glittering steel.
+
+A roar and a rush, and the Prussian line three deep came furiously like
+a huge steel-pointed wave, at the French lines. A tremendous wave of
+fire rushed out to meet that wave of steel: a crash of two hundred
+muskets, and all was still. Then you could see through the black
+steel-tipped line in a hundred frightful gaps, and the ground sparkled
+with bayonets and the air rang with the cries of the wounded.
+
+A tremendous cheer from the brigade, and the colonel charged at the head
+of his column, out by Death’s Alley.
+
+The broken wall was melting away into the night. The colonel wheeled
+his men to the right: one company, led by the impetuous young Captain
+Jullien, followed the flying enemy.
+
+The other attack had been only too successful. They shot the sentries,
+and bayoneted many of the soldiers in their tents: others escaped by
+running to the rear, and some into the next parallel.
+
+Several, half dressed, snatched up their muskets, killed one Prussian,
+and fell riddled like sieves.
+
+A gallant officer got a company together into the place of arms and
+formed in line.
+
+Half the Prussian force went at them, the rest swept the trenches: the
+French company delivered a deadly volley, and the next moment clash
+the two forces crossed bayonets, and a silent deadly stabbing match was
+played: the final result of which was inevitable. The Prussians were
+five to one. The gallant officer and the poor fellows who did their duty
+so stoutly, had no thought left but to die hard, when suddenly a roaring
+cheer seemed to come from the rear rank of the enemy. “France! France!”
+ Half the 24th brigade came leaping and swarming over the trenches in the
+Prussian rear. The Prussians wavered. “France!” cried the little party
+that were being overpowered, and charged in their turn with such fury
+that in two seconds the two French corps went through the enemy’s centre
+like paper, and their very bayonets clashed together in more than one
+Prussian body.
+
+Broken thus in two fragments the Prussian corps ceased to exist as a
+military force. The men fled each his own way back to the fort, and many
+flung away their muskets, for French soldiers were swarming in from all
+quarters. At this moment, bang! bang! bang! from the bastion.
+
+“They are firing on my brigade,” said our colonel. “Who has led his
+company there against my orders? Captain Neville, into the battery, and
+fire twenty rounds at the bastion! Aim at the flashes from their middle
+tier.”
+
+“Yes, colonel.”
+
+The battery opened with all its guns on the bastion. The right attack
+followed suit. The town answered, and a furious cannonade roared and
+blazed all down both lines till daybreak. Hell seemed broken loose.
+
+Captain Jullien had followed the flying foe: but could not come up with
+them: and, as the enemy had prepared for every contingency, the
+fatal bastion, after first throwing a rocket or two to discover their
+position, poured showers of grape into them, killed many, and would have
+killed more but that Captain Neville and his gunners happened by mere
+accident to dismount one gun and to kill a couple of gunners at the
+others. This gave the remains of the company time to disperse and run
+back. When the men were mustered, Captain Jullien and twenty-five of
+his company did not answer to their names. At daybreak they were visible
+from the trenches lying all by themselves within eighty yards of the
+bastion.
+
+A flag of truce came from the fort: the dead were removed on both sides
+and buried. Some Prussian officers strolled into the French lines.
+Civilities and cigars exchanged: “Bon jour,” “Gooten daeg:” then at it
+again, ding dong all down the line blazing and roaring.
+
+At twelve o’clock the besieged had got a man on horseback, on top of a
+hill, with colored flags in his hand, making signals.
+
+“What are you up to now?” inquired Dard.
+
+“You will see,” said La Croix, affecting mystery; he knew no more than
+the other.
+
+Presently off went Long Tom on the top of the bastion, and the shot came
+roaring over the heads of the speakers.
+
+The flags were changed, and off went Long Tom again at an elevation.
+
+Ten seconds had scarcely elapsed when a tremendous explosion took place
+on the French right. Long Tom was throwing red-hot shot; one had fallen
+on a powder wagon, and blown it to pieces, and killed two poor fellows
+and a horse, and turned an artillery man at some distance into a seeming
+nigger, but did him no great harm; only took him three days to get the
+powder out of his clothes with pipe clay, and off his face with raw
+potato-peel.
+
+When the tumbril exploded, the Prussians could be heard to cheer, and
+they turned to and fired every iron spout they owned. Long Tom worked
+all day.
+
+They got into a corner where the guns of the battery could not hit
+them or him, and there was his long muzzle looking towards the sky, and
+sending half a hundredweight of iron up into the clouds, and plunging
+down a mile off into the French lines.
+
+And, at every shot, the man on horseback made signals to let the gunners
+know where the shot fell.
+
+At last, about four in the afternoon, they threw a forty-eight-pound
+shot slap into the commander-in-chief’s tent, a mile and a half behind
+trenches.
+
+Down comes a glittering aide-de-camp as hard as he can gallop.
+
+“Colonel Dujardin, what are you about, sir? YOUR BASTION has thrown a
+round shot into the commander-in-chief’s tent.”
+
+The colonel did not appear so staggered as the aide-de-camp expected.
+
+“Ah, indeed!” said he quietly. “I observed they were trying distances.”
+
+“Must not happen again, colonel. You must drive them from the gun.”
+
+“How?”
+
+“Why, where is the difficulty?”
+
+“If you will do me the honor to step into the battery, I will show you,”
+ said the colonel.
+
+“If you please,” said the aide-de-camp stiffly.
+
+Colonel Dujardin took him to the parapet, and began, in a calm,
+painstaking way, to show him how and why none of his guns could be
+brought to bear upon Long Tom.
+
+In the middle of the explanation a melodious sound was heard in the air
+above them, like a swarm of Brobdingnag bees.
+
+“What is that?” inquired the aide-de-camp.
+
+“What? I see nothing.”
+
+“That humming noise.”
+
+“Oh, that? Prussian bullets. Ah, by-the-by, it is a compliment to your
+uniform, monsieur; they take you for some one of importance. Well, as I
+was observing”--
+
+“Your explanation is sufficient, colonel; let us get out of this. Ha,
+ha! you are a cool hand, colonel, I must say. But your battery is a warm
+place enough: I shall report it so at headquarters.”
+
+The grim colonel relaxed.
+
+“Captain,” said he politely, “you shall not have ridden to my post in
+vain. Will you lend me your horse for ten minutes?”
+
+“Certainly; and I will inspect your trenches meantime.”
+
+“Do so; oblige me by avoiding that angle; it is exposed, and the enemy
+have got the range to an inch.”
+
+Colonel Dujardin slipped into his quarters; off with his half-dress
+jacket and his dirty boots, and presently out he came full fig,
+glittering brighter than the other, with one French and two foreign
+orders shining on his breast, mounted the aide-de-camp’s horse, and away
+full pelt.
+
+Admitted, after some delay, into the generalissimo’s tent, Dujardin
+found the old gentleman surrounded by his staff and wroth: nor was the
+danger to which he had been exposed his sole cause of ire.
+
+The shot had burst through his canvas, struck a table on which was a
+large inkstand, and had squirted the whole contents over the despatches
+he was writing for Paris.
+
+Now this old gentleman prided himself upon the neatness of his
+despatches: a blot on his paper darkened his soul.
+
+Colonel Dujardin expressed his profound regret. The commander, however,
+continued to remonstrate. “I have a great deal of writing to do,”
+ said he, “as you must be aware; and, when I am writing, I expect to be
+quiet.”
+
+Colonel Dujardin assented respectfully to the justice of this. He then
+explained at full length why he could not bring a gun in the battery to
+silence “Long Tom,” and quietly asked to be permitted to run a gun out
+of the trenches, and take a shot at the offender.
+
+“It is a point-blank distance, and I have a new gun, with which a man
+ought to be able to hit his own ball at three hundred yards.”
+
+The commander hesitated.
+
+“I cannot have the men exposed.”
+
+“I engage not to lose a man--except him who fires the gun. HE must take
+his chance.”
+
+“Well, colonel, it must be done by volunteers. The men must not be
+ORDERED out on such a service as that.”
+
+Colonel Dujardin bowed, and retired.
+
+
+“Volunteers to go out of the trenches!” cried Sergeant La Croix, in
+a stentorian voice, standing erect as a poker, and swelling with
+importance.
+
+There were fifty offers in less than as many seconds.
+
+“Only twelve allowed to go,” said the sergeant; “and I am one,” added
+he, adroitly inserting himself.
+
+A gun was taken down, placed on a carriage, and posted near Death’s
+Alley, but out of the line of fire.
+
+The colonel himself superintended the loading of this gun; and to the
+surprise of the men had the shot weighed first, and then weighed out the
+powder himself.
+
+He then waited quietly a long time till the bastion pitched one of its
+periodical shots into Death’s Alley, but no sooner had the shot struck,
+and sent the sand flying past the two lanes of curious noses, than
+Colonel Dujardin jumped upon the gun and waved his cocked hat. At this
+preconcerted signal, his battery opened fire on the bastion, and the
+battery to his right opened on the wall that fronted them; and the
+colonel gave the word to run the gun out of the trenches. They ran it
+out into the cloud of smoke their own guns were belching forth, unseen
+by the enemy; but they had no sooner twisted it into the line of Long
+Tom, than the smoke was gone, and there they were, a fair mark.
+
+“Back into the trenches, all but one!” roared Dujardin.
+
+And in they ran like rabbits.
+
+“Quick! the elevation.”
+
+Colonel Dujardin and La Croix raised the muzzle to the mark--hoo, hoo,
+hoo! ping, ping, ping! came the bullets about their ears.
+
+“Away with you!” cried the colonel, taking the linstock from him.
+
+Then Colonel Dujardin, fifteen yards from the trenches, in full blazing
+uniform, showed two armies what one intrepid soldier can do. He kneeled
+down and adjusted his gun, just as he would have done in a practising
+ground. He had a pot shot to take, and a pot shot he would take. He
+ignored three hundred muskets that were levelled at him. He looked
+along his gun, adjusted it, and re-adjusted it to a hair’s breadth. The
+enemy’s bullets pattered upon it: still he adjusted it delicately. His
+men were groaning and tearing their hair inside at his danger.
+
+At last it was levelled to his mind, and then his movements were as
+quick as they had hitherto been slow. In a moment he stood erect in the
+half-fencing attitude of a gunner, and his linstock at the touch-hole:
+a huge tongue of flame, a volume of smoke, a roar, and the iron
+thunderbolt was on its way, and the colonel walked haughtily but rapidly
+back to the trenches; for in all this no bravado. He was there to make a
+shot; not to throw a chance of life away watching the effect.
+
+Ten thousand eyes did that for him.
+
+Both French and Prussians risked their own lives craning out to see
+what a colonel in full uniform was doing under fire from a whole line
+of forts, and what would be his fate; but when he fired the gun their
+curiosity left the man and followed the iron thunderbolt.
+
+For two seconds all was uncertain; the ball was travelling.
+
+Tom gave a rear like a wild horse, his protruding muzzle went up
+sky-high, then was seen no more, and a ring of old iron and a clatter of
+fragments was heard on the top of the bastion. Long Tom was dismounted.
+Oh! the roar of laughter and triumph from one end to another of the
+trenches; and the clapping of forty thousand hands that went on for full
+five minutes; then the Prussians, either through a burst of generous
+praise for an act so chivalrous and so brilliant, or because they would
+not be crowed over, clapped their tea thousand hands as loudly, and thus
+thundering, heart-thrilling salvo of applause answered salvo on both
+sides that terrible arena.
+
+That evening came a courteous and flattering message from the
+commander-in-chief to Colonel Dujardin; and several officers visited his
+quarters to look at him; they went back disappointed. The cry was, “What
+a miserable, melancholy dog! I expected to see a fine, dashing fellow.”
+
+
+The trenches neared the town. Colonel Dujardin’s mine was far advanced;
+the end of the chamber was within a few yards of the bastion. Of late,
+the colonel had often visited this mine in person. He seemed a little
+uneasy about something in that quarter; but no one knew what: he was a
+silent man. The third evening, after he dismounted Long Tom, he received
+private notice that an order was coming down from the commander-in-chief
+to assault the bastion. He shrugged his shoulders, but said nothing.
+That same night the colonel and one of his lieutenants stole out of the
+trenches, and by the help of a pitch-dark, windy night, got under the
+bastion unperceived, and crept round it, and made their observations,
+and got safe back. About noon down came General Raimbaut.
+
+“Well, colonel, you are to have your way at last. Your bastion is to
+be stormed this afternoon previous to the general assault. Why, how is
+this? you don’t seem enchanted?”
+
+“I am not.”
+
+“Why, it was you who pressed for the assault.”
+
+“At the right time, general, not the wrong. In five days I undertake to
+blow that bastion into the air. To assault it now would be to waste our
+men.”
+
+General Raimbaut thought this excess of caution a great piece
+of perversity in Achilles. They were alone, and he said a little
+peevishly,--
+
+“Is not this to blow hot and cold on the same thing?”
+
+“No, general,” was the calm reply. “Not on the same thing. I blew hot
+upon timorous counsels; I blow cold on rash ones. General, last night
+Lieutenant Fleming and I were under that bastion; and all round it.”
+
+“Ah! my prudent colonel, I thought we should not talk long without your
+coming out in your true light. If ever a man secretly enjoyed risking
+his life, it is you.”
+
+“No, general,” said Dujardin looking gloomily down; “I enjoy neither
+that nor anything else. Live or die, it is all one to me; but to the
+lives of my soldiers I am not indifferent, and never will be while I
+live. My apparent rashness of last night was pure prudence.”
+
+Raimbaut’s eye twinkled with suppressed irony. “No doubt!” said he; “no
+doubt!”
+
+The impassive colonel would not notice the other’s irony; he went calmly
+on:--
+
+“I suspected something; I went to confute, or confirm that suspicion. I
+confirmed it.”
+
+Rat! tat! tat! tat! tat! tat! tat! was heard a drum. Relieving guard in
+the mine.
+
+Colonel Dujardin interrupted himself.
+
+“That comes apropos,” said he. “I expect one proof more from that
+quarter. Sergeant, send me the sentinel they are relieving.”
+
+Sergeant La Croix soon came back, as pompous as a hen with one chick,
+predominating with a grand military air over a droll figure that
+chattered with cold, and held its musket in hands clothed in great
+mittens. Dard.
+
+La Croix marched him up as if he had been a file; halted him like a
+file, sang out to him as to a file, stentorian and unintelligible, after
+the manner of sergeants.
+
+“Private No. 4.”
+
+DARD. P-p-p-present!
+
+LA CROIX. Advance to the word of command, and speak to the colonel.
+
+The shivering figure became an upright statue directly, and carried one
+of his mittens to his forehead. Then, suddenly recognizing the rank of
+the gray-haired officer, he was morally shaken, but remained physically
+erect, and stammered,--
+
+“Colonel!--general!--colonel!”
+
+“Don’t be frightened, my lad. But look at the general and answer me.”
+
+“Yes! general! colonel!” and he levelled his eye dead at the general, as
+he would a bayonet at a foe, being so commanded.
+
+“Now answer in as few syllables as you can.”
+
+“Yes! general--colonel.”
+
+“You have been on guard in the mine.”
+
+“Yes, general.”
+
+“What did you see there?”
+
+“Nothing; it was night down there.”
+
+“What did you feel?”
+
+“Cold! I--was--in--water--hugh!”
+
+“Did you hear nothing, then?”
+
+“Yes.”
+
+“What?”
+
+“Bum! bum! bum!”
+
+“Are you sure you did not hear particles of earth fall at the end of the
+trench?”
+
+“I think it did, and this (touching his musket) sounded of its own
+accord.”
+
+“Good! you have answered well; go.”
+
+“Sergeant, I did not miss a word,” cried Dard, exulting. He thought
+he had passed a sort of military college examination. The sergeant was
+awe-struck and disgusted at his familiarity, speaking to him before the
+great: he pushed Private Dard hastily out of the presence, and bundled
+him into the trenches.
+
+“Are you countermined, then?” asked General Raimbaut.
+
+“I think not, general; but the whole bastion is. And we found it had
+been opened in the rear, and lately half a dozen broad roads cut through
+the masonry.”
+
+“To let in re-enforcements?”
+
+“Or to let the men run out in ease of an assault. I have seen from the
+first an able hand behind that part of the defences. If we assault the
+bastion, they will pick off as many of us as they can with their muskets
+then they will run for it, and fire a train, and blow it and us into the
+air.”
+
+“Colonel, this is serious. Are you prepared to lay this statement before
+the commander-in-chief?”
+
+“I am, and I do so through you, the general of my division. I even beg
+you to say, as from me, that the assault will be mere suicide--bloody
+and useless.”
+
+General Raimbaut went off to headquarters in some haste, a thorough
+convert to Colonel Dujardin’s opinion. Meantime the colonel went
+slowly to his tent. At the mouth of it a corporal, who was also his
+body-servant, met him, saluted, and asked respectfully if there were any
+orders.
+
+“A few minutes’ repose, Francois, that is all. Do not let me be
+disturbed for an hour.”
+
+“Attention!” cried Francois. “Colonel wants to sleep.”
+
+The tent was sentinelled, and Dujardin was alone with the past.
+
+Then had the fools, that took (as fools will do) deep sorrow for
+sullenness, seen the fiery soldier droop, and his wan face fall into
+haggard lines, and his martial figure shrink, and heard his stout heart
+sigh! He took a letter from his bosom: it was almost worn to pieces. He
+had read it a thousand times, yet he read it again. A part of the sweet
+sad words ran thus:--
+
+
+“We must bow. We can never be happy together on earth; let us make
+Heaven our friend. This is still left us,--not to blush for our love; to
+do our duty, and to die.”
+
+
+“How tender, but how firm,” thought Camille. “I might agitate, taunt,
+grieve her I love, but I could not shake her. No! God and the saints to
+my aid! they saved me from a crime I now shudder at. And they have given
+me the good chaplain: he prays with me, he weeps for me. His prayers
+still my beating heart. Yes, poor suffering angel! I read your will in
+these tender, but bitter, words: you prefer duty to love. And one day
+you will forget me; not yet awhile, but it will be so. It wounds me when
+I think of it, but I must bow. Your will is sacred. I must rise to your
+level, not drag you to mine.”
+
+Then the soldier that had stood between two armies in a hail of bullets,
+and fired a master-shot, took a little book of offices in one hand,--the
+chaplain had given it him,--and fixed his eyes upon the pious words,
+and clung like a child to the pious words, and kissed his lost wife’s
+letter, and tried hard to be like her he loved: patient, very patient,
+till the end should come.
+
+“Qui vive?” cried the sentinel outside to a strange officer.
+
+“France,” was his reply. He then asked the sentinel, “Where is the
+colonel commanding the brigade?”
+
+The sentinel lowered his voice, “Asleep, my officer,” said he; for the
+new-comer carried two epaulets.
+
+“Wake him,” said the officer in a tone of a man used to command on a
+large scale.
+
+Dujardin heard, and did not choose a stranger should think he was
+asleep in broad day. He came hastily out of the tent, therefore, with
+Josephine’s letter in his hand, and, in the very act of conveying it to
+his bosom, found himself face to face with--her husband.
+
+Did you ever see two duellists cross rapiers?
+
+How unlike a theatrical duel! How smooth and quiet the bright blades
+are! they glide into contact. They are polished and slippery, yet they
+hold each other. So these two men’s eyes met, and fastened: neither
+spoke: each searched the other’s face keenly. Raynal’s countenance,
+prepared as he was for this meeting, was like a stern statue’s. The
+other’s face flushed, and his heart raged and sickened at sight of the
+man, that, once his comrade and benefactor, was now possessor of the
+woman he loved. But the figures of both stood alike haughty, erect, and
+immovable, face to face.
+
+Colonel Raynal saluted Colonel Dujardin ceremoniously. Colonel Dujardin
+returned the salute in the same style.
+
+“You thought I was in Egypt,” said Raynal with grim significance
+that caught Dujardin’s attention, though he did not know quite how to
+interpret it.
+
+He answered mechanically, “Yes, I did.”
+
+“I am sent here by General Bonaparte to take a command,” explained
+Raynal.
+
+“You are welcome. What command?”
+
+“Yours.”
+
+“Mine?” cried Dujardin, his forehead flushing with mortification and
+anger. “What, is it not enough that you take my”--He stopped then.
+
+“Come, colonel,” said the other calmly, “do not be unjust to an old
+comrade. I take your demi-brigade; but you are promoted to Raimbaut’s
+brigade. The exchange is to be made to-morrow.”
+
+“Was it then to announce to me my promotion you came to my quarters?”
+ and Camille looked with a strange mixture of feelings at his old
+comrade.
+
+“That was the first thing, being duty, you know.”
+
+“What? have you anything else to say to me, then?”
+
+“I have.”
+
+“Is it important? for my own duties will soon demand me.”
+
+“It is so important that, command or no command, I should have come
+further than the Rhine to say it to you.”
+
+Let a man be as bold as a lion, a certain awe still waits upon doubt
+and mystery; and some of this vague awe crept over Camille Dujardin at
+Raynal’s mysterious speech, and his grave, quiet, significant manner.
+
+Had he discovered something, and what? For Josephine’s sake, more than
+his own, Camille was on his guard directly.
+
+Raynal looked at him in silence a moment.
+
+“What?” said he with a slight sneer, “has it never occurred to you
+that I MUST have a serious word to say to you? First, let me put you
+a question: did they treat you well at my house? at the chateau de
+Beaurepaire?”
+
+“Yes,” faltered Camille.
+
+“You met, I trust, all the kindness and care due to a wounded soldier
+and an officer of merit. It would annoy me greatly if I thought you were
+not treated like a brother in my house.”
+
+Colonel Dujardin writhed inwardly at this view of matters. He could not
+reply in few words. This made him hesitate.
+
+His inquisitor waited, but, receiving no reply, went on, “Well, colonel,
+have you shown the sense of gratitude we had a right to look for in
+return? In a word, when you left Beaurepaire, had your conscience
+nothing to reproach you with?”
+
+Dujardin still hesitated. He scarcely knew what to think or what to say.
+But he thought to himself, “Who has told him? does he know all?”
+
+“Colonel Dujardin, I am the husband of Josephine, the son of Madame de
+Beaurepaire, and the brother of Rose. You know very well what brings me
+here. Your answer?”
+
+“Colonel Raynal, between men of honor, placed as you and I are, few
+words should pass, for words are idle. You will never prove to me that
+I have wronged you: I shall never convince you that I have not. Let us
+therefore close this painful interview in the way it is sure to close. I
+am at your service, at any hour and place you please.”
+
+“And pray is that all the answer you can think of?” asked Raynal
+somewhat scornfully.
+
+“Why, what other answer can I give you?”
+
+“A more sensible, a more honest, and a less boyish one. Who doubts that
+you can fight, you silly fellow? haven’t I seen you? I want you to show
+me a much higher sort of courage: the courage to repair a wrong, not the
+paltry valor to defend one.”
+
+“I really do not understand you, sir. How can I undo what is done?”
+
+“Why, of course you cannot. And therefore I stand here ready to forgive
+all that is past; not without a struggle, which you don’t seem to
+appreciate.”
+
+Camille was now utterly mystified. Raynal continued, “But of course it
+is upon condition that you consent to heal the wound you have made. If
+you refuse--hum! but you will not refuse.”
+
+“But what is it you require of me?” inquired Camille impatiently.
+
+“Only a little common honesty. This is the case: you have seduced a
+young lady.”
+
+“Sir!” cried Camille angrily.
+
+“What is the matter? The word is not so bad as the crime, I take it. You
+have seduced her, and under circumstances--But we won’t speak of them,
+because I am resolved to keep cool. Well, sir, as you said just now,
+it’s no use crying over spilled milk; you can’t unseduce the little
+fool; so you must marry her.”
+
+“M--m--marry her?” and Dujardin flushed all over, and his heart beat,
+and he stared in Raynal’s face.
+
+“Why, what is the matter again? If she has played the fool, it was with
+you, and no other man: it is not as if she was depraved. Come, my lad,
+show a little generosity! Take the consequences of your own act--or your
+share of it--don’t throw it all on the poor feeble woman. If she has
+loved you too much, you are the man of all others that should forgive
+her. Come, what do you say?”
+
+This was too much for Camille; that Raynal should come and demand of him
+to marry his own wife, for so he understood the proposal. He stared at
+Raynal in silence ever so long, and even when he spoke it was only to
+mutter, “Are you out of your senses, or am I?”
+
+At this it cost Raynal a considerable effort to restrain his wrath.
+However, he showed himself worthy of the office he had undertaken. He
+contained himself, and submitted to argue the matter. “Why, colonel,”
+ said he, “is it such a misfortune to marry poor Rose? She is young,
+she is lovely, she has many good qualities, and she would have walked
+straight to the end of her days but for you.”
+
+Now here was another surprise for Dujardin, another mystification.
+
+“Rose de Beaurepaire?” said he, putting his hand to his head, as if to
+see whether his reason was still there.
+
+“Yes, Rose de Beaurepaire--Rose Dujardin that ought to be, and that is
+to be, if you please.”
+
+“One word, monsieur: is it of Rose we have been talking all this time?”
+
+Raynal nearly lost his temper at this question, and the cold,
+contemptuous tone with which it was put; but he gulped down his ire.
+
+“It is,” said he.
+
+“One question more. Did she tell you I had--I had”--
+
+“Why, as to that, she was in no condition to deny she had fallen, poor
+girl; the evidence was too strong. She did not reveal her seducer’s
+name; but I had not far to go for that.”
+
+“One question more,” said Dujardin, with a face of anguish. “Is it
+Jos--is it Madame Raynal’s wish I should marry her sister?”
+
+“Why, of course,” said Raynal, in all sincerity, assuming that naturally
+enough as a matter of course; “if you have any respect for HER feelings,
+look on me as her envoy in this matter.”
+
+At this Camille turned sick with disgust; then rage and bitterness
+swelled his heart. A furious impulse seized him to expose Josephine on
+the spot. He overcame that, however, and merely said, “She wishes me to
+marry her sister, does she? very well then, I decline.”
+
+Raynal was shocked. “Oh,” said he, sorrowfully, “I cannot believe this
+of you; such heartlessness as this is not written in your face; it is
+contradicted by your past actions.”
+
+“I refuse,” said Dujardin, hastily; and to tell the truth, not sorry to
+inflict some pain on the honest soldier who had unintentionally driven
+the iron so deep into his own soul.
+
+“And I,” said Raynal, losing his temper, “insist, in the name of my dear
+Josephine”--
+
+“Perdition!” snarled Dujardin, losing his self-command in turn.
+
+“And of the whole family.”
+
+“And I tell you I will never marry her. Upon my honor, never.”
+
+“Your honor! you have none. The only question is would you rather marry
+her--or die.”
+
+“Die, to be sure.”
+
+“Then die you shall.”
+
+“Ah!” said Dujardin; “did I not tell you we were wasting time?
+
+“Let us waste no more then. WHEN and WHERE?”
+
+“At the rear of the commander-in-chief’s tent; when you like.”
+
+“This afternoon, then--at five.”
+
+“At five.”
+
+“Seconds?”
+
+“What for?”
+
+“You are right. They are only in the way of men who carry sabres; and
+besides the less gossip the better. Good-by, till five,” and the two
+saluted one another with grim ceremony; and Raynal turned on his heel.
+
+Camille stood transfixed; a fierce, guilty joy throbbed in his heart.
+His rival had quarrelled with him, had insulted him, had challenged him.
+It was not his fault. The sun shone bright now upon his cold despair.
+An hour ago life offered nothing. A few hours more, and then joy beyond
+expression, or an end of all. Death or Josephine! Then he remembered
+that this very Josephine wished to marry him to Rose. Then he remembered
+Raynal had saved his life. Cold chills crossed his breaking heart.
+Of all that could happen to him death alone seemed a blessing without
+alloy.
+
+He stood there so torn with conflicting passions, that he noted neither
+the passing hours nor the flying bullets.
+
+He was only awakened from his miserable trance by the even tread of
+soldiers marching towards him; he looked up and there were several
+officers coming along the edge of the trench, escorted by a corporal’s
+guard.
+
+He took a step or two to meet them. After the usual salutes, one of the
+three colonels delivered a large paper, with a large seal, to Dujardin.
+He read it out to his captains and lieutenants, who had assembled at
+sight of the cocked hats and full uniforms.
+
+
+“Attack by the army to-morrow upon all the lines. Attack of the bastion
+St. Andre this evening. The 22d, the 24th, and 12th brigades will
+furnish the contingents; the operation will be conducted by one of the
+colonels of the second division, to be appointed by General Raimbaut.”
+
+
+“Aha!” sounded a voice like a trombone at the reader’s elbow. “I am just
+in the nick of time. When, colonel, when?”
+
+“At five this evening, Colonel Raynal.”
+
+“There,” said Raynal, in a half-whisper, to Dujardin; “could they choose
+no hour but that?”
+
+“Do not be uneasy,” replied Dujardin, under his breath. He explained
+aloud--“the assault will not take place, gentlemen; the bastion is
+mined.”
+
+“What of that? half of them are mined. We will take our engineers in
+with us,” said Raynal.
+
+“Such an assault will be a useless massacre,” resumed Dujardin. “I
+reconnoitred the bastion last night, and saw their preparations for
+blowing us to the devil; and General Raimbaut, at my request, is even
+now presenting my remarks to the commander-in-chief, and enforcing them.
+There will be no assault. In a day or two we shall blow the bastion,
+mines, and all into the air.”
+
+At this moment Raynal caught sight of a gray-haired officer coming at
+some distance. “There IS General Raimbaut,” said he. “I will go and
+pay my respects to him.” General Raimbaut shook his hand warmly, and
+welcomed him to the army. They were old and warm friends. “And you are
+come at the right time,” said he. “It will soon be as hot here as in
+Egypt.”
+
+Raynal laughed and said all the better.
+
+General Raimbaut now joined the group of officers, and entered at once
+in the business which had brought him. Addressing himself to
+Colonel Dujardin, first he informs that officer he had presented his
+observations to the commander-in-chief, who had given them the attention
+they merited.
+
+Colonel Dujardin bowed.
+
+“But,” continued General Raimbaut, “they are overruled by imperious
+circumstances, some of which he did not reveal; they remain in his
+own breast. However, on the eve of a general attack, which he cannot
+postpone, that bastion must be disarmed, otherwise it would be too fatal
+to all the storming parties. It is a painful necessity.” He added, “Tell
+Colonel Dujardin I count greatly on the courage and discipline of his
+brigade, and on his own wise measures.”
+
+Colonel Dujardin bowed. Then he whispered in the other’s ear, “Both will
+alike be wasted.”
+
+The other colonels waved their hats in triumph at the
+commander-in-chief’s decision, and Raynal’s face showed he looked on
+Dujardin as a sort of spoil-sport happily defeated.
+
+“Well, then, gentlemen,” said General Raimbaut, “we begin by settling
+the contingents to be furnished by your several brigades. Say, an equal
+number from each. The sum total shall be settled by Colonel Dujardin,
+who has so long and ably baffled the bastion at this post.”
+
+Colonel Dujardin bowed stiffly and not very graciously. In his heart he
+despised these old fogies, compounds of timidity and rashness.
+
+“So, how many men in all, colonel?” asked General Raimbaut.
+
+“The fewer the better,” replied the other solemnly, “since”--and then
+discipline tied his tongue.
+
+“I understand you,” said the old man. “Shall we say eight hundred men?”
+
+“I should prefer three hundred. They have made a back door to the
+bastion, and the means of flight at hand will put flight into their
+heads. They will pick off some of our men as we go at them. When the
+rest jump in they will jump out, and”--He paused.
+
+“Why, he knows all about it before it comes,” said one of the colonels
+naively.
+
+“I do. I see the whole operation and its result before me, as I see this
+hand. Three hundred men will do.”
+
+“But, general,” objected Raynal, “you are not beginning at the
+beginning. The first thing in these cases is to choose the officer to
+command the storming party.”
+
+“Yes, Raynal, unquestionably; but you must be aware that is a painful
+and embarrassing part of my duty, especially after Colonel Dujardin’s
+remarks.”
+
+“Ah, bah!” cried Raynal. “He is prejudiced. He has been digging a
+thundering long mine here, and now you are going to make his child
+useless. We none of us like that. But when he gets the colors in his
+hand, and the storming column at his back, his misgivings will all go to
+the wind, and the enemy after them, unless he has been committing some
+crime, and is very much changed from what I knew him four years ago.”
+
+“Colonel Raynal,” said one of the other colonels, politely but firmly,
+“pray do not assume that Colonel Dujardin is to lead the column; there
+are three other claimants. General Raimbaut is to select from us four.”
+
+“Yes, gentlemen, and in a service of this kind I would feel grateful to
+you all if you would relieve me of that painful duty.”
+
+“Gentlemen,” said Dujardin, with an imperceptible sneer, “the general
+means to say this: the operation is so glorious that he could hardly
+without partiality assign the command to either of us four claimants.
+Well, then, let us cast lots.”
+
+The proposal was received by acclamation.
+
+“The general will mark a black cross on one lot, and he who draws it
+wins the command.”
+
+The young colonels prepared their lots with almost boyish eagerness.
+These fiery spirits were sick to death of lying and skulking in the
+trenches. They flung their lots into the hat. After them, who
+should approach the hat, lot in hand, but Raynal. Dujardin instantly
+interfered, and held his arm as he was in the act of dropping in his
+lot.
+
+“What is the matter?” said Raynal, sharply.
+
+“This is our affair, Colonel Raynal. You have no command in this army.”
+
+“I beg your pardon, sir, I have yours.”
+
+“Not till to-morrow.”
+
+“Why, you would not take such a pettifogging advantage of an old comrade
+as that.”
+
+“Tell him the day ends at twelve o’clock,” said one of the colonels
+interested by this strange strife.
+
+“Ah!” cried Raynal, triumphantly; “but no,” said he, altering his tone,
+“let us leave that sort of argument to lawyers. I have come a good many
+miles to fight with you, general; and now you must decide to pay me this
+little compliment on my arrival, or put a bitter affront on me--choose!”
+
+While the old general hesitated, Camille replied, “Since you take that
+tone there can be but one answer. You are too great a credit to the
+French army for even an apparent slight to be put on you here. The
+rule, I think, is, that one of the privates shall hold the hat.--Hallo!
+Private Dard, come here--there--hold this hat.”
+
+“Yes, colonel.--Lord, here is my young mistress’s husband!”
+
+“Silence!”
+
+And they began to draw, and, in the act of drawing, a change of manner
+was first visible in these gay and ardent spirits.
+
+“It is not I,” said one, throwing away his lot.
+
+“Nor I.”
+
+“It is I,” said Raynal; then with sudden gravity, “I am the lucky one.”
+
+And now that the honor and the danger no longer floated vaguely over
+four heads, but had fixed on one, a sudden silence and solemnity took
+the place of eager voices.
+
+It was first broken by Private Dard saying, with foolish triumph, “And I
+held the hat for you, colonel.”
+
+“Ah, Raynal!” said General Raimbaut, sorrowfully, “it was not worth
+while to come from Egypt for this.”
+
+Raynal made no reply to this. He drew out his watch, and said calmly, he
+had no time to lose; he must inspect the detachments he was to command.
+“Besides,” said he, “I have some domestic arrangements to make. Hitherto
+on these occasions I was a bachelor, now I am married.” General Raimbaut
+could not help sighing. Raynal read this aright, and turned to him, “A
+droll marriage, my old friend; I’ll tell you all about it if ever I
+have the time. It began with a purchase, general, and ends with--with a
+bequest, which I might as well write now, and so have nothing to think
+of but duty afterwards. Where can I write?”
+
+“Colonel Dujardin will lend you his tent, I am sure.”
+
+“Certainly.”
+
+“And, messieurs,” said Raynal, “if I waste time you need not. You can
+pick me my men from your brigades. Give me a strong spice of old hands.”
+
+The colonels withdrew on this, and General Raimbaut walked sadly and
+thoughtfully towards the battery. Dujardin and Raynal were left alone.
+
+“This postpones our affair, sir.”
+
+“Yes, Raynal.”
+
+“Have you writing materials in your tent?”
+
+“Yes; on the table.”
+
+“You are quite sure the bastion is mined, comrade?”
+
+This unexpected word and Raynal’s gentle appeal touched Dujardin deeply.
+It was in a broken voice he replied that he was unfortunately too sure
+of it.
+
+Raynal received this reply as a sentence of death, and without another
+word walked slowly into Dujardin’s tent.
+
+Dujardin’s generosity was up in arms; he followed Raynal, and said
+eagerly, “Raynal, for Heaven’s sake resign this command!”
+
+“Allow me to write to my wife, colonel,” was the cold reply.
+
+Camille winced at this affront, and drew back a moment; but his nobler
+part prevailed. He seized Raynal by the wrist. “You shall not affront
+me, you cannot affront me. You go to certain death I tell you, if you
+attack that bastion.”
+
+“Don’t be a fool, colonel,” said Raynal: “somebody must lead the men.”
+
+“Yes; but not you. Who has so good a right to lead them as I, their
+colonel?”
+
+“And be killed in my place, eh?”
+
+“I know the ground better than you,” said Camille. “Besides, who cares
+for me? I have no friends, no family. But you are married--and so many
+will mourn if you”--
+
+Raynal interrupted him sternly. “You forget, sir, that Rose de
+Beaurepaire is my sister, when you tell me you have no tie to life.”
+ He added, with wonderful dignity and sobriety, “Allow me to write to
+my wife, sir; and, while I write, reflect that you can embitter an old
+comrade’s last moments by persisting in your refusal to restore his
+sister the honor you have robbed her of.”
+
+And leaving the other staggered and confused by this sudden blow, he
+retired into Dujardin’s tent, and finding writing materials on a little
+table that was there, sat down to pen a line to Josephine.
+
+Camille knew to whom he was writing, and a jealous pang passed through
+him.
+
+What he wrote ran thus,--
+
+
+“A bastion is to be attacked at five. I command. Colonel Dujardin
+proposed we should draw lots, and I lost. The service is honorable,
+but the result may, I fear, give you some pain. My dear wife, it is our
+fate. I was not to have time to make you know, and perhaps love me. God
+bless you.”
+
+
+In writing these simple words, Raynal’s hard face worked, and his
+mustache quivered, and once he had to clear his eye with his hand to
+form the letters. He, the man of iron.
+
+He who stood there, leaning on his scabbard and watching the writer, saw
+this, and it stirred all that was great and good in that grand though
+passionate heart of his.
+
+“Poor Raynal!” thought he, “you were never like that before on going
+into action. He is loath to die. Ay, and it is a coward’s trick to let
+him die. I shall have her, but shall I have her esteem? What will the
+army say? What will my conscience say? Oh! I feel already it will gnaw
+my heart to death; the ghost of that brave fellow--once my dear friend,
+my rival now, by no fault of his--will rise between her and me, and
+reproach me with my bloody inheritance. The heart never deceives; I feel
+it now whispering in my ear: ‘Skulking captain, white-livered soldier,
+that stand behind a parapet while a better man does your work! you
+assassinate the husband, but the rival conquers you.’ There, he puts his
+hand to his eyes. What shall I do?”
+
+“Colonel,” said a low voice, and at the same time a hand was laid on his
+shoulder.
+
+It was General Raimbaut. The general looked pale and distressed.
+
+“Come apart, colonel, for Heaven’s sake! One word, while he is writing.
+Ah! that was an unlucky idea of yours.”
+
+“Of mine, general?”
+
+“‘Twas you proposed to cast lots.”
+
+“Good God! so it was.”
+
+“I thought of course it was to be managed so that Raynal should not be
+the one. Between ourselves, what honorable excuse can we make?”
+
+“None, general.”
+
+“The whole division will be disgraced, and forgive me if I say a portion
+of the discredit will fall on you.”
+
+“Help me to avert that shame then,” cried Camille, eagerly.
+
+“Ah! that I will: but how?”
+
+“Take your pencil and write--‘I authorize Colonel Dujardin to save the
+honor of the colonels of the second division.’”
+
+The general hesitated. He had never seen an order so worded. But at
+last he took out his pencil and wrote the required order, after his own
+fashion; i.e., in milk and water:--
+
+
+On account of the singular ability and courage with which Colonel
+Dujardin has conducted the operations against the Bastion St. Andre, a
+discretionary power is given him at the moment of assault to carry
+into effect such measures, as, without interfering with the
+commander-in-chief’s order, may sustain his own credit, and that of the
+other colonels of the second division.
+
+RAIMBAUT, General of Division.
+
+
+Camille put the paper into his bosom.
+
+“Now, general, you may leave all to me. I swear to you, Raynal shall not
+die--shall not lead this assault.”
+
+“Your hand, colonel. You are an honor to the French armies. How will you
+do it?”
+
+“Leave it to me, general, it shall be done.”
+
+“I feel it will, my noble fellow: but, alas! I fear not without risking
+some valuable life or other, most likely your own. Tell me!”
+
+“General, I decline.”
+
+“You refuse me, sir?”
+
+“Yes; this order gives me a discretionary power. I will hand back the
+order at your command; but modify it I will not. Come, sir, you veteran
+generals have been unjust to me, and listened to me too little all
+through this siege, but at last you have honored me. This order is the
+greatest honor that was ever done me since I wore a sword.”.
+
+“My poor colonel!”
+
+“Let me wear it intact, and carry it to my grave.”
+
+“Say no more! One word--Is there anything on earth I can do for you, my
+brave soldier?”
+
+“Yes, general. Be so kind as to retire to your quarters; there are
+reasons why you ought not to be near this post in half an hour.”
+
+“I go. Is there NOTHING else?”
+
+“Well, general, ask the good priest Ambrose, to pray for all those who
+shall die doing their duty to their country this afternoon.”
+
+They parted. General Raimbaut looked back more than once at the firm,
+intrepid figure that stood there unflinching, on the edge of the grave.
+But HE never took his eye off Raynal. The next minute the sad letter was
+finished, and Raynal walked out of the tent, and confronted the man he
+had challenged to single combat.
+
+I have mentioned elsewhere that Colonel Dujardin had eyes strangely
+compounded of battle and love, of the dove and the hawk. And these,
+softened by a noble act he meditated, now rested on Raynal with a
+strange expression of warmth and goodness. This strange gaze struck
+Raynal, so far at least as this; he saw it was no hostile eye. He was
+glad of that, for his own heart was calmed and softened by the solemn
+prospect before him.
+
+“We, too, have a little account to settle before I order out the men,”
+ said he, calmly, “and I can’t give you a long credit. I am pressed for
+time.”
+
+“Our quarrel is at an end. When duty sounds the recall, a soldier’s
+heart leaves private feuds. See! I come to you without anger and
+ill-will. Just now my voice was loud, my manner, I dare say, offensive,
+and menacing even, and that always tempts a brave fellow like you to
+resist. But now, you see, I am harmless as a woman. We are alone. Humbug
+to the winds! I know that you are the only man in this army fit to
+command a division. I know that when you say the assault of that bastion
+is death, death it is. To the point then; now that my manner is no
+longer irritating, now that I am going to die, Camille Dujardin, my old
+comrade, have you the heart to refuse me? am I to die unhappy?”
+
+“No; no: I will do whatever you like.”
+
+“You will marry that poor girl, then?”
+
+“Yes.”
+
+“Aha! did not I always say he was a good fellow? Clench the nail; give
+me your honor.”
+
+“I give you my honor to marry her, if I live.”
+
+“You take a load off me; may Heaven reward you. In one hour those poor
+women, whose support I had promised to be, will lose their protector;
+but I give them another in you. We shall not leave that family in tears,
+Rose in shame, and your child without a name.”
+
+Dujardin stared at the speaker. What new and devilish deception was
+this?
+
+“My child!” he faltered. “What child?”
+
+“Ah,” said Raynal, “what a fool I was! That is the first thing I ought
+to have told you. Poor little fellow! I surprised him in his cradle; his
+mother and Josephine were rocking him, and singing over him. Oh! it was
+a scene, I can tell you. My poor wife had been ill for some time, and
+was so weakened by it, that I frightened her into a fit, stealing a
+march on her that way. She fainted away. Perhaps it is as well she did;
+for I--I did not know what to think; it looked ugly; but while she lay
+at our feet insensible, I forced the truth from Rose; she owned the boy
+was hers.”
+
+While Raynal told him this strange story, Camille turned hot and cold.
+First came a thrill of glowing joy; he had some clew to all this: he was
+a father; that child was Josephine’s and his; the next moment he froze
+within. So Josephine had not only gulled her husband, but him, too; she
+had refused him the sad consolation of knowing he had a child. Cruelty,
+calculation, and baseness unexampled! Here was a creature who could
+sacrifice anything and anybody to her comfort, to the peace and sordid
+smoothness of her domestic life. She stood between two men--a thing.
+Between two truths--a double lie.
+
+His heart, in one moment, turned against her like a stone. A
+musket-bullet through the body does not turn life to death quicker than
+Raynal turned his rival’s love to despair and scorn: that love which
+neither wounds, absence, prison, nor even her want of constancy had
+prevailed to shake.
+
+“Out of my bosom!” he cried--“out of it, in this world and the next!”
+
+He forgot, in his lofty rage, who stood beside him.
+
+“What?--what?” cried Raynal.
+
+“No matter,” said Camille; “only I esteem YOU, Raynal. You are truth;
+you are a man, and deserve a better lot.”
+
+“Don’t say that,” replied Raynal, quite misunderstanding him. “It is a
+soldier’s end: I never desired nor hoped a better: only, of course, I
+feel sad. You are a happy fellow, to have a child and to live to see it,
+and her you love.”
+
+“Oh, yes, I am very happy,” replied the poor fellow, his lip quivering.
+
+“Watch over all those poor women, comrade, and sometimes speak to them
+of me. It is foolish, but we like to be remembered.”
+
+“Yes! but do not let us speak of that. Raynal, you and I were
+lieutenants together; do you remember saving my life in the Arno?”
+
+“Yes.”
+
+“Then promise me, if you should live, to remember not our quarrel of
+to-day, nor anything; but only those early days, AND THIS AFTERNOON.”
+
+“I do.”
+
+“Your hand, comrade.”
+
+“There, comrade, there.”
+
+They wrung one another’s hands, and turned away and hid their faces from
+each other, for their eyes were moist.
+
+“This won’t do, comrade, I must go. I shall attack from your position.
+So I shall go down the line, and bring the men up. Meantime, pick me
+your detachment. Give me a good spice of veterans. I shall get one word
+with you before we go out. God bless you!”
+
+“God bless you, Raynal!”
+
+The moment Raynal was gone, Camille beckoned a lieutenant to him,
+and ordered half the brigade to form in a strong column on both sides
+Death’s Alley.
+
+His eye fell upon private Dard, as luck would have it. “Come here,” said
+he. Dard came and saluted.
+
+“Have you anybody at Beaurepaire that would be sorry if you were
+killed?”
+
+“Yes, colonel! Jacintha, that used to make your broth, colonel.”
+
+“Take this line to Colonel Raynal. You will find him with the 12th
+brigade.”
+
+He wrote a few lines in pencil, folded them, and Dard went off with
+them, little dreaming that the colonel of his brigade was taking the
+trouble to save his life, because he came from Beaurepaire. Colonel
+Dujardin then went into his tent, and closed the aperture, and took the
+good book the priest had given him, and prayed humbly, and forgave all
+the world.
+
+Then he sat down, his head in his hands, and thought of his child, and
+how hard it was he must die and never see him. Then he lighted a candle,
+and sealed up his orders of valor, and wrote a line, begging that they
+might be sent to his sister. He also sealed up his purse, and left a
+memorandum that the contents should be given to disabled soldiers of his
+brigade upon their being invalided.
+
+Then he took out Josephine’s letter. “Poor coward,” he said, “let me not
+be unkind. See, I burn your letter, lest it should be found, and disturb
+the peace you prize so highly. I, too, shall soon be at peace.” He
+lighted the letter, and dropped it on the ground: it burned slowly away.
+He eyed it, despairingly. “Ay,” said he, “you perish, last record of an
+unhappy love: and even so pass away my life; my hopes of glory, and my
+dreams of love; it all ends to-day: at nine and twenty.”
+
+He put his white handkerchief to his eyes. Josephine had given it him.
+He cried a little.
+
+When he had done crying, he put his white handkerchief in his bosom, and
+the whole man was transformed beyond language to express. Powder does
+not change more when it catches fire. He rose that moment and went like
+a flash of lightning out of the tent. The next, he came down between the
+lines of the strong column that stood awaiting orders in Death’s Alley.
+
+“Attention!” cried the sergeants; “the colonel!”
+
+There was a dead silence, for the bare sight of that erect and inspired
+figure made the men’s bosoms thrill with the certainty of great deeds to
+come: the light of battle was in his eye. No longer the moody colonel,
+but a thunderbolt of war, red-hot, and waiting to be launched.
+
+“Officers, sergeants, soldiers, a word with you!”
+
+La Croix. Attention!
+
+“Do you know what passed here five minutes ago?”
+
+“The attack of the bastion was settled!” cried a captain.
+
+“It was; and who was to lead the assault? do you know that?”
+
+“No.”
+
+“A colonel FROM EGYPT.”
+
+At that there was a groan from the men.
+
+“With detachments from the other brigades.”
+
+“AH!” an angry roar.
+
+Colonel Dujardin walked quickly down between the two lines, looking with
+his fiery eye into the men’s eyes on his right. Then he came back on the
+other side, and, as he went, he lighted those men’s eyes with his own.
+It was a torch passing along a line of ready gas-lights.
+
+“The work to us!” he cried in a voice like a clarion (it fired the
+hearts as his eye had fired the eyes)--“The triumph to strangers! Our
+fatigues and our losses have not gained the brigade the honor of going
+out at those fellows that have killed so many of our comrades.”
+
+A fierce groan broke from the men.
+
+“What! shall the colors of another brigade and not ours fly from that
+bastion this afternoon?”
+
+“No! no!” in a roar like thunder.
+
+“Ah! you are of my mind. Attention! the attack is fixed for five
+o’clock. Suppose you and I were to carry the bastion ten minutes before
+the colonel from Egypt can bring his men upon the ground.”
+
+At this there was a fierce burst of joy and laughter; the strange
+laughter of veterans and born invincibles. Then a yell of exulting
+assent, accompanied by the thunder of impatient drums, and the rattle of
+fixing bayonets.
+
+The colonel told off a party to the battery.
+
+“Level the guns at the top tier. Fire at my signal, and keep firing over
+our heads, till you see our colors on the place.”
+
+He then darted to the head of the column, which instantly formed behind
+him in the centre of Death’s Alley.
+
+“The colors! No hand but mine shall hold them to-day.”
+
+They were instantly brought him: his left hand shook them free in the
+afternoon sun.
+
+A deep murmur of joy rolled out from the old hands at the now unwonted
+sight. Out flashed the colonel’s sword like steel lightning. He pointed
+to the battery.
+
+Bang! bang! bang! bang! went his cannon, and the smoke rolled over
+the trenches. At the same moment up went the colors waving, and the
+colonel’s clarion voice pealed high above all:--
+
+“Twenty-fourth brigade--FORWARD!”
+
+They went so swiftly out of the trenches that they were not seen through
+their own smoke until they had run some sixty yards. As soon as they
+were seen, coming on like devils through their own smoke, two thousand
+muskets were levelled at them from the Prussian line. It was not a
+rattle of small arms--it was a crash, and the men fell fast: but in a
+moment they were seen to spread out like a fan, and to offer less mark,
+and when the fan closed again, it half encircled the bastion. It was a
+French attack: part swarmed at it in front like bees, part swept round
+the glacis and flanked it. They were seen to fall in numbers, shot down
+from the embrasures. But the living took the place of the dead: and the
+fight ranged evenly there. Where are the colors? Towards the rear
+there. The colonel and a hundred men are fighting hand to hand with
+the Prussians, who have charged out at the back doors of the bastion.
+Success there, and the bastion must fall--both sides know this.
+
+The colors disappeared. There was a groan from the French lines. The
+colors reappeared, and close under the bastion.
+
+And now in front the attack was so hot, that often the Prussian gunners
+were seen to jump down, driven from their posts; and the next moment
+a fierce hurrah from the rear told that the French had won some great
+advantage there. The fire slackening told a similar tale and presently
+down came the Prussian flag-staff. That might be an accident. A few
+moments of thirsting expectation, and up went the colors of the 24th
+brigade upon the Bastion St. Andre.
+
+The French army raised a shout that rent the sky, and their cannon began
+to play on the Prussian lines and between the bastion and the nearest
+fort, to prevent a recapture.
+
+Sudden there shot from the bastion a cubic acre of fire: it carried up a
+heavy mountain of red and black smoke that looked solid as marble. There
+was a heavy, sullen, tremendous explosion that snuffed out the sound of
+the cannon, and paralyzed the French and Prussian gunners’ hands, and
+checked the very beating of their hearts. Thirty thousand pounds of
+gunpowder were in that awful explosion. War itself held its breath,
+and both armies, like peaceable spectators, gazed wonder-struck,
+terror-struck. Great hell seemed to burst through the earth’s crust,
+and to be rushing at heaven. Huge stones, cannons, corpses, and limbs of
+soldiers, were seen driven or falling through the smoke. Some of these
+last came quite clear of the ruins, ay, into the French and Prussian
+lines, that even the veterans put their hands to their eyes. Raynal felt
+something patter on him from the sky--it was blood--a comrade’s perhaps.
+
+
+The smoke cleared. Where, a moment before, the great bastion stood and
+fought, was a monstrous pile of blackened, bloody stones and timbers,
+with dismounted cannon sticking up here and there.
+
+And, rent and crushed to atoms beneath the smoking mass, lay the relics
+of the gallant brigade, and their victorious colors.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII.
+
+
+A few wounded soldiers of the brigade lay still till dusk. Then they
+crept back to the trenches. These had all been struck down or disabled
+short of the bastion. Of those that had taken the place no one came
+home.
+
+Raynal, after the first stupefaction, pressed hard and even angrily for
+an immediate assault on the whole Prussian line. Not they. It was on
+paper that the assault should be at daybreak to-morrow. Such leaders as
+they were cannot IMPROVISE.
+
+Rage and grief in his heart, Raynal waited chafing in the trenches till
+five minutes past midnight. He then became commander of the brigade,
+gave his orders, and took thirty men out to creep up to the wreck of the
+bastion, and find the late colonel’s body.
+
+Going for so pious a purpose, he was rewarded by an important discovery.
+The whole Prussian lines had been abandoned since sunset, and, mounting
+cautiously on the ramparts, Raynal saw the town too was evacuated, and
+lights and other indications on a rising ground behind it convinced
+him that the Prussians were in full retreat, probably to effect that
+junction with other forces which the assault he had recommended would
+have rendered impossible.
+
+They now lighted lanterns, and searched all over and round the bastion
+for the poor colonel, in the rear of the bastion they found many French
+soldiers, most of whom had died by the bayonet. The Prussian dead had
+all been carried off.
+
+Here they found the talkative Sergeant La Croix. The poor fellow was
+silent enough now. A terrible sabre-cut on the skull. The colonel was
+not there. Raynal groaned, and led the way on to the bastion. The ruins
+still smoked. Seven or eight bodies were discovered by an arm or a foot
+protruding through the masses of masonry. Of these some were Prussians;
+a proof that some devoted hand had fired the train, and destroyed both
+friend and foe.
+
+They found the tube of Long Tom sticking up, just as he had shown over
+the battlements that glorious day, with this exception, that a great
+piece was knocked off his lip, and the slice ended in a long, broad
+crack.
+
+The soldiers looked at this. “That is our bullet’s work,” said they.
+Then one old veteran touched his cap, and told Raynal gravely, he knew
+where their beloved colonel was. “Dig here, to the bottom,” said he. “HE
+LIES BENEATH HIS WORK.”
+
+Improbable and superstitious as this was, the hearts of the soldiers
+assented to it.
+
+Presently there was a joyful cry outside the bastion. A rush was made
+thither. But it proved to be only Dard, who had discovered that Sergeant
+La Croix’s heart still beat. They took him up carefully, and carried him
+gently into camp. To Dard’s delight the surgeon pronounced him curable.
+For all that, he was three days insensible, and after that unfit for
+duty. So they sent him home invalided, with a hundred francs out of the
+poor colonel’s purse.
+
+Raynal reported the evacuation of the place, and that Colonel Dujardin
+was buried under the bastion, and soon after rode out of the camp.
+
+The words Camille had scratched with a pencil, and sent him from the
+edge of the grave, were few but striking.
+
+
+“A dead man takes you once more by the hand. My last thought, thank God,
+is France. For her sake and mine, Raynal. GO FOR GENERAL BONAPARTE. Tell
+him, from a dying soldier, the Rhine is a river to these generals, but
+to him a field of glory. He will lay out our lives, not waste them.”
+
+
+There was nothing to hinder Raynal from carrying out this sacred
+request: for the 24th brigade had ceased to exist: already thinned by
+hard service, it was reduced to a file or two by the fatal bastion. It
+was incorporated with the 12th; and Raynal rode heavy at heart to Paris,
+with a black scarf across his breast.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII.
+
+
+You see now into what a fatal entanglement two high-minded young ladies
+were led, step by step, through yielding to the natural foible of their
+sex--the desire to hide everything painful from those they love, even at
+the expense of truth.
+
+A nice mess they made of it with their amiable dishonesty. And pray take
+notice that after the first White Lie or two, circumstances overpowered
+them, and drove them on against their will. It was no small part of all
+their misery that they longed to get back to truth and could not.
+
+We shall see presently how far they succeeded in that pious object, for
+the sake of which they first entered on concealments. But first a word
+is due about one of the victims of their amiable, self-sacrificing
+lubricity. Edouard Riviere fell in one night, from happiness and
+confidence, such as till that night he had never enjoyed, to deep and
+hopeless misery.
+
+He lost that which, to every heart capable of really loving, is the
+greatest earthly blessing, the woman he adored. But worse than that,
+he lost those prime treasures of the masculine soul, belief in human
+goodness, and in female purity. To him no more could there be in nature
+a candid eye, a virtuous ready-mantling cheek: for frailty and treachery
+had put on these signs of virtue and nobility. Henceforth, let him live
+a hundred years, whom could he trust or believe in?
+
+Here was a creature whose virtues seemed to make frailty impossible:
+treachery, doubly impossible: a creature whose very faults--for faults
+she had--had seemed as opposite to treachery as her very virtues were.
+Yet she was all frailty and falsehood.
+
+He passed in that one night of anguish from youth to age. He went about
+his business like a leaden thing. His food turned tasteless. His life
+seemed ended. Nothing appeared what it had been. The very landscape
+seemed cut in stone, and he a stone in the middle of it, and his heart
+a stone in him. At times, across that heavy heart came gushes of furious
+rage and bitter mortification; his heart was broken, and his faith was
+gone, for his vanity had been stabbed as fiercely as his love. “Georges
+Dandin!” he would cry, “curse her! curse her!” But love and misery
+overpowered these heats, and froze him to stone again.
+
+The poor boy pined and pined. His clothes hung loose about him; his
+face was so drawn with suffering, you would not have known him. He hated
+company. The things he was expected to talk about!--he with his crushed
+heart. He could not. He would not. He shunned all the world; he went
+alone like a wounded deer. The good doctor, on his return from Paris,
+called on him to see if he was ill: since he had not come for days to
+the chateau. He saw the doctor coming and bade the servant say he was
+not in the village.
+
+He drew down the blind, that he might never see the chateau again. He
+drew it up again: he could not exist without seeing it. “She will be
+miserable, too,” he cried, gnashing his teeth. “She will see whether she
+has chosen well.” At other times, all his courage, and his hatred, and
+his wounded vanity, were drowned in his love and its despair, and then
+he bowed his head, and sobbed and cried as if his heart would burst. One
+morning he was so sobbing with his head on the table, when his landlady
+tapped at his door. He started up and turned his head away from the
+door.
+
+“A young woman from Beaurepaire, monsieur.”
+
+“From Beaurepaire?” his heart gave a furious leap. “Show her in.”
+
+He wiped his eyes and seated himself at a table, and, all in a flutter,
+pretended to be the state’s.
+
+It was not Jacintha, as he expected, but the other servant. She made a
+low reverence, cast a look of admiration on him, and gave him a letter.
+His eye darted on it: his hand trembled as he took it. He turned away
+again to open it. He forced himself to say, in a tolerably calm voice,
+“I will send an answer.”
+
+The letter was apparently from the baroness de Beaurepaire; a mere line
+inviting him to pay her a visit. It was written in a tremulous hand.
+Edouard examined the writing, and saw directly it was written by Rose.
+
+Being now, naturally enough, full of suspicion, he set this down as an
+attempt to disguise her hand. “So,” said he, to himself, “this is the
+game. The old woman is to be drawn into it, too. She is to help to make
+Georges Dandin of me. I will go. I will baffle them all. I will expose
+this nest of depravity, all ceremony on the surface, and voluptuousness
+and treachery below. O God! who could believe that creature never loved
+me! They shall none of them see my weakness. Their benefactor shall
+be still their superior. They shall see me cold as ice, and bitter as
+gall.”
+
+But to follow him farther just now, would be to run too far in advance
+of the main story. I must, therefore, return to Beaurepaire, and show,
+amongst other things, how this very letter came to be written.
+
+
+When Josephine and Rose awoke from that startled slumber that followed
+the exhaustion of that troubled night, Rose was the more wretched of the
+two. She had not only dishonored herself, but stabbed the man she loved.
+
+Josephine, on the other hand, was exhausted, but calm. The fearful
+escape she had had softened down by contrast her more distant terrors.
+
+She began to shut her eyes again, and let herself drift. Above all, the
+doctor’s promise comforted her: that she should go to Paris with him,
+and have her boy.
+
+This deceitful calm of the heart lasted three days.
+
+Carefully encouraged by Rose, it was destroyed by Jacintha.
+
+Jacintha, conscious that she had betrayed her trust, was almost
+heart-broken. She was ashamed to appear before her young mistress, and,
+coward-like, wanted to avoid knowing even how much harm she had done.
+
+She pretended toothache, bound up her face, and never stirred from the
+kitchen. But she was not to escape: the other servant came down with a
+message: “Madame Raynal wanted to see her directly.”
+
+She came quaking, and found Josephine all alone.
+
+Josephine rose to meet her, and casting a furtive glance round the room
+first, threw her arms round Jacintha’s neck, and embraced her with many
+tears.
+
+“Was ever fidelity like yours? how COULD you do it, Jacintha? and how
+can I ever repay it? But, no; it is too base of me to accept such a
+sacrifice from any woman.”
+
+Jacintha was so confounded she did not know what to say. But it was a
+mystification that could not endure long between two women, who were
+both deceived by a third. Between them they soon discovered that it must
+have been Rose who had sacrificed herself.
+
+“And Edouard has never been here since,” said Josephine.
+
+“And never will, madame.”
+
+“Yes, he shall! there must be some limit even to my feebleness, and my
+sister’s devotion. You shall take a line to him from me. I will write it
+this moment.”
+
+The letter was written. But it was never sent. Rose found Josephine and
+Jacintha together; saw a letter was being written, asked to see it; on
+Josephine’s hesitating, snatched it out of her hand, read it, tore it to
+pieces, and told Jacintha to leave the room. She hated the sight of
+poor Jacintha, who had slept at the very moment when all depended on her
+watchfulness.
+
+“So you were going to send to HIM, unknown to me.”
+
+“Forgive me, Rose.” Rose burst out crying.
+
+“O Josephine! is it come to this? Would you deceive ME?”
+
+“You have deceived ME! Yes! it has come to that. I know all. Twill not
+consent to destroy ALL I love.”
+
+She then begged hard for leave to send the letter.
+
+Rose gave an impetuous refusal. “What could you say to him? foolish
+thing, don’t you know him, and his vanity? When you had exposed yourself
+to him, and showed him I had insulted him for you, do you think he would
+forgive me? No! this is to make light of my love--to make me waste the
+sacrifice I have made. I feel that sacrifice as much as you do, more
+perhaps, and I would rather die in a convent than waste that night of
+shame and agony. Come, promise me, no more attempts of that kind, or we
+are sisters no more, friends no more, one heart and one blood no more.”
+
+The weaker nature, weakened still more by ill-health and grief, was
+terrified into submission, or rather temporized. “Kiss me then,” said
+Josephine, “and love me to the end. Ah, if I was only in my grave!”
+
+Rose kissed her with many sighs, but Josephine smiled. Rose eyed her
+with suspicion. That deep smile; what did it mean? She had formed some
+resolution. “She is going to deceive me somehow,” thought Rose.
+
+From that day she watched Josephine like a spy. Confidence was gone
+between them. Suspicion took its place.
+
+Rose was right in her misgivings. The moment Josephine saw that
+Edouard’s happiness and Rose’s were to be sacrificed for her whom
+nothing could make happy, the poor thing said to herself, “I CAN DIE.”
+
+And that was the happy thought that made her smile.
+
+The doctor gave her laudanum: he found she could not sleep: and he
+thought it all-important that she should sleep.
+
+Josephine, instead of taking these small doses, saved them all up,
+secreted them in a phial, and so, from the sleep of a dozen nights,
+collected the sleep of death: and now she was tranquil. This young
+creature that could not bear to give pain to any one else, prepared her
+own death with a calm resolution the heroes of our sex have not often
+equalled. It was so little a thing to her to strike Josephine. Death
+would save her honor, would spare her the frightful alternative of
+deceiving her husband, or of telling him she was another’s. “Poor
+Raynal,” said she to herself, “it is so cruel to tie him to a woman
+who can never be to him what he deserves. Rose would then prove her
+innocence to Edouard. A few tears for a weak, loving soul, and they
+would all be happy and forget her.”
+
+
+One day the baroness, finding herself alone with Rose and Dr. Aubertin,
+asked the latter what he thought of Josephine’s state.
+
+“Oh, she was better: had slept last night without her usual narcotic.”
+
+The baroness laid down her knitting and said, with much meaning, “And
+I tell you, you will never cure her body till you can cure her mind. My
+poor child has some secret sorrow.”
+
+“Sorrow!” said Aubertin, stoutly concealing the uneasiness these words
+created, “what sorrow?”
+
+“Oh, she has some deep sorrow. And so have you, Rose.”
+
+“Me, mamma! what DO you mean?”
+
+The baroness’s pale cheek flushed a little. “I mean,” said she, “that
+my patience is worn out at last; I cannot live surrounded by secrets.
+Raynal’s gloomy looks when he left us, after staying but one hour;
+Josephine ill from that day, and bursting into tears at every word;
+yourself pale and changed, hiding an unaccountable sadness under forced
+smiles--Now, don’t interrupt me. Edouard, who was almost like a son,
+gone off, without a word, and never comes near us now.”
+
+“Really you are ingenious in tormenting yourself. Josephine is ill!
+Well, is it so very strange? Have you never been ill? Rose is pale! you
+ARE pale, my dear; but she has nursed her sister for a month; is it a
+wonder she has lost color? Edouard is gone a journey, to inherit his
+uncle’s property: a million francs. But don’t you go and fall ill, like
+Josephine; turn pale, like Rose; and make journeys in the region of
+fancy, after Edouard Riviere, who is tramping along on the vulgar high
+road.”
+
+This tirade came from Aubertin, and very clever he thought himself.
+But he had to do with a shrewd old lady, whose suspicions had long
+smouldered; and now burst out. She said quietly, “Oh, then Edouard is
+not in this part of the world. That alters the case: where IS he?”
+
+“In Normandy, probably,” said Rose, blushing.
+
+The baroness looked inquiringly towards Aubertin. He put on an innocent
+face and said nothing.
+
+“Very good,” said the baroness. “It’s plain I am to learn nothing from
+you two. But I know somebody who will be more communicative. Yes:
+this uncomfortable smiling, and unreasonable crying, and interminable
+whispering; these appearances of the absent, and disappearances of the
+present; I shall know this very day what they all mean.”
+
+“Really, I do not understand you.”
+
+“Oh, never mind; I am an old woman, and I am in my dotage. For all that,
+perhaps you will allow me two words alone with my daughter.”
+
+“I retire, madame,” and he disappeared with a bow to her, and an anxious
+look at Rose. She did not need this; she clenched her teeth, and braced
+herself up to stand a severe interrogatory.
+
+Mother and daughter looked at one another, as if to measure forces, and
+then, instead of questioning her as she had intended, the baroness sank
+back in her chair and wept aloud. Rose was all unprepared for this. She
+almost screamed in a voice of agony, “O mamma! mamma! O God! kill me
+where I stand for making my mother weep!”
+
+“My girl,” said the baroness in a broken voice, and with the most
+touching dignity, “may you never know what a mother feels who finds
+herself shut out from her daughters’ hearts. Sometimes I think it is my
+fault; I was born in a severer age. A mother nowadays seems to be a sort
+of elder sister. In my day she was something more. Yet I loved my mother
+as well, or better than I did my sisters. But it is not so with those I
+have borne in my bosom, and nursed upon my knee.”
+
+At this Rose flung herself, sobbing and screaming, at her mother’s
+knees. The baroness was alarmed. “Come, dearest, don’t cry like that. It
+is not too late to take your poor old mother into your confidence. What
+is this mystery? and why this sorrow? How comes it I intercept at every
+instant glances that were not intended for me? Why is the very air
+loaded with signals and secrecy? (Rose replied only by sobs.) Is some
+deceit going on? (Rose sobbed.) Am I to have no reply but these sullen
+sobs? will you really tell me nothing?”
+
+“I’ve nothing to tell,” sobbed Rose.
+
+“Well, then, will you do something for me?”
+
+Such a proposal was not only a relief, but a delight to the deceiving
+but loving daughter. She started up crying, “Oh, yes, mamma; anything,
+everything. Oh, thank you!” In the ardor of her gratitude, she wanted
+to kiss her mother; but the baroness declined the embrace politely, and
+said, coldly and bitterly, “I shall not ask much; I should not venture
+now to draw largely on your affection; it’s only to write a few lines
+for me.”
+
+Rose got paper and ink with great alacrity, and sat down all beaming,
+pen in hand.
+
+The baroness dictated the letter slowly, with an eye gimleting her
+daughter all the time.
+
+“Dear--Monsieur--Riviere.”
+
+The pen fell from Rose’s hand, and she turned red and then pale.
+
+“What! write to him?”
+
+“Not in your own name; in mine. But perhaps you prefer to give me the
+trouble.”
+
+“Cruel! cruel!” sighed Rose, and wrote the words as requested.
+
+The baroness dictated again,--
+
+“Oblige me by coming here at your very earliest convenience.”
+
+“But, mamma, if he is in Normandy,” remonstrated Rose, fighting every
+inch of the ground.
+
+“Never you mind where he is,” said the baroness. “Write as I request.”
+
+“Yes, mamma,” said Rose with sudden alacrity; for she had recovered her
+ready wit, and was prepared to write anything, being now fully resolved
+the letter should never go.
+
+“Now sign my name.” Rose complied. “There; now fold it, and address it
+to his lodgings.” Rose did so; and, rising with a cheerful air, said she
+would send Jacintha with it directly.
+
+She was half across the room when her mother called her quietly back.
+
+“No, mademoiselle,” said she sternly. “You will give me the letter.
+I can trust neither the friend of twenty years, nor the servant that
+stayed by me in adversity, nor the daughter I suffered for and nursed.
+And why don’t I trust you? Because YOU HAVE TOLD ME A LIE.”
+
+At this word, which in its coarsest form she had never heard from those
+high-born lips till then, Rose cowered like a hare.
+
+“Ay, A LIE,” said the baroness. “I saw Edouard Riviere in the park
+but yesterday. I saw him. My old eyes are feeble, but they are not
+deceitful. I saw him. Send my breakfast to my own room. I come of an
+ancient race: I could not sit with liars; I should forget courtesy;
+you would see in my face how thoroughly I scorn you all.” And she went
+haughtily out with the letter in her hand.
+
+Rose for the first time, was prostrated. Vain had been all this deceit;
+her mother was not happy; was not blinded. Edouard might come and tell
+her his story. Then no power could keep Josephine silent. The plot was
+thickening; the fatal net was drawing closer and closer.
+
+She sank with a groan into a chair, and body and spirit alike succumbed.
+But that was only for a little while. To this prostration succeeded a
+feverish excitement. She could not, would not, look Edouard in the face.
+She would implore Josephine to be silent; and she herself would fly from
+the chateau. But, if Josephine would not be silent? Why, then she would
+go herself to Edouard, and throw herself upon his honor, and tell him
+the truth. With this, she ran wildly up the stairs, and burst into
+Josephine’s room so suddenly, that she caught her, pale as death, on her
+knees, with a letter in one hand and a phial of laudanum in the other.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV.
+
+
+Josephine conveyed the phial into her bosom with wonderful rapidity
+and dexterity, and rose to her feet. But Rose just saw her conceal
+something, and resolved to find out quietly what it was. So she said
+nothing about it, but asked Josephine what on earth she was doing.
+
+“I was praying.”
+
+“And what is that letter?”
+
+“A letter I have just received from Colonel Raynal.”
+
+Rose took the letter and read it. Raynal had written from Paris. He was
+coming to Beaurepaire to stay a month, and was to arrive that very day.
+
+Then Rose forgot all about herself, and even what she had come for. She
+clung about her sister’s neck, and implored her, for her sake, to try
+and love Raynal.
+
+Josephine shuddered, and clung weeping to her sister in turn. For in
+Rose’s arms she realized more powerfully what that sister would suffer
+if she were to die. Now, while they clung together, Rose felt something
+hard, and contrived just to feel it with her cheek. It was the phial.
+
+A chill suspicion crossed the poor girl. The attitude in which she had
+found Josephine; the letter, the look of despair, and now this little
+bottle, which she had hidden. WHY HIDE IT? She resolved not to let
+Josephine out of her sight; at all events, until she had seen this
+little bottle, and got it away from her.
+
+She helped her to dress, and breakfasted with her in the tapestried
+room, and dissembled, and put on gayety, and made light of everything
+but Josephine’s health.
+
+Her efforts were not quite in vain. Josephine became more composed; and
+Rose even drew from her a half promise that she would give Raynal and
+time a fair trial.
+
+And now Rose was relieved of her immediate apprehensions for Josephine,
+but the danger of another kind, from Edouard, remained. So she ran into
+her bedroom for her bonnet and shawl, determined to take the strong
+measure of visiting Edouard at once, or intercepting him. While she was
+making her little toilet, she heard her mother’s voice in the room. This
+was unlucky; she must pass through that room to go out. She sat down
+and fretted at this delay. And then, as the baroness appeared to be
+very animated, Rose went to the keyhole, and listened. Their mother was
+telling Josephine how she had questioned Rose, and how Rose had told her
+an untruth, and how she had made that young lady write to Edouard, etc.;
+in short, the very thing Rose wanted to conceal from Josephine.
+
+Rose lost all patience, and determined to fly through the room and out
+before anybody could stop her. She heard Jacintha come in with some
+message, and thought that would be a good opportunity to slip out
+unmolested. So she opened the door softly. Jacintha, it seemed, had been
+volunteering some remark that was not well received, for the baroness
+was saying, sharply, “Your opinion is not asked. Go down directly, and
+bring him up here, to this room.” Jacintha cast a look of dismay at
+Rose, and vanished.
+
+Rose gathered from that look, as much as from the words, who the visitor
+was. She made a dart after Jacintha. But the room was a long one, and
+the baroness intercepted her: “No,” said she, gravely, “I cannot spare
+you.”
+
+Rose stood pale and panting, but almost defiant. “Mamma,” said she, “if
+it is Monsieur Riviere, I MUST ask your leave to retire. And you have
+neither love nor pity, nor respect for me, if you detain me.”
+
+“Mademoiselle!” was the stern reply, “I FORBID you to move. Be good
+enough to sit there;” with which the baroness pointed imperiously to
+a sofa at the other side of the room. “Josephine, go to your room.”
+ Josephine retired, casting more than one anxious glance over her
+shoulder.
+
+Rose looked this way and that in despair and terror; but ended by
+sinking, more dead than alive, into the seat indicated; and even as she
+drooped, pale and trembling, on that sofa, Edouard Riviere, worn and
+agitated, entered the room, and bowed low to them all, without a word.
+
+The baroness looked at him, and then at her daughter, as much as to say,
+now I have got you; deceive me now if you can. “Rose, my dear,” said
+this terrible old woman, affecting honeyed accents, “don’t you see
+Monsieur Riviere?”
+
+The poor girl at this challenge rose with difficulty, and courtesied
+humbly to Edouard.
+
+He bowed to her, and stealing a rapid glance saw her pallor and
+distress; and that showed him she was not so hardened as he had thought.
+
+“You have not come to see us lately,” said the baroness, quietly, “yet
+you have been in the neighborhood.”
+
+These words puzzled Edouard. Was the old lady all in the dark, then? As
+a public man he had already learned to be on his guard; so he stammered
+out, “That he had been much occupied with public duties.”
+
+Madame de Beaurepaire despised this threadbare excuse too much to notice
+it at all. She went on as if he had said nothing. “Intimate as you were
+with us, you must have some reason for deserting us so suddenly.”
+
+“I have,” said Edouard, gravely.
+
+“What is it?”
+
+“Excuse me,” said Edouard, sullenly.
+
+“No, monsieur, I cannot. This neglect, succeeding to a somewhat ardent
+pursuit of my daughter, is almost an affront. You shall, of course,
+withdraw yourself altogether, if you choose. But not without an
+explanation. This much is due to me; and, if you are a gentleman, you
+will not withhold it from me.”
+
+“If he is a gentleman!” cried Rose; “O mamma, do not you affront a
+gentleman, who never, never gave you nor me any ground of offence. Why
+affront the friends and benefactors we have lost by our own fault?”
+
+“Oh, then, it is all your fault,” said the baroness. “I feared as much.”
+
+“All my fault, all,” said Rose; then putting her pretty palms together,
+and casting a look of abject supplication on Edouard, she murmured, “my
+temper!”
+
+“Do not you put words into his mouth,” said the shrewd old lady. “Come,
+Monsieur Riviere, be a man, and tell me the truth. What has she said to
+you? What has she done?”
+
+By this time the abject state of terror the high-spirited Rose was in,
+and her piteous glances, had so disarmed Edouard, that he had not the
+heart to expose her to her mother.
+
+“Madame,” said he, stiffly, taking Rose’s hint, “my temper and
+mademoiselle’s could not accord.”
+
+“Why, her temper is charming: it is joyous, equal, and gentle.”
+
+“You misunderstand me, madame; I do not reproach Mademoiselle Rose. It
+is I who am to blame.”
+
+“For what?” inquired the baroness dryly.
+
+“For not being able to make her love me.”
+
+“Oh! that is it! She did not love you?”
+
+“Ask herself, madame,” said Edouard, bitterly.
+
+“Rose,” said the baroness, her eye now beginning to twinkle, “were
+you really guilty of such a want of discrimination? Didn’t you love
+monsieur?”
+
+Rose flung her arms round her mother’s neck, and said, “No, mamma, I
+did not love Monsieur Edouard,” in an exquisite tone of love, that to a
+female ear conveyed the exact opposite of the words.
+
+But Edouard had not that nice discriminating ear. He sighed deeply, and
+the baroness smiled. “You tell me that?” said she, “and you are crying!”
+
+“She is crying, madame?” said Edouard, inquiringly, and taking a step
+towards them.
+
+“Why, you see she is, you foolish boy. Come, I must put an end to this;”
+ and she rose coolly from her seat, and begging Edouard to forgive her
+for leaving him a moment with his deadly enemy, went off with knowing
+little nods into Josephine’s room; only, before she entered it, she
+turned, and with a maternal smile discharged this word at the pair.
+
+“Babies!”
+
+But between the alienated lovers was a long distressing silence. Neither
+knew what to say; and their situation was intolerable. At last Rose
+ventured in a timorous voice to say, “I thank you for your generosity.
+But I knew that you would not betray me.”
+
+“Your secret is safe for me,” sighed Edouard. “Is there anything else I
+can do for you?”
+
+Rose shook her head sadly.
+
+Edouard moved to the door.
+
+Rose bowed her head with a despairing moan. It took him by the heart and
+held him. He hesitated, then came towards her.
+
+“I see you are sorry for what you have done to me who loved you so; and
+you loved me. Oh! yes, do not deny it, Rose; there was a time you loved
+me. And that makes it worse: to have given me such sweet hopes, only to
+crush both them and me. And is not this cruel of you to weep so and let
+me see your penitence--when it is too late?”
+
+“Alas! how can I help my regrets? I have insulted so good a friend.”
+
+There was a sad silence. Then as he looked at her, her looks belied the
+charge her own lips had made against herself.
+
+A light seemed to burst on Edouard from that high-minded,
+sorrow-stricken face.
+
+“Tell me it is false!” he cried.
+
+She hid her face in her hands--woman’s instinct to avoid being read.
+
+“Tell me you were misled then, fascinated, perverted, but that your
+heart returned to me. Clear yourself of deliberate deceit, and I will
+believe and thank you on my knees.”
+
+“Heaven have pity on us both!” cried poor Rose.
+
+“On us! Thank you for saying on us. See now, you have not gained
+happiness by destroying mine. One word--do you love that man?--that
+Dujardin?”
+
+“You know I do not.”
+
+“I am glad of that; since his life is forfeited; if he escapes my friend
+Raynal, he shall not escape me.”
+
+Rose uttered a cry of terror. “Hush! not so loud. The life of Camille!
+Oh! if he were to die, what would become of--oh, pray do not speak so
+loud.”
+
+“Own then that you DO love him,” yelled Edouard; “give me truth, if you
+have no love to give. Own that you love him, and he shall be safe. It is
+myself I will kill, for being such a slave as to love you still.”
+
+Rose’s fortitude gave way.
+
+“I cannot bear it,” she cried despairingly; “it is beyond my strength;
+Edouard, swear to me you will keep what I tell you secret as the grave!”
+
+“Ah!” cried Edouard, all radiant with hope, “I swear.”
+
+“Then you are under a delirium. I have deceived, but never wronged you;
+that unhappy child is not--Hush! HERE SHE COMES.”
+
+The baroness came smiling out, and Josephine’s wan, anxious face was
+seen behind her.
+
+“Well,” said the baroness, “is the war at an end? What, are we still
+silent? Let me try then what I can do. Edouard, lend me your hand.”
+
+While Edouard hesitated, Josephine clasped her hands and mutely
+supplicated him to consent. Her sad face, and the thought of how often
+she had stood his friend, shook his resolution. He held out his hand,
+but slowly and reluctantly.
+
+“There is my hand,” he groaned.
+
+“And here is mine, mamma,” said Rose, smiling to please her mother.
+
+Oh! the mixture of feeling, when her soft warm palm pressed his. How the
+delicious sense baffled and mystified the cold judgment.
+
+Josephine raised her eyes thankfully to heaven.
+
+While the young lovers yet thrilled at each other’s touch, yet could not
+look one another in the face, a clatter of horses’ feet was heard.
+
+“That is Colonel Raynal,” said Josephine, with unnatural calmness. “I
+expected him to-day.”
+
+The baroness was at the side window in a moment.
+
+“It is he!--it is he!”
+
+She hurried down to embrace her son.
+
+Josephine went without a word to her own room. Rose followed her the
+next minute. But in that one minute she worked magic.
+
+She glided up to Edouard, and looked him full in the face: not the sad,
+depressed, guilty-looking humble Rose of a moment before, but the old
+high-spirited, and some what imperious girl.
+
+“You have shown yourself noble this day. I am going to trust you as only
+the noble are trusted. Stay in the house till I can speak to you.”
+
+She was gone, and something leaped within Edouard’s bosom, and a flood
+of light seemed to burst in on him. Yet he saw no object clearly: but he
+saw light.
+
+Rose ran into Josephine’s room, and once more surprised her on her
+knees, and in the very act of hiding something in her bosom.
+
+“What are you doing, Josephine, on your knees?” said she, sternly.
+
+“I have a great trial to go through,” was the hesitating answer.
+
+Rose said nothing. She turned paler. She is deceiving me, thought she,
+and she sat down full of bitterness and terror, and, affecting not to
+watch Josephine, watched her.
+
+“Go and tell them I am coming, Rose.”
+
+“No, Josephine, I will not leave you till this terrible meeting is over.
+We will encounter him hand in hand, as we used to go when our hearts
+were one, and we deceived others, but never each other.”
+
+At this tender reproach Josephine fell upon her neck and wept.
+
+“I will not deceive you,” she said. “I am worse than the poor doctor
+thinks me. My life is but a little candle that a breath may put out any
+day.”
+
+Rose said nothing, but trembled and watched her keenly.
+
+“My little Henri,” said Josephine imploringly, “what would you do with
+him--if anything should happen to me?”
+
+“What would I do with him? He is mine. I should be his mother. Oh! what
+words are these: my heart! my heart!”
+
+“No, dearest; some day you will be married, and owe all the mother to
+your children; and Henri is not ours only: he belongs to some one I have
+seemed unkind to. Perhaps he thinks me heartless. For I am a foolish
+woman; I don’t know how to be virtuous, yet show a man my heart. But
+THEN he will understand me and forgive me. Rose, love, you will write
+to him. He will come to you. You will go together to the place where I
+shall be sleeping. You will show him my heart. You will tell him all my
+long love that lasted to the end. YOU need not blush to tell him all. I
+have no right. Then you will give him his poor Josephine’s boy, and you
+will say to him, ‘She never loved but you: she gives you all that
+is left of her, her child. She only prays you not to give him a bad
+mother.’”
+
+Poor soul! this was her one bit of little, gentle jealousy; but it made
+her eyes stream. She would have put out her hand from the tomb to keep
+her boy’s father single all his life.
+
+“Oh! my Josephine, my darling sister,” cried Rose, “why do you speak of
+death? Do you meditate a crime?”
+
+“No; but it was on my heart to say it: it has done me good.”
+
+“At least, take me to your bosom, my well-beloved, that I may not SEE
+your tears.”
+
+“There--tears? No, you have lightened my heart. Bless you! bless you!”
+
+The sisters twined their bosoms together in a long, gentle embrace. You
+might have taken them for two angels that flowed together in one love,
+but for their tears.
+
+A deep voice was now heard in the sitting-room.
+
+Josephine and Rose postponed the inevitable one moment more, by
+arranging their hair in the glass: then they opened the door, and
+entered the tapestried room.
+
+Raynal was sitting on the sofa, the baroness’s hand in his. Edouard was
+not there.
+
+Colonel Raynal had given him a strange look, and said, “What, you here?”
+ in a tone of voice that was intolerable.
+
+Raynal came to meet the sisters. He saluted Josephine on the brow.
+
+“You are pale, wife: and how cold her hand is.”
+
+“She has been ill this month past,” said Rose interposing.
+
+“You look ill, too, Mademoiselle Rose.”
+
+“Never mind,” cried the baroness joyously, “you will revive them both.”
+
+Raynal made no reply to that.
+
+“How long do you stay this time, a day?”
+
+“A month, mother.”
+
+The doctor now joined the party, and friendly greetings passed between
+him and Raynal.
+
+But ere long somehow all became conscious this was not a joyful meeting.
+The baroness could not alone sustain the spirits of the party, and soon
+even she began to notice that Raynal’s replies were short, and that his
+manner was distrait and gloomy. The sisters saw this too, and trembled
+for what might be coming.
+
+At last Raynal said bluntly, “Josephine, I want to speak to you alone.”
+
+The baroness gave the doctor a look, and made an excuse for going
+down-stairs to her own room. As she was going Josephine went to her and
+said calmly,--
+
+“Mother, you have not kissed me to-day.”
+
+“There! Bless you, my darling!”
+
+Raynal looked at Rose. She saw she must go, but she lingered, and sought
+her sister’s eye: it avoided her. At that Rose ran to the doctor, who
+was just going out of the door.
+
+“Oh! doctor,” she whispered trembling, “don’t go beyond the door. I
+found her praying. My mind misgives me. She is going to tell him--or
+something worse.”
+
+“What do you mean?”
+
+“I am afraid to say all I dread. She could not be so calm if she meant
+to live. Be near! as I shall. She has a phial hid in her bosom.”
+
+She left the old man trembling, and went back.
+
+“Excuse me,” said she to Raynal, “I only came to ask Josephine if she
+wants anything.”
+
+“No!--yes!--a glass of eau sucree.”
+
+Rose mixed it for her. While doing this she noticed that Josephine
+shunned her eye, but Raynal gazed gently and with an air of pity on her.
+
+She retired slowly into Josephine’s bedroom, but did not quite close the
+door.
+
+Raynal had something to say so painful that he shrank from plunging into
+it. He therefore, like many others, tried to creep into it, beginning
+with something else.
+
+“Your health,” said he, “alarms me. You seem sad, too. I don’t
+understand that. You have no news from the Rhine, have you?”
+
+“Monsieur!” said Josephine scared.
+
+“Do not call me monsieur, nor look so frightened. Call me your friend. I
+am your sincere friend.”
+
+“Oh, yes; you always were.”
+
+“Thank you. You will give me a dearer title before we part this time.”
+
+“Yes,” said Josephine in a low whisper, and shuddered.
+
+“Have you forgiven me frightening you so that night?”
+
+“Yes.”
+
+“It was a shock to me, too, I can tell you. I like the boy. She
+professed to love him, and, to own the truth, I loathe all treachery
+and deceit. If I had done a murder, I would own it. A lie doubles every
+crime. But I took heart; we are all selfish, we men; of the two sisters
+one was all innocence and good faith; and she was the one I had chosen.”
+
+At these words Josephine rose, like a statue moving, and took a phial
+from her bosom and poured the contents into the glass.
+
+But ere she could drink it, if such was her intention, Raynal, with his
+eyes gloomily lowered, said, in a voice full of strange solemnity,--
+
+“I went to the army of the Rhine.”
+
+Josephine put down the glass directly, though without removing her hand
+from it.
+
+“I see you understand me, and approve. Yes, I saw that your sister would
+be dishonored, and I went to the army and saw her seducer.”
+
+“You saw HIM. Oh, I hope you did not go and speak to him of--of this?”
+
+“Why, of course I did.”
+
+Josephine resolved to know the worst at once. “May I ask,” said she,
+“what you told him?”
+
+“Why, I told him all I had discovered, and pointed out the course he
+must take; he must marry your sister at once. He refused. I challenged
+him. But ere we met, I was ordered to lead a forlorn hope against a
+bastion. Then, seeing me go to certain death, the noble fellow pitied
+me. I mean this is how I understood it all at the time; at any rate, he
+promised to marry Rose if he should live.”
+
+Josephine put out her hand, and with a horrible smile said, “I thank
+you; you have saved the honor of our family;” and with no more ado, she
+took the glass in her hand to drink the fatal contents.
+
+But Raynal’s reply arrested her hand. He said solemnly, “No, I have
+not. Have you no inkling of the terrible truth? Do not fiddle with
+that glass: drink it, or leave it alone; for, indeed, I need all your
+attention.”
+
+He took the glass out of her patient hand, and with a furtive look at
+the bedroom-door, drew her away to the other end of the room; “and,”
+ said he, “I could not tell your mother, for she knows nothing of the
+girl’s folly; still less Rose, for I see she loves him still, or why is
+she so pale? Advise me, now, whilst we are alone. Colonel Dujardin was
+COMPARATIVELY indifferent to YOU. Will you undertake the task? A rough
+soldier like me is not the person to break the terrible tidings to that
+poor girl.”
+
+“What tidings? You confuse, you perplex me. Oh! what does this horrible
+preparation mean?”
+
+“It means he will never marry your sister; he will never see her more.”
+
+Then Raynal walked the room in great agitation, which at once
+communicated itself to his hearer. But the loving heart is ingenious in
+avoiding its dire misgivings.
+
+“I see,” said she; “he told you he would never visit Beaurepaire again.
+He was right.”
+
+Raynal shook his head sorrowfully.
+
+“Ah, Josephine, you are far from the truth. I was to attack the bastion.
+It was mined by the enemy, and he knew it. He took advantage of my
+back being turned. He led his men out of the trenches; he assaulted the
+bastion at the head of his brigade. He took it.”
+
+“Ah, it was noble; it was like him.”
+
+“The enemy, retiring, blew the bastion into the air, and Dujardin--is
+dead.”
+
+“Dead!” said Josephine, in stupefied tones, as if the word conveyed no
+meaning to her mind, benumbed and stunned by the blow.
+
+“Don’t speak so loud,” said Raynal; “I hear the poor girl at the door.
+Ay, he took my place, and is dead.”
+
+“Dead!”
+
+“Swallowed up in smoke and flames, overwhelmed and crushed under the
+ruins.”
+
+Josephine’s whole body gave way, and heaved like a tree falling under
+the axe. She sank slowly to her knees, and low moans of agony broke from
+her at intervals. “Dead, dead, dead!”
+
+“Is it not terrible?” he cried.
+
+She did not see him nor hear him, but moaned out wildly, “Dead, dead,
+dead!” The bedroom-door was opened.
+
+She shrieked with sudden violence, “Dead! ah, pity! the glass! the
+composing draught.” She stretched her hands out wildly. Raynal, with a
+face full of concern, ran to the table, and got the glass. She crawled
+on her knees to meet it; he brought it quickly to her hand.
+
+“There, my poor soul!”
+
+Even as their hands met, Rose threw herself on the cup, and snatched
+it with fury from them both. She was white as ashes, and her eyes,
+supernaturally large, glared on Raynal with terror. “Madman!” she cried,
+“would you kill her?”
+
+He glared back on her: what did this mean? Their eyes were fixed on each
+other like combatants for life and death; they did not see that the room
+was filling with people, that the doctor was only on the other side of
+the table, and that the baroness and Edouard were at the door, and all
+looking wonderstruck at this strange sight--Josephine on her knees,
+and those two facing each other, white, with dilating eyes, the glass
+between them.
+
+But what was that to the horror, when the next moment the patient
+Josephine started to her feet, and, standing in the midst, tore her hair
+by handfuls, out of her head.
+
+“Ah, you snatch the kind poison from me!”
+
+“Poison!”
+
+“Poison!”
+
+“Poison!” cried the others, horror-stricken.
+
+“Ah! you won’t let me die. Curse you all! curse you! I never had my own
+way in anything. I was always a slave and a fool. I have murdered the
+man I love--I love. Yes, my husband, do you hear? the man I love.”
+
+“Hush! daughter, respect my gray hairs.”
+
+“Your gray hairs! You are not so old in years as I am in agony. So this
+is your love, Rose! Ah, you won’t let me die--won’t you? THEN I’LL DO
+WORSE--I’LL TELL.”
+
+“He who is dead; you have murdered him amongst you, and I’ll follow
+him in spite of you all--he was my betrothed. He struggled wounded,
+bleeding, to my feet. He found me married. News came of my husband’s
+death; I married my betrothed.”
+
+“Married him!” exclaimed the baroness.
+
+“Ah, my poor mother. And she kissed me so kindly just now--she will kiss
+me no more. Oh, I am not ashamed of marrying him. I am only ashamed
+of the cowardice that dared not do it in face of all the world. We had
+scarce been happy a fortnight, when a letter came from Colonel Raynal.
+He was alive. I drove my true husband away, wretch that I was. None
+but bad women have an atom of sense. I tried to do my duty to my legal
+husband. He was my benefactor. I thought it was my duty. Was it? I don’t
+know: I have lost the sense of right and wrong. I turned from a living
+creature to a lie. He who had scattered benefits on me and all this
+house; he whom it was too little to love; he ought to have been adored:
+this man came here one night to wife proud, joyous, and warm-hearted. He
+found a cradle, and two women watching it. Now Edouard, now MONSIEUR, do
+you see that life is IMPOSSIBLE to me? One bravely accused herself: she
+was innocent. One swooned away like a guilty coward.”
+
+Edouard uttered an exclamation.
+
+“Yes, Edouard, you shall not be miserable like me; she was guilty. You
+do not understand me yet, my poor mother--and she was so happy this
+morning--I was the liar, the coward, the double-faced wife, the
+miserable mother that denied her child. Now will you let me die? Now do
+you see that I can’t and won’t live upon shame and despair? Ah, Monsieur
+Raynal, my dear friend, you were always generous: you will pity and
+kill me. I have dishonored the name you gave me to keep: I am neither
+Beaurepaire nor Raynal. Do pray kill me, monsieur--Jean, do pray release
+me from my life!”
+
+And she crawled to his knees and embraced them, and kissed his hand, and
+pleaded more piteously for death, than others have begged for life.
+
+Raynal stood like a rock: he was pale, and drew his breath audibly,
+but not a word. Then came a sight scarce less terrible than Josephine’s
+despair. The baroness, looking and moving twenty years older than an
+hour before, tottered across the room to Raynal.
+
+“Sir, you whom I have called my son, but whom I will never presume so
+to call again, I thought I had lived long enough never to have to blush
+again. I loved you, monsieur. I prayed every day for you. But she who
+WAS my daughter was not of my mind. Monsieur, I have never knelt but to
+God and to my king, and I kneel to you: forgive us, sir, forgive us!”
+
+She tried to go down on her knees. He raised her with his strong arm,
+but he could not speak. She turned on the others.
+
+“So this is the secret you were hiding from me! This secret has not
+killed you all. Oh! I shall not live under its shame so long as
+you have. Chateau of Beaurepaire--nest of treason, ingratitude, and
+immodesty--I loathe you as much as once I loved you. I will go and hide
+my head, and die elsewhere.”
+
+“Stay, madame!” said he, in a voice whose depth and dignity was
+such that it seemed impossible to disobey it. “It was sudden--I was
+shaken--but I am myself again.”
+
+“Oh, show some pity!” cried Rose.
+
+“I shall try to be just.”
+
+There was a long, trembling silence; and during that silence and
+terrible agitation, one figure stood firm among those quaking, beating
+hearts, like a rock with the waves breaking round it--the MAN OF
+PRINCIPLE among the creatures of impulse.
+
+He raised Josephine from her knees, and placed her all limp and
+powerless in an arm-chair. To her frenzy had now succeeded a sickness
+and feebleness like unto death.
+
+“Widow Dujardin,” said he, in a broken voice, “listen to me.”
+
+She moaned a sort of assent.
+
+“Your mistake has been not trusting me. I was your friend, and not
+a selfish friend. I was not enough in love with you to destroy your
+happiness. Besides, I despise that sort of love. If you had told me all,
+I would have spared you this misery. By the present law, civil contracts
+of marriage can be dissolved by mutual consent.”
+
+At this the baroness uttered some sign of surprise.
+
+“Ah!” continued Raynal, sadly, “you are aristocrats, and cannot keep
+pace with the times. This very day our mere contract shall be formally
+dissolved. Indeed, it ceases to exist since both parties are resolved
+to withdraw from it. So, if you married Dujardin in a church, you are
+Madame Dujardin at this moment, and his child is legitimate. What does
+she say?”
+
+This question was to Rose, for what Josephine uttered sounded like a
+mere articulate moan. But Rose’s quick ear had caught words, and she
+replied, all in tears, “My poor sister is blessing you, sir. We all
+bless you.”
+
+“She does not understand my position,” said Raynal. He then walked up to
+Josephine, and leaning over her arm, and speaking rather loud, under the
+impression that her senses were blunted by grief, he said, “Look here:
+Colonel Dujardin, your husband, deliberately, and with his eyes open,
+sacrificed his life for me, and for his own heroic sense of honor. Now,
+it is my turn. If that hero stood here, and asked me for all the blood
+in my body, I would give it him. He is gone; but, dying for me, he has
+left me his widow and his child; they remain under my wing. To protect
+them is my pride, and my only consolation. I am going to the mayor to
+annul our unlucky contract in due form, and make us brother and sister
+instead. But,” turning to the baroness, “don’t you think to escape me
+as your daughter has done: no, no, old lady, once a mother, always a
+mother. Stir from your son’s home if you dare!”
+
+And with these words, in speaking which his voice had recovered its iron
+firmness, he strode out at the door, superb in manhood and principle,
+and every eye turned with wonder and admiration after him. Even when he
+was gone they gazed at the door by which a creature so strangely noble
+had disappeared.
+
+The baroness was about to follow him without taking any notice of
+Josephine. But Rose caught her by the gown. “O mother, speak to poor
+Josephine: bid her live.”
+
+The baroness only made a gesture of horror and disgust, and turned her
+back on them both.
+
+Josephine, who had tottered up from her seat at Rose’s words, sank
+heavily down again, and murmured, “Ah! the grave holds all that love me
+now.”
+
+Rose ran to her side. “Cruel Josephine! what, do not I love you? Mother,
+will you not help me persuade her to live? Oh! if she dies, I will die
+too; you will kill both your children.”
+
+Stern and indignant as the baroness was, yet these words pierced her
+heart. She turned with a piteous, half apologetic air to Edouard and
+Aubertin. “Gentlemen,” said she, “she has been foolish, not guilty.
+Heaven pardons the best of us. Surely a mother may forgive her child.”
+ And with this nature conquered utterly; and she held out her arms, wide,
+wide, as is a mother’s heart. Her two erring children rushed sobbing
+violently into them; and there was not a dry eye in the room for a long
+time.
+
+After this, Josephine’s heart almost ceased to beat. Fear and
+misgivings, and the heavy sense of deceit gnawing an honorable heart,
+were gone. Grief reigned alone in the pale, listless, bereaved widow.
+
+The marriage was annulled before the mayor; and, three days afterwards,
+Raynal, by his influence, got the consummated marriage formally allowed
+in Paris.
+
+With a delicacy for which one would hardly have given him credit, he
+never came near Beaurepaire till all this was settled; but he brought
+the document from Paris that made Josephine the widow Dujardin, and
+her boy the heir of Beaurepaire; and the moment she was really Madame
+Dujardin he avoided her no longer; and he became a comfort to her
+instead of a terror.
+
+The dissolution of the marriage was a great tie between them. So much
+that, seeing how much she looked up to Raynal, the doctor said one day
+to the baroness, “If I know anything of human nature, they will marry
+again, provided none of you give her a hint which way her heart is
+turning.”
+
+They, who have habituated themselves to live for others, can suffer as
+well as do great things. Josephine kept alive. A passion such as hers,
+in a selfish nature, must have killed her.
+
+Even as it was, she often said, “It is hard to live.”
+
+Then they used to talk to her of her boy. Would she leave him--Camille’s
+boy--without a mother? And these words were never spoken to her quite in
+vain.
+
+Her mother forgave her entirely, and loved her as before. Who could be
+angry with her long? The air was no longer heavy with lies. Wretched as
+she was, she breathed lighter. Joy and hope were gone. Sorrowful peace
+was coming. When the heart comes to this, nothing but Time can cure; but
+what will not Time do? What wounds have I seen him heal! His cures are
+incredible.
+
+
+The little party sat one day, peaceful, but silent and sad, in the
+Pleasaunce, under the great oak.
+
+Two soldiers came to the gate. They walked feebly, for one was lame, and
+leaned upon the other, who was pale and weak, and leaned upon a stick.
+
+“Soldiers,” said Raynal, “and invalided.”
+
+“Give them food and wine,” said Josephine.
+
+Rose went towards them; but she had scarcely taken three steps ere she
+cried out,--
+
+“It is Dard! it is poor Dard! Come in, Dard, come in.”
+
+Dard limped towards them, leaning upon Sergeant La Croix. A bit of
+Dard’s heel had been shot away, and of La Croix’s head.
+
+Rose ran to the kitchen.
+
+“Jacintha, bring out a table into the Pleasaunce, and something for two
+guests to eat.”
+
+The soldiers came slowly to the Pleasaunce, and were welcomed, and
+invited to sit down, and received with respect; for France even in that
+day honored the humblest of her brave.
+
+Soon Jacintha came out with a little round table in her hands, and
+affected a composure which was belied by her shaking hands and her
+glowing cheek.
+
+After a few words of homely welcome--not eloquent, but very sincere--she
+went off again with her apron to her eyes. She reappeared with the good
+cheer, and served the poor fellows with radiant zeal.
+
+“What regiment?” asked Raynal.
+
+Dard was about to answer, but his superior stopped him severely;
+then, rising with his hand to his forehead, he replied, with pride,
+“Twenty-fourth brigade, second company. We were cut up at Philipsburg,
+and incorporated with the 12th.”
+
+Raynal instantly regretted his question; for Josephine’s eye fixed on
+Sergeant La Croix with an expression words cannot paint. Yet she showed
+more composure, real or forced, than he expected.
+
+“Heaven sends him,” said she. “My friend, tell me, were you--ah!”
+
+Colonel Raynal interfered hastily. “Think what you do. He can tell you
+nothing but what we know, not so much, in fact, as we know; for, now I
+look at him, I think this is the very sergeant we found lying insensible
+under the bastion. He must have been struck before the bastion was taken
+even.”
+
+“I was, colonel, I was. I remember nothing but losing my senses, and
+feeling the colors go out of my hand.”
+
+“There, you see, he knows nothing,” said Raynal.
+
+“It was hot work, colonel, under that bastion, but it was hotter to the
+poor fellows that got in. I heard all about it from Private Dard here.”
+
+“So, then, it was you who carried the colors?”
+
+“Yes, I was struck down with the colors of the brigade in my hand,”
+ cried La Croix.
+
+“See how people blunder about, everything; they told me the colonel
+carried the colors.”
+
+“Why, of course he did. You don’t think our colonel, the fighting
+colonel, would let me hold the colors of the brigade so long as he was
+alive. No; he was struck by a Prussian bullet, and he had just time to
+hand the colors to me, and point with his sword to the bastion, and down
+he went. It was hot work, I can tell you. I did not hold them long, not
+thirty seconds, and if we could know their history, they passed through
+more hands than that before they got to the Prussian flag-staff.”
+
+Raynal suddenly rose, and walked rapidly to and fro, with his hands
+behind him.
+
+“Poor colonel!” continued La Croix. “Well, I love to think he died like
+a soldier, and not like some of my poor comrades, hashed to atoms, and
+not a volley fired over him. I hope they put a stone over him, for he
+was the best soldier and the best general in the army.”
+
+“O sir!” cried Josephine, “there is no stone even to mark the spot where
+he fell,” and she sobbed despairingly.
+
+“Why, how is this, Private Dard?” inquired La Croix, sternly.
+
+Dard apologized for his comrade, and touching his own head significantly
+told them that since his wound the sergeant’s memory was defective.
+
+“Now, sergeant, didn’t I tell you the colonel must have got the better
+of his wound, and got into the battery?”
+
+“It’s false, Private Dard; don’t I know our colonel better than that?
+Would ever he have let those colors out of his hand, if there had been
+an ounce of life left in him?”
+
+“He died at the foot of the battery, I tell you.”
+
+“Then why didn’t we find him?”
+
+Here Jacintha put in a word with the quiet subdued meaning of her class.
+“I can’t find that anybody ever saw the colonel dead.”
+
+“They did not find him, because they did not look for him,” said
+Sergeant La Croix.
+
+“God forgive you, sergeant!” said Dard, with some feeling. “Not look
+for OUR COLONEL! We turned over every body that lay there,--full thirty
+there were,--and you were one of them.”
+
+“Only thirty! Why, we settled more Prussians than that, I’ll swear.”
+
+“Oh! they carried off their dead.”
+
+“Ay! but I don’t see why they should carry our colonel off. His epaulets
+was all the thieves could do any good with. Stop! yet I do, Private
+Dard; I have a horrible suspicion. No, I have not; it is a certainty.
+What! don’t you see, ye ninny? Thunder and thousands of devils, here’s a
+disgrace. Dogs of Prussians! they have got our colonel, they have taken
+him prisoner.”
+
+“O God bless them!” cried Josephine; “O God bless the mouth that tells
+me so! O sir, I am his wife, his poor heart-broken wife. You would not
+be so cruel as to mock my despair. Say again that he may be alive, pray,
+say it again!”
+
+“His wife! Private Dard, why didn’t you tell me? You tell me nothing.
+Yes, my pretty lady, I’ll say it again, and I’ll prove it. Here is an
+enemy in full retreat, would they encumber themselves with the colonel?
+If he was dead, they’d have whipped off his epaulets, and left him
+there. Alive? why not? Look at me: I am alive, and I was worse wounded
+than he was. They took me for dead, you see. Courage, madame! you will
+see him again, take an old soldier’s word for it. Dard, attention! this
+is the colonel’s wife.”
+
+She gazed on the speaker like one in a trance.
+
+Every eye and every soul had been so bent on Sergeant La Croix that it
+was only now Raynal was observed to be missing. The next minute he came
+riding out of the stable-yard, and went full gallop down the road.
+
+“Ah!” cried Rose, with a burst of hope; “he thinks so too; he has hopes.
+He is gone somewhere for information. Perhaps to Paris.”
+
+Josephine’s excitement and alternations of hope and fear were now
+alarming. Rose held her hand, and implored her to try and be calm till
+they could see Raynal.
+
+Just before dark he came riding fiercely home. Josephine flew down the
+stairs. Raynal at sight of her forgot all his caution. He waved his
+cocked hat in the air. She fell on her knees and thanked God. He gasped
+out,--
+
+“Prisoner--exchanged for two Prussian lieutenants--sent home--they say
+he is in France!”
+
+The tears of joy gushed in streams from her.
+
+Some days passed in hope and joy inexpressible; but the good doctor
+was uneasy for Josephine. She was always listening with supernatural
+keenness and starting from her chair, and every fibre of her lovely
+person seemed to be on the quiver.
+
+Nor was Rose without a serious misgiving. Would husband and wife ever
+meet? He evidently looked on her as Madame Raynal, and made it a point
+of honor to keep away from Beaurepaire.
+
+They had recourse to that ever-soothing influence--her child. Madame
+Jouvenel was settled in the village, and Josephine visited her every
+day, and came back often with red eyes, but always soothed.
+
+One day Rose and she went to Madame Jouvenel, and, entering the house
+without ceremony, found the nurse out, and no one watching the child.
+
+“How careless!” said Rose.
+
+Josephine stopped eagerly to kiss him. But instead of kissing him, she
+uttered a loud cry. There was a locket hanging round his neck.
+
+It was a locket containing some of Josephine’s hair and Camille’s. She
+had given it him in the happy days that followed their marriage. She
+stood gasping in the middle of the room. Madame Jouvenel came running
+in soon after. Josephine, by a wonderful effort over herself, asked her
+calmly and cunningly,--
+
+“Where is the gentleman who put this locket round my child’s neck? I
+want to speak with him.”
+
+Madame Jouvenel stammered and looked confused.
+
+“A soldier--an officer?--come, tell me!”
+
+“Woman,” cried Rose, “why do you hesitate?”
+
+“What am I to do?” said Madame Jouvenel. “He made me swear never to
+mention his coming here. He goes away, or hides whenever you come. And
+since Madame does not love the poor wounded gentleman, what can he do
+better?”
+
+“Not love him!” cried Rose: “why, she is his wife, his lawful wedded
+wife; he is a fool or a monster to run away for her. She loves him as no
+woman ever loved before. She pines for him. She dies for him.”
+
+The door of a little back room opened at these words of Rose, and there
+stood Camille, with his arm in a sling, pale and astounded, but great
+joy and wonder working in his face.
+
+Josephine gave a cry of love that made the other two women weep, and in
+a moment they were sobbing for joy upon each other’s neck.
+
+Away went sorrow, doubt, despair, and all they had suffered. That one
+moment paid for all. And in that moment of joy and surprise, so great as
+to be almost terrible, perhaps it was well for Josephine that Camille,
+weakened by his wound, was quite overcome, and nearly fainted. She was
+herself just going into hysterics; but, seeing him quite overcome,
+she conquered them directly, and nursed, and soothed, and pitied, and
+encouraged him instead.
+
+Then they sat hand in hand. Their happiness stopped their very breath.
+They could not speak. So Rose told him all. He never owned why he had
+slipped away when he saw them coming. He forgot it. He forgot all his
+hard thoughts of her. They took him home in the carriage. His wife would
+not let him out of her sight. For years and years after this she could
+hardly bear to let him be an hour out of her sight.
+
+The world is wide; there may be a man in it who can paint the sudden
+bliss that fell on these two much suffering hearts; but I am not that
+man; this is beyond me; it was not only heaven, but heaven after hell.
+
+Leave we the indescribable and the unspeakable for a moment, and go to a
+lighter theme.
+
+The day Rose’s character was so unexpectedly cleared, Edouard had no
+opportunity of speaking to her, or a reconciliation would have taken
+place. As it was, he went home intensely happy. But he did not resume
+his visits to the chateau. When he came to think calmly over it, his
+vanity was cruelly mortified. She was innocent of the greater offence;
+but how insolently she had sacrificed him, his love, and his respect, to
+another’s interest.
+
+More generous thoughts prevailed by degrees. And one day that her pale
+face, her tears, and her remorse got the better of his offended pride,
+he determined to give her a good lecture that should drown her in
+penitent tears; and then end by forgiving her. For one thing he could
+not be happy till he had forgiven her.
+
+She walked into the room with a calm, dignified, stately air, and before
+he could utter one word of his grave remonstrance, attacked him thus:
+“You wish to speak to me, sir. If it is to apologize to me, I will save
+your vanity the mortification. I forgive you.”
+
+“YOU forgive ME!” cried Edouard furiously.
+
+“No violence, if you please,” said the lady with cold hauteur. “Let us
+be friends, as Josephine and Raynal are. We cannot be anything more
+to one another now. You have wounded me too deeply by your jealous,
+suspicious nature.”
+
+Edouard gasped for breath, and was so far out-generalled that he
+accepted the place of defendant. “Wasn’t I to believe your own lips? Did
+not Colonel Raynal believe you?”
+
+“Oh, that’s excusable. He did not know me. But you were my lover; you
+ought to have seen I was forced to deceive poor Raynal. How dare you
+believe your eyes; much more your ears, against my truth, against my
+honor; and then to believe such nonsense?” Then, with a grand assumption
+of superior knowledge, says she, “You little simpleton, how could the
+child be mine when I wasn’t married at all?”
+
+At this reproach, Edouard first stared, then grinned. “I forgot that,”
+ said he.
+
+“Yes, and you forgot the moon isn’t made of green cheese. However, if I
+saw you very humble, and very penitent, I might, perhaps, really forgive
+you--in time.”
+
+“No, forgive me at once. I don’t understand your angelical, diabolical,
+incomprehensible sex: who on earth can? forgive me.”
+
+“Oh! oh! oh! oh!”
+
+Lo! the tears that could not come at a remonstrance were flowing in a
+stream at his generosity.
+
+“What is the matter now?” said he tenderly. She cried away, but at the
+same time explained,--
+
+“What a f--f--foolish you must be not to see that it is I who am without
+excuse. You were my betrothed. It was to you I owed my duty; not my
+sister. I am a wicked, unhappy girl. How you must hate me!”
+
+“I adore you. There, no more forgiving on either side. Let our only
+quarrel be who shall love the other best.”
+
+“Oh, I know how that will be,” said the observant toad. “You will love
+me best till you have got me; and then I shall love you best; oh, ever
+so much.”
+
+However, the prospect of loving best did not seem disagreeable to her;
+for with this announcement she deposited her head on his shoulder, and
+in that attitude took a little walk with him up and down the Pleasaunce:
+sixty times; about eight miles.
+
+These two were a happy pair. This wayward, but generous heart never
+forgot her offence, and his forgiveness. She gave herself to him heart
+and soul, at the altar, and well she redeemed her vow. He rose high in
+political life: and paid the penalty of that sort of ambition; his
+heart was often sore. But by his own hearth sat comfort and ever ready
+sympathy. Ay, and patient industry to read blue-books, and a ready hand
+and brain to write diplomatic notes for him, off which the mind glided
+as from a ball of ice.
+
+In thirty years she never once mentioned the servants to him.
+
+“Oh, let eternal honor crown her name!”
+
+It was only a little bit of heel that Dard had left in Prussia. More
+fortunate than his predecessor (Achilles), he got off with a slight but
+enduring limp. And so the army lost him.
+
+He married Jacintha, and Josephine set them up in Bigot’s, (deceased)
+auberge. Jacintha shone as a landlady, and custom flowed in. For all
+that, a hankering after Beaurepaire was observable in her. Her favorite
+stroll was into the Beaurepaire kitchen, and on all fetes and grand
+occasions she was prominent in gay attire as a retainer of the house.
+The last specimen of her homely sagacity I shall have the honor to lay
+before you is a critique upon her husband, which she vented six years
+after marriage.
+
+“My Dard,” said she, “is very good as far as he goes. What he has felt
+himself, that he can feel FOR: nobody better. You come to him with an
+empty belly, or a broken head, or all bleeding with a cut, or black
+and blue, and you shall find a friend. But if it is a sore heart, or
+trouble, and sorrow, and no hole in your carcass to show for it, you had
+better come to ME; for you might as well tell your grief to a stone wall
+as to my man.”
+
+
+The baroness took her son Raynal to Paris, and there, with keen eye,
+selected him a wife. She proved an excellent one. It would have been
+hard if she had not, for the baroness with the severe sagacity of her
+age and sex, had set aside as naught a score of seeming angels, before
+she could suit herself with a daughter-in-law. At first the Raynals very
+properly saw little of the Dujardins; but when both had been married
+some years, the recollection of that fleeting and nominal connection
+waxed faint, while the memory of great benefits conferred on both sides
+remained lively as ever in hearts so great, and there was a warm, a
+sacred friendship between the two houses--a friendship of the ancient
+Greeks, not of the modern club-house.
+
+Camille and Josephine were blessed almost beyond the lot of humanity:
+none can really appreciate sunshine but those who come out of the cold
+dark. And so with happiness. For years they could hardly be said to live
+like mortals: they basked in bliss. But it was a near thing; for they
+but just scraped clear of life-long misery, and death’s cold touch
+grazed them both as they went.
+
+Yet they had heroic virtues to balance White Lies in the great Judge’s
+eye.
+
+A wholesome lesson, therefore, and a warning may be gathered from this
+story: and I know many novelists who would have preached that lesson at
+some length in every other chapter, and interrupted the sacred
+narrative to do it. But when I read stories so mutilated, I think of a
+circumstance related by Mr. Joseph Miller.
+
+“An Englishman sojourning in some part of Scotland was afflicted with
+many hairs in the butter, and remonstrated. He was told, in reply, that
+the hairs and the butter came from one source--the cow; and that the
+just and natural proportions hitherto observed, could not be deranged,
+and bald butter invented--for ONE. ‘So be it,’ said the Englishman; ‘but
+let me have the butter in one plate, and the hairs in another.’”
+
+Acting on this hint, I have reserved some admirable remarks,
+reflections, discourses, and tirades, until the story should be ended,
+and the other plate be ready for the subsidiary sermon.
+
+And now that the proper time is come, that love of intruding one’s own
+wisdom in one’s own person on the reader, which has marred so many works
+of art, is in my case restrained--first, by pure fatigue; secondly,
+because the moral of this particular story stands out so clear in the
+narrative, that he who runs may read it without any sermon at all.
+
+Those who will not take the trouble to gather my moral from the living
+tree, would not lift it out of my dead basket: would not unlock their
+jaw-bones to bite it, were I to thrust it into their very mouths.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of White Lies, by Charles Reade
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+
+<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" lang="en">
+  <head>
+    <title>
+      White Lies, by Charles Reade
+    </title>
+    <style type="text/css" xml:space="preserve">
+
+    body { margin:5%; background:#faebd0; text-align:justify}
+    P { text-indent: 1em; margin-top: .25em; margin-bottom: .25em; }
+    H1,H2,H3,H4,H5,H6 { text-align: center; margin-left: 15%; margin-right: 15%; }
+    hr  { width: 50%; text-align: center;}
+    .foot { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; text-indent: -3em; font-size: 90%; }
+    blockquote {font-size: 97%; font-style: italic; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%;}
+    .mynote    {background-color: #DDE; color: #000; padding: .5em; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 95%;}
+    .toc       { margin-left: 10%; margin-bottom: .75em;}
+    .toc2      { margin-left: 20%;}
+    div.fig    { display:block; margin:0 auto; text-align:center; }
+    div.middle { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; }
+    .figleft   {float: left; margin-left: 0%; margin-right: 1%;}
+    .figright  {float: right; margin-right: 0%; margin-left: 1%;}
+    .pagenum   {display:inline; font-size: 70%; font-style:normal;
+               margin: 0; padding: 0; position: absolute; right: 1%;
+               text-align: right;}
+    pre        { font-style: italic; font-size: 90%; margin-left: 10%;}
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+  <body>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of White Lies, by Charles Reade
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: White Lies
+
+Author: Charles Reade
+
+Release Date: May 16, 2006 [EBook #2472]
+Last Updated: September 27, 2016
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: UTF-8
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WHITE LIES ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Donald Lainson; David Widger
+
+
+
+
+
+</pre>
+    <p>
+      <br /> <br />
+    </p>
+    <h1>
+      WHITE LIES
+    </h1>
+    <p>
+      <br />
+    </p>
+    <h2>
+      By Charles Reade
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      <br /> <br />
+    </p>
+    <hr />
+    <p>
+      <br /> <br />
+    </p>
+    <blockquote>
+      <p class="toc">
+        <big><b>CONTENTS</b></big>
+      </p>
+      <p>
+        <br />
+      </p>
+      <p class="toc">
+        <a href="#link2HCH0001"> CHAPTER I. </a>
+      </p>
+      <p class="toc">
+        <a href="#link2HCH0002"> CHAPTER II. </a>
+      </p>
+      <p class="toc">
+        <a href="#link2HCH0003"> CHAPTER III. </a>
+      </p>
+      <p class="toc">
+        <a href="#link2HCH0004"> CHAPTER IV. </a>
+      </p>
+      <p class="toc">
+        <a href="#link2HCH0005"> CHAPTER V. </a>
+      </p>
+      <p class="toc">
+        <a href="#link2HCH0006"> CHAPTER VI. </a>
+      </p>
+      <p class="toc">
+        <a href="#link2HCH0007"> CHAPTER VII. </a>
+      </p>
+      <p class="toc">
+        <a href="#link2HCH0008"> CHAPTER VIII. </a>
+      </p>
+      <p class="toc">
+        <a href="#link2HCH0009"> CHAPTER IX. </a>
+      </p>
+      <p class="toc">
+        <a href="#link2HCH0010"> CHAPTER X. </a>
+      </p>
+      <p class="toc">
+        <a href="#link2HCH0011"> CHAPTER XI. </a>
+      </p>
+      <p class="toc">
+        <a href="#link2HCH0012"> CHAPTER XII. </a>
+      </p>
+      <p class="toc">
+        <a href="#link2HCH0013"> CHAPTER XIII. </a>
+      </p>
+      <p class="toc">
+        <a href="#link2HCH0014"> CHAPTER XIV. </a>
+      </p>
+      <p class="toc">
+        <a href="#link2HCH0015"> CHAPTER XV. </a>
+      </p>
+      <p class="toc">
+        <a href="#link2HCH0016"> CHAPTER XVI. </a>
+      </p>
+      <p class="toc">
+        <a href="#link2HCH0017"> CHAPTER XVII. </a>
+      </p>
+      <p class="toc">
+        <a href="#link2HCH0018"> CHAPTER XVIII. </a>
+      </p>
+      <p class="toc">
+        <a href="#link2HCH0019"> CHAPTER XIX. </a>
+      </p>
+      <p class="toc">
+        <a href="#link2HCH0020"> CHAPTER XX. </a>
+      </p>
+      <p class="toc">
+        <a href="#link2HCH0021"> CHAPTER XXI. </a>
+      </p>
+      <p class="toc">
+        <a href="#link2HCH0022"> CHAPTER XXII. </a>
+      </p>
+      <p class="toc">
+        <a href="#link2HCH0023"> CHAPTER XXIII. </a>
+      </p>
+      <p class="toc">
+        <a href="#link2HCH0024"> CHAPTER XXIV. </a>
+      </p>
+    </blockquote>
+    <p>
+      <br /> <br />
+    </p>
+    <hr />
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0001" id="link2HCH0001">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a> <br /> <br />
+    </p>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER I.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Towards the close of the last century the Baron de Beaurepaire lived in
+      the chateau of that name in Brittany. His family was of prodigious
+      antiquity; seven successive barons had already flourished on this spot
+      when a younger son of the house accompanied his neighbor the Duke of
+      Normandy in his descent on England, and was rewarded by a grant of English
+      land, on which he dug a mote and built a chateau, and called it
+      Beaurepaire (the worthy Saxons turned this into Borreper without delay).
+      Since that day more than twenty gentlemen of the same lineage had held in
+      turn the original chateau and lands, and handed them down to their present
+      lord.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Thus rooted in his native Brittany, Henri Lionel Marie St. Quentin de
+      Beaurepaire was as fortunate as any man can be pronounced before he dies.
+      He had health, rank, a good income, a fair domain, a goodly house, a
+      loving wife, and two lovely young daughters, all veneration and affection.
+      Two months every year he visited the Faubourg St. Germain and the Court.
+      At both every gentleman and every lacquey knew his name, and his face: his
+      return to Brittany after this short absence was celebrated by a rustic
+      fete.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Above all, Monsieur de Beaurepaire possessed that treasure of treasures,
+      content. He hunted no heart-burns. Ambition did not tempt him; why should
+      he listen to long speeches, and court the unworthy, and descend to
+      intrigue, for so precarious and equivocal a prize as a place in the
+      Government, when he could be De Beaurepaire without trouble or loss of
+      self-respect? Social ambition could get little hold of him; let parvenus
+      give balls half in doors, half out, and light two thousand lamps, and
+      waste their substance battling and manoeuvring for fashionable
+      distinction; he had nothing to gain by such foolery, nothing to lose by
+      modest living; he was the twenty-ninth Baron of Beaurepaire. So wise, so
+      proud, so little vain, so strong in health and wealth and honor, one would
+      have said nothing less than an earthquake could shake this gentleman and
+      his house. Yet both were shaken, though rooted by centuries to the soil;
+      and by no vulgar earthquake.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      For years France had bowed in silence beneath two galling burdens&mdash;a
+      selfish and corrupt monarchy, and a multitudinous, privileged, lazy, and
+      oppressive aristocracy, by whom the peasant was handled like a Russian
+      serf. [Said peasant is now the principal proprietor of the soil.]
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The lower orders rose upon their oppressors, and soon showed themselves
+      far blacker specimens of the same breed. Law, religion, humanity, and
+      common sense, hid their faces; innocent blood flowed in a stream, and
+      terror reigned. To Monsieur de Beaurepaire these republicans&mdash;murderers
+      of women, children, and kings&mdash;seemed the most horrible monsters
+      nature had ever produced; he put on black, and retired from society; he
+      felled timber, and raised large sums of money upon his estate. And one day
+      he mounted his charger, and disappeared from the chateau.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Three months after this, a cavalier, dusty and pale, rode into the
+      courtyard of Beaurepaire, and asked to see the baroness. She came to him;
+      he hung his head and held her out a letter.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It contained a few sad words from Monsieur de Laroche-jaquelin. The baron
+      had just fallen in La Vendee, fighting for the Crown.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      From that hour till her death the baroness wore black.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The mourner would have been arrested, and perhaps beheaded, but for a
+      friend, the last in the world on whom the family reckoned for any solid
+      aid. Dr. Aubertin had lived in the chateau twenty years. He was a man of
+      science, and did not care a button for money; so he had retired from the
+      practice of medicine, and pursued his researches at ease under the baron&rsquo;s
+      roof. They all loved him, and laughed at his occasional reveries, in the
+      days of prosperity; and now, in one great crisis, the protege became the
+      protector, to their astonishment and his own. But it was an age of ups and
+      downs. This amiable theorist was one of the oldest verbal republicans in
+      Europe. And why not? In theory a republic is the perfect form of
+      government: it is merely in practice that it is impossible; it is only
+      upon going off paper into reality, and trying actually to self-govern
+      limited nations, after heating them white hot with the fire of politics
+      and the bellows of bombast&mdash;that the thing resolves itself into
+      bloodshed silvered with moonshine.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Dr. Aubertin had for years talked and written speculative republicanism.
+      So they applied to him whether the baroness shared her husband&rsquo;s opinions,
+      and he boldly assured them she did not; he added, &ldquo;She is a pupil of
+      mine.&rdquo; On this audacious statement they contented themselves with laying a
+      heavy fine on the lands of Beaurepaire.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Assignats were abundant, but good mercantile paper, a notorious coward,
+      had made itself wings and fled, and specie was creeping into strong boxes
+      like a startled rabbit into its hole. The fine was paid; but Beaurepaire
+      had to be heavily mortgaged, and the loan bore a high rate of interest.
+      This, with the baron&rsquo;s previous mortgages, swamped the estate.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness sold her carriage and horses, and she and her daughters
+      prepared to deny themselves all but the bare necessaries of life, and pay
+      off their debts if possible. On this their dependants fell away from them;
+      their fair-weather friends came no longer near them; and many a flush of
+      indignation crossed their brows, and many an aching pang their hearts, as
+      adversity revealed the baseness and inconstancy of common people high or
+      low.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      When the other servants had retired with their wages, one Jacintha
+      remained behind, and begged permission to speak to the baroness.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What would you with me, my child?&rdquo; asked that lady, with an accent in
+      which a shade of surprise mingled with great politeness.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Forgive me, madame,&rdquo; began Jacintha, with a formal courtesy; &ldquo;but how can
+      I leave you, and Mademoiselle Josephine, and Mademoiselle Rose? I was born
+      at Beaurepaire; my mother died in the chateau: my father died in the
+      village; but he had meat every day from the baron&rsquo;s own table, and fuel
+      from the baron&rsquo;s wood, and died blessing the house of Beaurepaire. I
+      CANNOT go. The others are gone because prosperity is here no longer. Let
+      it be so; I will stay till the sun shines again upon the chateau, and then
+      you shall send me away if you are bent on it; but not now, my ladies&mdash;oh,
+      not now! Oh! oh! oh!&rdquo; And the warm-hearted girl burst out sobbing
+      ungracefully.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My child,&rdquo; said the baroness, &ldquo;these sentiments touch me, and honor you.
+      But retire, if you please, while I consult my daughters.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Jacintha cut her sobs dead short, and retreated with a formal reverence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The consultation consisted of the baroness opening her arms, and both her
+      daughters embracing her at once. Proud as they were, they wept with joy at
+      having made one friend amongst all their servants. Jacintha stayed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      As months rolled on, Rose de Beaurepaire recovered her natural gayety in
+      spite of bereavement and poverty; so strong are youth, and health, and
+      temperament. But her elder sister had a grief all her own: Captain
+      Dujardin, a gallant young officer, well-born, and his own master, had
+      courted her with her parents&rsquo; consent; and, even when the baron began to
+      look coldly on the soldier of the Republic, young Dujardin, though too
+      proud to encounter the baron&rsquo;s irony and looks of scorn, would not yield
+      love to pique. He came no more to the chateau, but he would wait hours and
+      hours on the path to the little oratory in the park, on the bare chance of
+      a passing word or even a kind look from Josephine. So much devotion
+      gradually won a heart which in happier times she had been half encouraged
+      to give him; and, when he left her on a military service of uncommon
+      danger, the woman&rsquo;s reserve melted, and, in that moment of mutual grief
+      and passion, she vowed she loved him better than all the world.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Letters from the camp breathing a devotion little short of worship fed her
+      attachment; and more than one public mention of his name and services made
+      her proud as well as fond of the fiery young soldier.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Still she did not open her heart to her parents. The baron, alive at that
+      time, was exasperated against the Republic, and all who served it; and, as
+      for the baroness, she was of the old school: a passionate love in a lady&rsquo;s
+      heart before marriage was contrary to her notions of etiquette. Josephine
+      loved Rose very tenderly; but shrank with modest delicacy from making her
+      a confidante of feelings, the bare relation of which leaves the female
+      hearer a child no longer.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      So she hid her heart, and delicious first love nestled deep in her nature,
+      and thrilled in every secret vein and fibre.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They had parted two years, and he had joined the army of the Pyrenees
+      about one month, when suddenly all correspondence ceased on his part.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Restless anxiety rose into terror as this silence continued; and starting
+      and trembling at every sound, and edging to the window at every footstep,
+      Josephine expected hourly the tidings of her lover&rsquo;s death.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Months rolled on in silence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then a new torture came. He must not be dead but unfaithful. At this all
+      the pride of her race was fired in her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The struggle between love and ire was almost too much for nature:
+      violently gay and moody by turns she alarmed both her mother and the good
+      Dr. Aubertin. The latter was not, I think, quite without suspicion of the
+      truth; however, he simply prescribed change of air and place; she must go
+      to Frejus, a watering-place distant about five leagues. Mademoiselle de
+      Beaurepaire yielded a languid assent. To her all places were alike.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But when they returned from Frejus a change had taken place. Rose had
+      extracted her sister&rsquo;s secret, and was a changed girl. Pity, and the keen
+      sense of Josephine&rsquo;s wrong, had raised her sisterly love to a passion. The
+      great-hearted girl hovered about her lovely, suffering sister like an
+      angel, and paid her the tender attentions of a devoted lover, and hated
+      Camille Dujardin with all her heart: hated him all the more that she saw
+      Josephine shrink even from her whenever she inveighed against him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At last Rose heard some news of the truant lover. The fact is, this young
+      lady was as intelligent as she was inexperienced; and she had asked
+      Jacintha to tell Dard to talk to every soldier that passed through the
+      village, and ask him if he knew anything about Captain Dujardin of the
+      17th regiment. Dard cross-examined about a hundred invalided warriors, who
+      did not even recognize the captain&rsquo;s name; but at last, by extraordinary
+      luck, he actually did fall in with two, who told him strange news about
+      Captain Dujardin. And so then Dard told Jacintha; and Jacintha soon had
+      the men into the kitchen and told Rose. Rose ran to tell Josephine; but
+      stopped in the passage, and turned suddenly very cold. Her courage failed
+      her; she feared Josephine would not take the news as she ought; and
+      perhaps would not love her so well if SHE told her; so she thought to
+      herself she would let the soldiers tell their own tale. She went into the
+      room where Josephine was reading to the baroness and Dr. Aubertin; she sat
+      quietly down; but at the first opportunity made Josephine one of those
+      imperceptible signals which women, and above all, sisters, have reduced to
+      so subtle a system. This done, she went carelessly out: and Josephine in
+      due course followed her, and found her at the door.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What is it?&rdquo; said Josephine, earnestly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Have you courage?&rdquo; was Rose&rsquo;s reply.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He is dead?&rdquo; said Josephine, turning pale as ashes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, no;&rdquo; said Rose hastily; &ldquo;he is alive. But you will need all your
+      courage.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Since he lives I fear nothing,&rdquo; said Josephine; and stood there and
+      quivered from head to foot. Rose, with pitying looks, took her by the hand
+      and drew her in silence towards the kitchen.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine yielded a mute submission at first; but at the very door hung
+      back and faltered, &ldquo;He loves another; he is married: let me go.&rdquo; Rose made
+      no reply, but left her there and went into the kitchen and found two
+      dragoons seated round a bottle of wine. They rose and saluted her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Be seated, my brave men,&rdquo; said she; &ldquo;only please tell me what you told
+      Jacintha about Captain Dujardin.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t stain your mouth with the captain, my little lady. He is a
+      traitor.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How do you know?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Marcellus! mademoiselle asks us how we know Captain Dujardin to be a
+      traitor. Speak.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Marcellus, thus appealed to, told Rose after his own fashion that he knew
+      the captain well: that one day the captain rode out of the camp and never
+      returned: that at first great anxiety was felt on his behalf, for the
+      captain was a great favorite, and passed for the smartest soldier in the
+      division: that after awhile anxiety gave place to some very awkward
+      suspicions, and these suspicions it was his lot and his comrade&rsquo;s here to
+      confirm. About a month later he and the said comrade and two more were
+      sent, well mounted, to reconnoitre a Spanish village. At the door of a
+      little inn they caught sight of a French uniform. This so excited their
+      curiosity that he went forward nearer than prudent, and distinctly
+      recognized Captain Dujardin seated at a table drinking between two
+      guerillas; then he rode back and told the others, who then came up and
+      satisfied themselves it was so: that if any of the party had entertained a
+      doubt, it was removed in an unpleasant way; he, Marcellus, disgusted at
+      the sight of a French uniform drinking among Spaniards, took down his
+      carabine and fired at the group as carefully as a somewhat restive horse
+      permitted: at this, as if by magic, a score or so of guerillas poured out
+      from Heaven knows where, musket in hand, and delivered a volley; the
+      officer in command of the party fell dead, Jean Jacques here got a broken
+      arm, and his own horse was wounded in two places, and fell from loss of
+      blood a few furlongs from the French camp, to the neighborhood of which
+      the vagabonds pursued them, hallooing and shouting and firing like
+      barbarous banditti as they were.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;However, here I am,&rdquo; concluded Marcellus, &ldquo;invalided for awhile, my lady,
+      but not expended yet: we will soon dash in among them again for death or
+      glory. Meantime,&rdquo; concluded he, filling both glasses, &ldquo;let us drink to the
+      eyes of beauty (military salute); and to the renown of France; and double
+      damnation to all her traitors, like that Captain Dujardin; whose neck may
+      the devil twist.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Ere they could drink to this energetic toast, a low wail at the door, like
+      a dying hare&rsquo;s, arrested the glasses on their road, and the rough soldiers
+      stood transfixed, and looked at one another in some dismay. Rose flew to
+      the door with a face full of concern.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine was gone.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then Rose had the tact and resolution to say a few kind, encouraging words
+      to the soldiers, and bid Jacintha be hospitable to them. This done she
+      darted up-stairs after Josephine; she reached the main corridor just in
+      time to see her creep along it with the air and carriage of a woman of
+      fifty, and enter her own room.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose followed softly with wet eyes, and turned the handle gently. But the
+      door was locked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Josephine! Josephine!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      No answer.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I want to speak to you. I am frightened. Oh, do not be alone.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      A choking voice answered, &ldquo;Give me a little while to draw my breath.&rdquo; Rose
+      sank down at the door, and sat close to it, with her head against it,
+      sobbing bitterly. She was hurt at not being let in; such a friend as she
+      had proved herself. But this personal feeling was only a fraction of her
+      grief and anxiety.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A good half hour elapsed ere Josephine, pale and stern as no one had ever
+      seen her till that hour, suddenly opened the door. She started at sight of
+      Rose couched sorrowful on the threshold; her stern look relaxed into
+      tender love and pity; she sank, blushing, on her knees, and took her
+      sister&rsquo;s head quickly to her bosom. &ldquo;Oh, my little love, have you been
+      here all this time?&rdquo;&mdash;&ldquo;Oh! oh! oh!&rdquo; was all the little love could
+      reply. Then the deserted one, still kneeling, took Rose in her lap, and
+      caressed and comforted her, and poured words of gratitude and affection
+      over her like a warm shower.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They rose hand in hand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then Rose suddenly seized Josephine, and looked long and anxiously down
+      into her eyes. They flashed fire under the scrutiny. &ldquo;Yes, it is all over;
+      I could not despise and love. I am dead to him, as he is dead to France.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      This was joyful news to Rose. &ldquo;I hoped it would be so,&rdquo; said she; &ldquo;but you
+      frightened me. My noble sister, were I ever to lose your esteem, I should
+      die. Oh, how awful yet how beautiful is your scorn. For worlds I would not
+      be that Cam&rdquo;&mdash;Josephine laid her hand imperiously on Rose&rsquo;s mouth.
+      &ldquo;To mention his name to me will be to insult me; De Beaurepaire I am, and
+      a Frenchwoman. Come, dear, let us go down and comfort our mother.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They went down; and this patient sufferer, and high minded conqueror, of
+      her own accord took up a commonplace book, and read aloud for two mortal
+      hours to her mother and Aubertin. Her voice only wavered twice.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      To feel that life is ended; to wish existence, too, had ceased; and so to
+      sit down, an aching hollow, and take a part and sham an interest in
+      twaddle to please others; such are woman&rsquo;s feats. How like nothing at all
+      they look!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A man would rather sit on the buffer of a steam-engine and ride at the
+      Great Redan.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose sat at her elbow, a little behind her, and turned the leaves, and on
+      one pretence or other held Josephine&rsquo;s hand nearly all the rest of the
+      day. Its delicate fibres remained tense, like a greyhound&rsquo;s sinews after a
+      race, and the blue veins rose to sight in it, though her voice and eyes
+      were mastered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      So keen was the strife, so matched the antagonists, so hard the victory.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      For ire and scorn are mighty. And noble blood in a noble heart is heroic.
+      And Love is a giant.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0002" id="link2HCH0002">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER II.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      The French provinces were now organized upon a half military plan, by
+      which all the local authorities radiated towards a centre of government.
+      By-the-by, this feature has survived subsequent revolutions and political
+      changes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In days of change, youth is at a premium; because, though experience is
+      valuable, the experience of one order of things unfits ordinary men for
+      another order of things. So a good many old fogies in office were shown
+      the door, and a good deal of youth and energy infused into the veins of
+      provincial government. For instance, Edouard Riviere, who had but just
+      completed his education with singular eclat at a military school, was one
+      fine day ordered into Brittany to fill a responsible post under Commandant
+      Raynal, a blunt, rough soldier, that had risen from the ranks, and bore a
+      much higher character for zeal and moral integrity than for affability.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      This officer was the son of a widow that kept a grocer&rsquo;s shop in Paris.
+      She intended him for spice, but he thirsted for glory, and vexed her. So
+      she yielded, as mothers will.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In the armies of the republic a good soldier rose with unparalleled
+      certainty, and rapidity, too; for when soldiers are being mowed down like
+      oats, it is a glorious time for such of them as keep their feet. Raynal
+      mounted fast, and used to write to his mother, and joke her about the army
+      being such a bad profession; and, as he was all for glory, not money, he
+      lived with Spartan frugality, and saved half his pay and all his prize
+      money for the old lady in Paris.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But this prosperous man had to endure a deep disappointment; on the very
+      day he was made commandant and one of the general&rsquo;s aides-de-camp, came a
+      letter into the camp. His mother was dead after a short illness. This was
+      a terrible blow to the simple, rugged soldier, who had never had much time
+      nor inclination to flirt with a lot of girls, and toughen his heart. He
+      came back to Paris honored and rich, but downcast. The old home, empty of
+      his mother, seemed to him not to have the old look. It made him sadder. To
+      cheer him up they brought him much money. The widow&rsquo;s trade had taken a
+      wonderful start the last few years, and she had been playing the same game
+      as he had, living on ten-pence a day, and saving all for him. This made
+      him sadder, if anything.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;have we both been scraping all this dross together for?
+      I would give it all to sit one hour by the fire, with her hand in mine,
+      and hear her say, &lsquo;Scamp, you made me unhappy when you were young, but I
+      have lived to be proud of you.&rsquo;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He applied for active service, no matter what: obtained at once this post
+      in Brittany, and threw himself into it with that honest zeal and activity,
+      which are the best earthly medicine for all our griefs. He was busy
+      writing, when young Riviere first presented himself. He looked up for a
+      moment, and eyed him, to take his measure; then put into his hand a report
+      by young Nicole, a subordinate filling a post of the same nature as
+      Riviere&rsquo;s; and bade him analyze that report on the spot: with this he
+      instantly resumed his own work.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Edouard Riviere was an adept at this sort of task, and soon handed him a
+      neat analysis. Raynal ran his eye over it, nodded cold approval, and told
+      him to take this for the present as a guide as to his own duties. He then
+      pointed to a map on which Riviere&rsquo;s district was marked in blue ink, and
+      bade him find the centre of it. Edouard took a pair of compasses off the
+      table, and soon discovered that the village of Beaurepaire was his centre.
+      &ldquo;Then quarter yourself at Beaurepaire; and good-day,&rdquo; said Raynal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The chateau was in sight from Riviere&rsquo;s quarters, and he soon learned that
+      it belonged to a royalist widow and her daughters, who all three held
+      themselves quite aloof from the rest of the world. &ldquo;Ah,&rdquo; said the young
+      citizen, &ldquo;I see. If these rococo citizens play that game with me, I shall
+      have to take them down.&rdquo; Thus a fresh peril menaced this family, on whose
+      hearts and fortunes such heavy blows had fallen.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      One evening our young official, after a day spent in the service of the
+      country, deigned to take a little stroll to relieve the cares of
+      administration. He imprinted on his beardless face the expression of a
+      wearied statesman, and strolled through an admiring village. The men
+      pretended veneration from policy; the women, whose views of this great man
+      were shallower but more sincere, smiled approval of his airs; and the
+      young puppy affected to take no notice of either sex.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Outside the village, Publicola suddenly encountered two young ladies, who
+      resembled nothing he had hitherto met with in his district; they were
+      dressed in black, and with extreme simplicity; but their easy grace and
+      composure, and the refined sentiment of their gentle faces, told at a
+      glance they belonged to the high nobility. Publicola divined them at once,
+      and involuntarily raised his hat to so much beauty and dignity, instead of
+      poking it with a finger as usual. On this the ladies instantly courtesied
+      to him after the manner of their party, with a sweep and a majesty, and a
+      precision of politeness, that the pup would have laughed at if he had
+      heard of it; but seeing it done, and well done, and by lovely women of
+      rank, he was taken aback by it, and lifted his hat again, and bowed again
+      after he had gone by, and was generally flustered. In short, instead of a
+      member of the Consular Government saluting private individuals of a
+      decayed party that existed only by sufferance, a handsome, vain,
+      good-natured boy had met two self-possessed young ladies of distinction
+      and breeding, and had cut the usual figure.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      For the next hundred yards his cheeks burned and his vanity cooled. But
+      bumptiousness is elastic in France, as in England, and doubtless among the
+      Esquimaux. &ldquo;Well, they are pretty girls,&rdquo; says he to himself. &ldquo;I never saw
+      two such pretty girls together; they will do for me to flirt with while I
+      am banished to this Arcadia.&rdquo; Banished from school, I beg to observe.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And &ldquo;awful beauty&rdquo; being no longer in sight, Mr. Edouard resolved he would
+      flirt with them to their hearts&rsquo; content. But there are ladies with whom a
+      certain preliminary is required before you can flirt with them. You must
+      be on speaking terms. How was this to be managed?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He used to watch at his window with a telescope, and whenever the sisters
+      came out of their own grounds, which unfortunately was not above twice a
+      week, he would throw himself in their way by the merest accident, and pay
+      them a dignified and courteous salute, which he had carefully got up
+      before a mirror in the privacy of his own chamber.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      One day, as he took off his hat to the young ladies, there broke from one
+      of them a smile, so sudden, sweet, and vivid, that he seemed to feel it
+      smite him first on the eyes then in the heart. He could not sleep for this
+      smile.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Yet he had seen many smilers; but to be sure most of them smiled without
+      effect, because they smiled eternally; they seemed cast with their mouths
+      open, and their pretty teeth forever in sight; and this has a saddening
+      influence on a man of sense&mdash;when it has any. But here a fair,
+      pensive face had brightened at sight of him; a lovely countenance, on
+      which circumstances, not nature, had impressed gravity, had sprung back to
+      its natural gayety for a moment, and had thrilled and bewitched the
+      beholder.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The next Sunday he went to church&mdash;and there worshipped&mdash;whom?
+      Cupid. He smarted for his heathenism; for the young ladies went with
+      higher motives, and took no notice of him. They lowered their long silken
+      lashes over one breviary, and scarcely observed the handsome citizen.
+      Meantime he, contemplating their pious beauty with earthly eyes, was
+      drinking long draughts of intoxicating passion. And when after the service
+      they each took an arm of Dr. Aubertin, and he with the air of an admiral
+      convoying two ships choke-full of specie, conducted his precious charge
+      away home, our young citizen felt jealous, and all but hated the worthy
+      doctor.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      This went on till he became listless and dejected on the days he did not
+      see them. Then he asked himself whether he was not a cowardly fool to keep
+      at such a distance. After all he was a man in authority. His friendship
+      was not to be despised, least of all by a family suspected of disaffection
+      to the state.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He put on his glossy beaver with enormous brim, high curved; his blue coat
+      with brass buttons; his white waistcoat, gray breeches, and top-boots; and
+      marched up to the chateau of Beaurepaire, and sent in his card with his
+      name and office inscribed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Jacintha took it, bestowed a glance of undisguised admiration on the young
+      Adonis, and carried it to the baroness. That lady sent her promptly down
+      again with a black-edged note to this effect.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Highly flattered by Monsieur de Riviere&rsquo;s visit, the baroness must inform
+      him that she receives none but old acquaintances, in the present grief of
+      the family, and of the KINGDOM.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Young Riviere was cruelly mortified by this rebuff. He went off hurriedly,
+      grinding his teeth with rage.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Cursed aristocrats! We have done well to pull you down, and we will have
+      you lower still. How I despise myself for giving any one the chance to
+      affront me thus. The haughty old fool; if she had known her interest, she
+      would have been too glad to make a powerful friend. These royalists are in
+      a ticklish position; I can tell her that. She calls me De Riviere; that
+      implies nobody without a &lsquo;De&rsquo; to their name would have the presumption to
+      visit her old tumble-down house. Well, it is a lesson; I am a republican,
+      and the Commonwealth trusts and honors me; yet I am so ungrateful as to go
+      out of the way to be civil to her enemies, to royalists; as if those
+      worn-out creatures had hearts, as if they could comprehend the struggle
+      that took place in my mind between duty, and generosity to the fallen,
+      before I could make the first overture to their acquaintance; as if they
+      could understand the politeness of the heart, or anything nobler than
+      curving and ducking and heartless etiquette. This is the last notice I
+      will ever take of that old woman, unless it is to denounce her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He walked home to the town very fast, his heart boiling, and his lips
+      compressed, and his brow knitted.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      To this mood succeeded a sullen and bitter one. He was generous, but vain,
+      and his love had humiliated him so bitterly, he resolved to tear it out of
+      his heart. He absented himself from church; he met the young ladies no
+      more. He struggled fiercely with his passion; he went about dogged,
+      silent, and sighing. Presently he devoted his leisure hours to shooting
+      partridges instead of ladies. And he was right; partridges cannot shoot
+      back; whereas beautiful women, like Cupid, are all archers more or less,
+      and often with one arrow from eye or lip do more execution than they have
+      suffered from several discharges of our small shot.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In these excursions, Edouard was generally accompanied by a thick-set
+      rustic called Dard, who, I believe, purposes to reveal his own character
+      to you, and so save me that trouble.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      One fine afternoon, about four o&rsquo;clock, this pair burst remorselessly
+      through a fence, and landed in the road opposite Bigot&rsquo;s Auberge; a long
+      low house, with &ldquo;ICI ON LOGE A PIED ET A CHEVAL,&rdquo; written all across it in
+      gigantic letters. Riviere was for moving homeward, but Dard halted and
+      complained dismally of &ldquo;the soldier&rsquo;s gripes.&rdquo; The statesman had never
+      heard of that complaint, so Dard explained that the VULGAR name for it was
+      hunger. &ldquo;And only smell,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;the soup is just fit to come off the
+      fire.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Riviere smiled sadly, but consented to deign to eat a morsel in the porch.
+      Thereat Dard dashed wildly into the kitchen.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They dined at one little round table, each after his fashion. When Dard
+      could eat no more, he proceeded to drink; and to talk in proportion.
+      Riviere, lost in his own thoughts, attended to him as men of business do
+      to a babbling brook; until suddenly from the mass of twaddle broke forth a
+      magic word&mdash;Beaurepaire; then the languid lover pricked up his ears
+      and found Mr. Dard was abusing that noble family right and left. Young
+      Riviere inquired what ground of offence they had given HIM. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll tell
+      you,&rdquo; said Dard; &ldquo;they impose on Jacintha; and so she imposes on me.&rdquo; Then
+      observing he had at last gained his employer&rsquo;s ear, he became prodigiously
+      loquacious, as such people generally are when once they get upon their own
+      griefs.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;These Beaurepaire aristocrats,&rdquo; said he, with his hard peasant
+      good-sense, &ldquo;are neither the one thing nor the other; they cannot keep up
+      nobility, they have not the means; they will not come down off their
+      perch, they have not the sense. No, for as small as they are, they must
+      look and talk as big as ever. They can only afford one servant, and I
+      don&rsquo;t believe they pay her; but they must be attended on just as
+      obsequious as when they had a dozen. And this is fatal to all us little
+      people that have the misfortune to be connected with them.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, how are you connected with them?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;By the tie of affection.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I thought you hated them.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of course I do; but I have the ill-luck to love Jacintha, and she loves
+      these aristocrats, and makes me do little odd jobs for them.&rdquo; And at this
+      Dard&rsquo;s eyes suddenly glared with horror.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, what of that?&rdquo; asked Riviere.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What of it, citizen, what? you do not know the fatal meaning of those
+      accursed words?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, I never heard of a man&rsquo;s back being broken by little odd jobs.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Perhaps not his back, citizen, but his heart? if little odd jobs will not
+      break that, why nothing will. Torn from place to place, and from trouble
+      to trouble; as soon as one tiresome thing begins to go a bit smooth, off
+      to a fresh plague, in-doors work when it is dry, out-a-doors when it
+      snows; and then all bustle; no taking one&rsquo;s work quietly, the only way it
+      agrees with a fellow. &lsquo;Milk the cow, Dard, but look sharp; the baroness&rsquo;s
+      chair wants mending. Take these slops to the pig, but you must not wait to
+      see him enjoy them: you are wanted to chop billets.&rsquo; Beat the mats, take
+      down the curtains, walk to church (best part of a league), and heat the
+      pew cushions; come back and cut the cabbages, paint the door, and wheel
+      the old lady about the terrace, rub quicksilver on the little dog&rsquo;s back,&mdash;mind
+      he don&rsquo;t bite you to make hisself sick,&mdash;repair the ottoman, roll the
+      gravel, scour the kettles, carry half a ton of water up two purostairs,
+      trim the turf, prune the vine, drag the fish-pond; and when you ARE there,
+      go in and gather water lilies for Mademoiselle Josephine while you are
+      drowning the puppies; that is little odd jobs: may Satan twist her neck
+      who invented them!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Very sad all this,&rdquo; said young Riviere.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Dard took the little sneer for sympathy, and proceeded to &ldquo;the cruellest
+      wrong of all.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;When I go into their kitchen to court Jacintha a bit, instead of finding
+      a good supper there, which a man has a right to, courting a cook, if I
+      don&rsquo;t take one in my pocket, there is no supper, not to say supper, for
+      either her or me. I don&rsquo;t call a salad and a bit of cheese-rind&mdash;SUPPER.
+      Beggars in silk and satin! Every sou they have goes on to their backs,
+      instead of into their bellies.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have heard their income is much reduced,&rdquo; said Edouard gently.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Income! I would not change with them if they&rsquo;d throw me in half a pancake
+      a day. I tell you they are the poorest family for leagues round; not that
+      they need be quite so starved, if they could swallow a little of their
+      pride. But no, they must have china and plate and fine linen at dinner; so
+      their fine plates are always bare, and their silver trays empty. Ask the
+      butcher, if you don&rsquo;t believe ME. Just you ask him whether he does not go
+      three times to the smallest shopkeeper, for once he goes to Beaurepaire.
+      Their tenants send them a little meal and eggs, and now and then a hen;
+      and their great garden is chock full of fruit and vegetables, and Jacintha
+      makes me dig in it gratis; and so they muddle on. But, bless your heart,
+      coffee! they can&rsquo;t afford it; so they roast a lot of horse-beans that cost
+      nothing, and grind them, and serve up the liquor in a silver coffee-pot,
+      on a silver salver. Haw, haw, haw!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is it possible? reduced to this?&rdquo; said Edouard gravely.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t you be so weak as to pity them,&rdquo; cried the remorseless plebeian.
+      &ldquo;Why don&rsquo;t they melt their silver into soup, and cut down their plate into
+      rashers of bacon? why not sell the superfluous, and buy the needful, which
+      it is grub? And, above all, why don&rsquo;t they let their old tumble-down
+      palace to some rich grocer, and that accursed garden along with it, where
+      I sweat gratis, and live small and comfortable, and pay honest men for
+      their little odd jobs, and&rdquo;&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Here Riviere interrupted him, and asked if it was really true about the
+      beans.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;True?&rdquo; said Dard, &ldquo;why, I have seen Rose doing it for the old woman&rsquo;s
+      breakfast: it was Rose invented the move. A girl of nineteen beginning
+      already to deceive the world! But they are all tarred with the same stick.
+      Down with the aristocrats!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dard,&rdquo; said Riviere, &ldquo;you are a brute.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Me, citizen?&rdquo; inquired Dard with every appearance of genuine surprise.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Edouard Riviere rose from his seat in great excitement. Dard&rsquo;s abuse of
+      the family he was lately so bitter against had turned him right round. He
+      pitied the very baroness herself, and forgave her declining his visit.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Be silent,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;for shame! There is such a thing as noble poverty;
+      and you have described it. I might have disdained these people in their
+      prosperity, but I revere them in their affliction. And I&rsquo;ll tell you what,
+      don&rsquo;t you ever dare to speak slightly of them again in my presence, or&rdquo;&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He did not conclude his threat, for just then he observed that a strapping
+      girl, with a basket at her feet, was standing against the corner of the
+      Auberge, in a mighty careless attitude, but doing nothing, so most likely
+      listening with all her ears and soul. Dard, however, did not see her, his
+      back being turned to her as he sat; so he replied at his ease,&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I consent,&rdquo; said he very coolly: &ldquo;that is your affair; but permit me,&rdquo;
+       and here he clenched his teeth at remembrance of his wrongs, &ldquo;to say that
+      I will no more be a scullery man without wages to these high-minded
+      starvelings, these illustrious beggars.&rdquo; Then he heated himself red-hot.
+      &ldquo;I will not even be their galley slave. Next, I have done my last little
+      odd job in this world,&rdquo; yelled the now infuriated factotum, bouncing up to
+      his feet in brief fury. &ldquo;Of two things one: either Jacintha quits those
+      aristos, or I leave Jacin&mdash;eh?&mdash;ah!&mdash;oh!&mdash;ahem! How&mdash;&lsquo;ow
+      d&rsquo;ye do, Jacintha?&rdquo; And his roar ended in a whine, as when a dog runs
+      barking out, and receives in full career a cut from his master&rsquo;s whip, his
+      generous rage turns to whimper with ludicrous abruptness. &ldquo;I was just
+      talking of you, Jacintha,&rdquo; quavered Dard in conclusion.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I heard you, Dard,&rdquo; replied Jacintha slowly, softly, grimly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Dard withered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was a lusty young woman, with a comely peasant face somewhat freckled,
+      and a pair of large black eyes surmounted by coal-black brows. She stood
+      in a bold attitude, her massive but well-formed arms folded so that the
+      pressure of each against the other made them seem gigantic, and her cheek
+      red with anger, and her eyes glistening like basilisks upon citizen Dard.
+      She looked so grand, with her lowering black brows, that even Riviere felt
+      a little uneasy. As for Jacintha, she was evidently brooding with more ire
+      than she chose to utter before a stranger. She just slowly unclasped her
+      arms, and, keeping her eye fixed on Dard, pointed with a domineering
+      gesture towards Beaurepaire. Then the doughty Dard seemed no longer master
+      of his limbs: he rose slowly, with his eyes fastened to hers, and was
+      moving off like an ill-oiled automaton in the direction indicated; but at
+      that a suppressed snigger began to shake Riviere&rsquo;s whole body till it
+      bobbed up and down on the seat. Dard turned to him for sympathy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There, citizen,&rdquo; he cried, &ldquo;do you see that imperious gesture? That means
+      you promised to dig in the aristocrat&rsquo;s garden this afternoon, so march!
+      Here, then, is one that has gained nothing by kings being put down, for I
+      am ruled with a mopstick of iron. Thank your stars, citizen, that you are
+      not in may place.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dard,&rdquo; retorted Jacintha, &ldquo;if you don&rsquo;t like your place, I&rsquo;d quit it.
+      There are two or three young men down in the village will be glad to take
+      it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I won&rsquo;t give them the chance, the vile egotists!&rdquo; cried Dard. And he
+      returned to the chateau and little odd jobs.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Jacintha hung behind, lowered her eyes, put on a very deferential manner,
+      and thanked Edouard for the kind sentiments he had uttered; but at the
+      same time she took the liberty to warn him against believing the
+      extravagant stories Dard had been telling about her mistress&rsquo;s poverty.
+      She said the simple fact was that the baron had contracted debts, and the
+      baroness, being the soul of honor, was living in great economy to pay them
+      off. Then, as to Dard getting no supper up at Beaurepaire, a complaint
+      that appeared to sting her particularly, she assured him she was alone to
+      blame: the baroness would be very angry if she knew it. &ldquo;But,&rdquo; said she,
+      &ldquo;Dard is an egotist. Perhaps you may have noticed that trait in him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Glimpses of it,&rdquo; replied Riviere, laughing.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur, he is so egotistic that he has not a friend in the world but
+      me. I forgive him, because I know the reason; he has never had a headache
+      or a heartache in his life.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Edouard, aged twenty, and a male, did not comprehend this piece of
+      feminine logic one bit: and, while he puzzled over it in silence, Jacintha
+      went on to say that if she were to fill her egotist&rsquo;s paunch, she should
+      never know whether he came to Beaurepaire for her, or himself. &ldquo;Now,
+      Dard,&rdquo; she added, &ldquo;is no beauty, monsieur; why, he is three inches shorter
+      than I am.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are joking! he looks a foot,&rdquo; said Edouard.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He is no scholar neither, and I have had to wipe up many a sneer and many
+      a sarcasm on his account; but up to now I have always been able to reply
+      that this five feet one of egotism loves me sincerely; and the moment I
+      doubt this, I give him the sack,&mdash;poor little fellow!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In a word,&rdquo; said Riviere, a little impatiently, &ldquo;the family at
+      Beaurepaire are not in such straits as he pretends?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur, do I look like one starved?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;By Jove, no! by Ceres, I mean.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Are my young mistresses wan, and thin?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Treason! blasphemy! ah, no! By Venus and Hebe, no!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Jacintha smiled at this enthusiastic denial, and also because her sex is
+      apt to smile when words are used they do not understand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dard is a fool,&rdquo; suggested Riviere, by way of general solution. He added,
+      &ldquo;And yet, do you know I wish every word he said had been true.&rdquo;
+       (Jacintha&rsquo;s eyes expressed some astonishment.) &ldquo;Because then you and I
+      would have concerted means to do them kindnesses, secretly; for I see you
+      are no ordinary servant; you love your young mistresses. Do you not?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      These simple words seemed to touch a grander chord in Jacintha&rsquo;s nature.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Love them?&rdquo; said she, clasping her hands; &ldquo;ah, sir, do not be offended;
+      but, believe me, it is no small thing to serve an old, old family. My
+      grandfather lived and died with them; my father was their gamekeeper, and
+      fed to his last from off the poor baron&rsquo;s plate (and now they have killed
+      him, poor man); my mother died in the house and was buried in the sacred
+      ground near the family chapel. They put an inscription on her tomb
+      praising her fidelity and probity. Do you think these things do not sink
+      into the heart of the poor?&mdash;praise on her tomb, and not a word on
+      their own, but just the name, and when each was born and died, you know.
+      Ah! the pride of the mean is dirt; but the pride of the noble is gold.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;For, look you, among parvenues I should be a servant, and nothing more;
+      in this proud family I am a humble friend; of course they are not always
+      gossiping with me like vulgar masters and mistresses; if they did, I
+      should neither respect nor love them; but they all smile on me whenever I
+      come into the room, even the baroness herself. I belong to them, and they
+      belong to me, by ties without number, by the many kind words in many
+      troubles, by the one roof that sheltered us a hundred years, and the grave
+      where our bones lie together till the day of judgment.&rdquo; *
+    </p>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+     * The French peasant often thinks half a sentence, and
+     utters the other half aloud, and so breaks air in the middle
+     of a thought. Probably Jacintha&rsquo;s whole thought, if we had
+     the means of knowing it, would have run like this&mdash;&ldquo;Besides,
+     I have another reason: I could not be so comfortable myself
+     elsewhere&mdash;for, look you&rdquo;&mdash;
+</pre>
+    <p>
+      Jacintha clasped her hands, and her black eyes shone out warm through the
+      dew. Riviere&rsquo;s glistened too.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That is well said,&rdquo; he cried; &ldquo;it is nobly said: yet, after all, these
+      are ties that owe their force to the souls they bind. How often have such
+      bonds round human hearts proved ropes of sand! They grapple YOU like hooks
+      of steel; because you are steel yourself to the backbone. I admire you,
+      Jacintha. Such women as you have a great mission in France just now.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Jacintha shook her head incredulously. &ldquo;What can we poor women do?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Bring forth heroes,&rdquo; cried Publicola with fervor. &ldquo;Be the mothers of
+      great men, the Catos and the Gracchi of the future!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Jacintha smiled. She did not know the Gracchi nor their politics; but the
+      name rang well. &ldquo;Gracchi!&rdquo; Aristocrats, no doubt. &ldquo;That would be too much
+      honor,&rdquo; replied she modestly. &ldquo;At present, I must say adieu!&rdquo; and she
+      moved off an inch at a time, in an uncertain hesitating manner, not very
+      difficult to read; but Riviere, you must know, had more than once during
+      this interview begged her to sit down, and in vain; she had always thanked
+      him, but said she had not a moment to stay. So he made no effort to detain
+      her now. The consequence was&mdash;she came slowly back of her own accord,
+      and sat down in a corner of the porch, where nobody could see her, and
+      then she sighed deeply.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What is the matter now?&rdquo; said Edouard, opening his eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She looked at him point-blank for one moment; and her scale turned.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur,&rdquo; said she timidly, &ldquo;you have a good face, and a good heart. All
+      I told you was&mdash;give me your honor not to betray us.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I swear it,&rdquo; said Edouard, a little pompously.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then&mdash;Dard was not so far from the truth; it was but a guess of his,
+      for I never trusted my own sweetheart as I now trust a stranger. But to
+      see what I see every day, and have no one I dare breathe a word to, oh, it
+      is very hard! But on what a thread things turn! If any one had told me an
+      hour ago it was you I should open my heart to! It&rsquo;s not economy: it&rsquo;s not
+      stinginess; they are not paying off their debts. They never can. The
+      baroness and the Demoiselles de Beaurepaire&mdash;are paupers.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Paupers, Jacintha?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay, paupers! their debts are greater than their means. They live here by
+      sufferance. They have only their old clothes to wear. They have hardly
+      enough to eat. Just now our cow is in full milk, you know; so that is a
+      great help: but, when she goes dry, Heaven knows what we shall do; for I
+      don&rsquo;t. But that is not the worst; better a light meal than a broken heart.
+      Your precious government offers the chateau for sale. They might as well
+      send for the guillotine at once, and cut off all our heads. You don&rsquo;t know
+      my mistress as I do. Ah, butchers, you will drag nothing out of that but
+      her corpse. And is it come to this? the great old family to be turned
+      adrift like beggars. My poor mistress! my pretty demoiselles that I played
+      with and nursed ever since I was a child! (I was just six when Josephine
+      was born) and that I shall love with my last breath&rdquo;&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She could say no more, but choked by the strong feeling so long pent up in
+      her own bosom, fell to sobbing hysterically, and trembling like one in an
+      ague.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The statesman, who had passed all his short life at school and college,
+      was frightened, and took hold of her and pulled her, and cried, &ldquo;Oh!
+      don&rsquo;t, Jacintha; you will kill yourself, you will die; this is frightful:
+      help here! help!&rdquo; Jacintha put her hand to his mouth, and, without leaving
+      off her hysterics, gasped out, &ldquo;Ah! don&rsquo;t expose me.&rdquo; So then he didn&rsquo;t
+      know what to do; but he seized a tumbler and filled it with wine, and
+      forced it between her lips. All she did was to bite a piece out of the
+      glass as clean as if a diamond had cut it. This did her a world of good:
+      destruction of sacred household property gave her another turn. &ldquo;There,
+      I&rsquo;ve broke your glass now,&rdquo; she cried, with a marvellous change of tone;
+      and she came-to and cried quietly like a reasonable person, with her apron
+      to her eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      When Edouard saw she was better, he took her hand and said proudly,
+      &ldquo;Secret for secret. I choose this moment to confide to you that I love
+      Mademoiselle Rose de Beaurepaire. Love her? I did love her; but now you
+      tell me she is poor and in distress, I adore her.&rdquo; The effect of this
+      declaration on Jacintha was magical, comical. Her apron came down from one
+      eye, and that eye dried itself and sparkled with curiosity: the whole
+      countenance speedily followed suit and beamed with sacred joy. What! an
+      interesting love affair confided to her all in a moment! She lowered her
+      voice to a whisper directly. &ldquo;Why, how did you manage? She never goes into
+      company.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No; but she goes to church. Besides, I have met her eleven times out
+      walking with her sister, and twice out of the eleven she smiled on me. O
+      Jacintha! a smile such as angels smile; a smile to warm the heart and
+      purify the soul and last forever in the mind.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, they say &lsquo;man is fire and woman tow:&rsquo; but this beats all. Ha! ha!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh! do not jest. I did not laugh at you. Jacintha, it is no laughing
+      matter; I revere her as mortals revere the saints; I love her so that were
+      I ever to lose all hope of her I would not live a day. And now that you
+      have told me she is poor and in sorrow, and I think of her walking so calm
+      and gentle&mdash;always in black, Jacintha,&mdash;and her low courtesy to
+      me whenever we met, and her sweet smile to me though her heart must be
+      sad, oh! my heart yearns for her. What can I do for her? How shall I
+      surround her with myself unseen&mdash;make her feel that a man&rsquo;s love
+      waits upon her feet every step she takes&mdash;that a man&rsquo;s love floats in
+      the air round that lovely head?&rdquo; Then descending to earth for a moment,
+      &ldquo;but I say, you promise not to betray me; come, secret for secret.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I will not tell a soul; on the honor of a woman,&rdquo; said Jacintha.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The form of protestation was quite new to Edouard, and not exactly the one
+      his study of the ancient writers would have led him to select. But the
+      tone was convincing: he trusted her. They parted sworn allies; and, at the
+      very moment of parting, Jacintha, who had cast many a furtive glance at
+      the dead game, told Edouard demurely, Mademoiselle Rose was very fond of
+      roast partridge. On this he made her take the whole bag; and went home on
+      wings. Jacintha&rsquo;s revelation roused all that was noble and forgiving in
+      him. His understanding and his heart expanded from that hour, and his
+      fancy spread its pinions to the sun of love. Ah! generous Youth, let who
+      will betray thee; let who will sneer at thee; let me, though young no
+      longer, smile on thee and joy in thee! She he loved was sad, was poor, was
+      menaced by many ills; then she needed a champion. He would be her unseen
+      friend, her guardian angel. A hundred wild schemes whirled in his beating
+      heart and brain. He could not go in-doors, indeed, no room could contain
+      him: he made for a green lane he knew at the back of the village, and
+      there he walked up and down for hours. The sun set, and the night came,
+      and the stars glittered; but still he walked alone, inspired, exalted,
+      full of generous and loving schemes: of sweet and tender fancies: a heart
+      on fire; and youth the fuel, and the flame vestal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0003" id="link2HCH0003">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER III.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      This very day was the anniversary of the baron&rsquo;s death.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness kept her room all the morning, and took no nourishment but
+      one cup of spurious coffee Rose brought her. Towards evening she came
+      down-stairs. In the hall she found two chaplets of flowers; they were
+      always placed there for her on this sad day. She took them in her hand,
+      and went into the little oratory that was in the park; there she found two
+      wax candles burning, and two fresh chaplets hung up. Her daughters had
+      been there before her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She knelt and prayed many hours for her husband&rsquo;s soul; then she rose and
+      hung up one chaplet and came slowly away with the other in her hand. At
+      the gate of the park, Josephine met her with tender anxiety in her
+      sapphire eyes, and wreathed her arms round her, and whispered, &ldquo;But you
+      have your children still.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness kissed her and they came towards the house together, the
+      baroness leaning gently on her daughter&rsquo;s elbow.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Between the park and the angle of the chateau was a small plot of turf
+      called at Beaurepaire the Pleasance, a name that had descended along with
+      other traditions; and in the centre of this Pleasance, or Pleasaunce,
+      stood a wonderful oak-tree. Its circumference was thirty-four feet. The
+      baroness came to this ancient tree, and hung her chaplet on a mutilated
+      limb called the &ldquo;knights&rsquo; bough.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The sun was setting tranquil and red; a broad ruby streak lingered on the
+      deep green leaves of the prodigious oak. The baroness looked at it awhile
+      in silence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then she spoke slowly to it and said, &ldquo;You were here before us: you will
+      be here when we are gone.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      A spasm crossed Josephine&rsquo;s face, but she said nothing at the time. And so
+      they went in together.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Now as this tree was a feat of nature, and, above all, played a curious
+      part in our story, I will ask you to stay a few minutes and look at it,
+      while I say what was known about it; not the thousandth part of what it
+      could have told, if trees could speak as well as breathe.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness did not exaggerate; the tree was far older than even this
+      ancient family. They possessed among other archives a manuscript written
+      by a monk, a son of the house, about four hundred years before our story,
+      and containing many of the oral traditions about this tree that had come
+      down to him from remote antiquity. According to this authority, the first
+      Baron of Beaurepaire had pitched his tent under a fair oak-tree that stood
+      prope rivum, near a brook. His grandson built a square tower hard by, and
+      dug a moat that enclosed both tree and tower, and received the waters of
+      the brook aforesaid.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At this time the tree seems only to have been remarked for its height.
+      But, a century and a half before the monk wrote, it had become famous in
+      all the district for its girth, and in the monk&rsquo;s own day had ceased to
+      grow; but not begun to decay. The mutilated arm I have mentioned was once
+      a long sturdy bough, worn smooth as velvet in one part from a curious
+      cause: it ran about as high above the ground as a full-sized horse, and
+      the knights and squires used to be forever vaulting upon it, the former in
+      armor; the monk, when a boy, had seen them do it a thousand times. This
+      bough broke in two, A.D. 1617: but the mutilated limb was still called the
+      knights&rsquo; bough, nobody knew why. So do names survive their ideas.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      What had not this tree seen since first it came green and tender as a
+      cabbage above the soil, and stood at the mercy of the first hare or rabbit
+      that should choose to cut short its frail existence!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Since then eagles had perched on its crown, and wild boars fed without
+      fear of man upon its acorns. Troubadours had sung beneath it to lords and
+      ladies seated round, or walking on the grass and commenting the minstrel&rsquo;s
+      tales of love by exchange of amorous glances. Mediaeval sculptors had
+      taken its leaves, and wisely trusting to nature, had adorned churches with
+      those leaves cut in stone.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It had seen a Norman duke conquer England, and English kings invade France
+      and be crowned at Paris. It had seen a girl put knights to the rout, and
+      seen the warrior virgin burned by envious priests with common consent both
+      of the curs she had defended and the curs she had defeated.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Why, in its old age it had seen the rise of printing, and the first dawn
+      of national civilization in Europe. It flourished and decayed in France;
+      but it sprung in Gaul. And more remarkable still, though by all accounts
+      it may see the world to an end, it was a tree in ancient history: its old
+      age awaits the millennium; its first youth belonged to that great tract of
+      time which includes the birth of Christ, the building of Rome, and the
+      siege of Troy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The tree had, ere this, mingled in the fortunes of the family. It had
+      saved their lives and taken their lives. One lord of Beaurepaire, hotly
+      pursued by his feudal enemies, made for the tree, and hid himself partly
+      by a great bough, partly by the thick screen of leaves. The foe darted in,
+      made sure he had taken to the house, ransacked it, and got into the
+      cellar, where by good-luck was a store of Malvoisie: and so the oak and
+      the vine saved the quaking baron. Another lord of Beaurepaire, besieged in
+      his castle, was shot dead on the ramparts by a cross-bowman who had
+      secreted himself unobserved in this tree a little before the dawn.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A young heir of Beaurepaire, climbing for a raven&rsquo;s nest to the top of
+      this tree, lost his footing and fell, and died at its foot: and his mother
+      in her anguish bade them cut down the tree that had killed her boy. But
+      the baron her husband refused, and spake in this wise: &ldquo;ytte ys eneugh
+      that I lose mine sonne, I will nat alsoe lose mine Tre.&rdquo; In the male you
+      see the sober sentiment of the proprietor outweighed the temporary
+      irritation of the parent. Then the mother bought fifteen ells of black
+      velvet, and stretched a pall from the knights&rsquo; bough across the west side
+      to another branch, and cursed the hand that should remove it, and she
+      herself &ldquo;wolde never passe the Tre neither going nor coming, but went
+      still about.&rdquo; And when she died and should have been carried past the tree
+      to the park, her dochter did cry from a window to the bearers, &ldquo;Goe about!
+      goe about!&rdquo; and they went about, and all the company. And in time the
+      velvet pall rotted, and was torn and driven away by the winds: and when
+      the hand of Nature, and no human hand, had thus flouted and dispersed the
+      trappings of the mother&rsquo;s grief, two pieces were picked up and preserved
+      among the family relics: but the black velvet had turned a rusty red.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      So the baroness did nothing new in this family when she hung her chaplet
+      on the knights&rsquo; bough; and, in fact, on the west side, about eighteen feet
+      from the ground, there still mouldered one corner of an Atchievement an
+      heir of Beaurepaire had nailed there two centuries before, when his
+      predecessor died: &ldquo;For,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;the chateau is of yesterday, but the
+      tree has seen us all come and go.&rdquo; The inside of the oak was hollow as a
+      drum; and on its east side yawned a fissure as high as a man and as broad
+      as a street-door. Dard used to wheel his wheelbarrow into the tree at a
+      trot, and there leave it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Yet in spite of excavation and mutilation not life only but vigor dwelt in
+      this wooden shell. The extreme ends of the longer boughs were firewood,
+      touchwood, and the crown was gone this many a year: but narrow the circle
+      a very little to where the indomitable trunk could still shoot sap from
+      its cruse deep in earth, and there on every side burst the green foliage
+      in its season countless as the sand. The leaves carved centuries ago from
+      these very models, though cut in stone, were most of them mouldered,
+      blunted, notched, deformed: but the delicate types came back with every
+      summer, perfect and lovely as when the tree was but their elder brother:
+      and greener than ever: for, from what cause nature only knows, the leaves
+      were many shades richer than any other tree could show for a hundred miles
+      round; a deep green, fiery, yet soft; and then their multitude&mdash;the
+      staircases of foliage as you looked up the tree, and could scarce catch a
+      glimpse of the sky. An inverted abyss of color, a mound, a dome, of flake
+      emeralds that quivered in the golden air.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And now the sun sets; the green leaves are black; the moon rises: her cold
+      light shoots across one half that giant stem.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      How solemn and calm stands the great round tower of living wood, half
+      ebony, half silver, with its mighty cloud above of flake jet leaves tipped
+      with frosty fire!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Now is the still hour to repeat in a whisper the words of the dame of
+      Beaurepaire, &ldquo;You were here before us: you will be here when we are gone.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      We leave the hoary king of trees standing in the moonlight, calmly defying
+      time, and follow the creatures of a day; for, what they were, we are.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A spacious saloon panelled; dead but showy white picked out sparingly with
+      gold. Festoons of fruits and flowers finely carved in wood on some of the
+      panels. These also not smothered in gilding, but as it were gold speckled
+      here and there, like tongues of flame winding among insoluble snow. Ranged
+      against the walls were sofas and chairs covered with rich stuffs well
+      worn. And in one little distant corner of the long room a gray-haired
+      gentleman and two young ladies sat round a small plain table, on which
+      burned a solitary candle; and a little way apart in this candle&rsquo;s twilight
+      an old lady sat in an easy-chair, thinking of the past, scarce daring to
+      inquire the future. Josephine and Rose were working: not fancy-work but
+      needle-work; Dr. Aubertin writing. Every now and then he put the one
+      candle nearer the girls. They raised no objection: only a few minutes
+      after a white hand would glide from one or other of them like a serpent,
+      and smoothly convey the light nearer to the doctor&rsquo;s manuscript.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is it not supper-time?&rdquo; he inquired. &ldquo;I have an inward monitor; and I
+      think our dinner was more ethereal than usual.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hush!&rdquo; said Josephine, and looked uneasily towards her mother. &ldquo;Wax is so
+      dear.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Wax?&mdash;ah!&mdash;pardon me:&rdquo; and the doctor returned hastily to his
+      work. But Rose looked up and said, &ldquo;I wonder Jacintha does not come; it is
+      certainly past the hour;&rdquo; and she pried into the room as if she expected
+      to see Jacintha on the road. But she saw in fact very little of anything,
+      for the spacious room was impenetrable to her eye; midway from the candle
+      to the distant door its twilight deepened, and all became shapeless and
+      sombre. The prospect ended sharp and black, as in those out-o&rsquo;-door
+      closets imagined and painted by a certain great painter, whose Nature
+      comes to a full stop as soon as he has no further commercial need of her,
+      instead of melting by fine expanse and exquisite gradation into genuine
+      distance, as nature does in Claude and in nature. To reverse the picture,
+      if you stood at the door you looked across forty feet of black, and the
+      little corner seemed on fire, and the fair heads about the candle shone
+      like the St. Cecilias and Madonnas in an antique stained-glass window.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At last the door opened, and another candle fired Jacintha&rsquo;s comely
+      peasant face in the doorway. She put down her candle outside the door, and
+      started as crow flies for the other light. After glowing a moment in the
+      doorway she dived into the shadow and emerged into light again close to
+      the table with napkins on her arm. She removed the work-box reverentially,
+      the doctor&rsquo;s manuscript unceremoniously, and proceeded to lay a cloth: in
+      which operation she looked at Rose a point-blank glance of admiration:
+      then she placed the napkins; and in this process she again cast a strange
+      look of interest upon Rose. The young lady noticed it this time, and
+      looked inquiringly at her in return, half expecting some communication;
+      but Jacintha lowered her eyes and bustled about the table. Then Rose spoke
+      to her with a sort of instinct of curiosity, on the chance of drawing her
+      out.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Supper is late to-night, is it not, Jacintha?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, mademoiselle; I have had more cooking than usual,&rdquo; and with this she
+      delivered another point-blank look as before, and dived into the palpable
+      obscure, and came to light in the doorway.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Her return was anxiously expected; for, if the truth must be told, they
+      were very hungry. So rigorous was the economy in this decayed but
+      honorable house that the wax candles burned to-day in the oratory had
+      scrimped their dinner, unsubstantial as it was wont to be. Think of that,
+      you in fustian jackets who grumble after meat. The door opened, Jacintha
+      reappeared in the light of her candle a moment with a tray in both hands,
+      and, approaching, was lost to view; but a strange and fragrant smell
+      heralded her. All their eyes turned with curiosity towards the unwonted
+      odor, and Jacintha dawned with three roast partridges on a dish.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They were wonder-struck, and looked from the birds to her in mute
+      surprise, that was not diminished by a certain cynical indifference she
+      put on. She avoided their eyes, and forcibly excluded from her face
+      everything that could imply she did not serve up partridges to this family
+      every night of her life.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The supper is served, madame,&rdquo; said she, with a respectful courtesy and a
+      mechanical tone, and, plunging into the night, swam out at her own candle,
+      shut the door, and, unlocking her face that moment, burst out radiant, and
+      so to the kitchen, and, with a tear in her eye, set-to and polished all
+      the copper stewpans with a vigor and expedition unknown to the new-fangled
+      domestic.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Partridges, mamma! What next?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pheasants, I hope,&rdquo; cried the doctor, gayly. &ldquo;And after them hares; to
+      conclude with royal venison. Permit me, ladies.&rdquo; And he set himself to
+      carve with zeal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Now nature is nature, and two pair of violet eyes brightened and dwelt on
+      the fragrant and delicate food with demure desire; for all that, when
+      Aubertin offered Josephine a wing, she declined it. &ldquo;No partridge?&rdquo; cried
+      the savant, in utter amazement.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not to-day, dear friend; it is not a feast day to-day.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah! no; what was I thinking of?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But you are not to be deprived,&rdquo; put in Josephine, anxiously. &ldquo;We will
+      not deny ourselves the pleasure of seeing you eat some.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What!&rdquo; remonstrated Aubertin, &ldquo;am I not one of you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness had attended to every word of this. She rose from her chair,
+      and said quietly, &ldquo;Both you and he and Rose will be so good as to let me
+      see you eat.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But, mamma,&rdquo; remonstrated Josephine and Rose in one breath.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Je le veux,&rdquo; was the cold reply.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      These were words the baroness uttered so seldom that they were little
+      likely to be disputed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The doctor carved and helped the young ladies and himself.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      When they had all eaten a little, a discussion was observed to be going on
+      between Rose and her sister. At last Aubertin caught these words, &ldquo;It will
+      be in vain; even you have not influence enough for that, Rose.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We shall see,&rdquo; was the reply, and Rose put the wing of a partridge on a
+      plate and rose calmly from her chair. She took the plate and put it on a
+      little work-table by her mother&rsquo;s side. The others pretended to be all
+      mouths, but they were all ears. The baroness looked in Rose&rsquo;s face with an
+      air of wonder that was not very encouraging. Then, as Rose said nothing,
+      she raised her aristocratic hand with a courteous but decided gesture of
+      refusal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Undaunted Rose laid her palm softly on the baroness&rsquo;s shoulder, and said
+      to her as firmly as the baroness herself had just spoken,&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Il le veut.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness was staggered. Then she looked with moist eyes at the fair
+      young face, then she reflected. At last she said, with an exquisite
+      mixture of politeness and affection, &ldquo;It is his daughter who has told me
+      &lsquo;Il le veut.&rsquo; I obey.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose returning like a victorious knight from the lists, saucily exultant,
+      and with only one wet eyelash, was solemnly kissed and petted by Josephine
+      and the doctor.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Thus they loved one another in this great, old, falling house. Their
+      familiarity had no coarse side; a form, not of custom but affection, it
+      went hand-in-hand with courtesy by day and night.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The love of the daughters for their mother had all the tenderness,
+      subtlety, and unselfishness of womanly natures, together with a certain
+      characteristic of the female character. And whither that one defect led
+      them, and by what gradations, it may be worth the reader&rsquo;s while to
+      observe.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness retired to rest early; and she was no sooner gone than
+      Josephine leaned over to Rose, and told her what their mother had said to
+      the oak-tree. Rose heard this with anxiety; hitherto they had carefully
+      concealed from their mother that the government claimed the right of
+      selling the chateau to pay the creditors, etc.; and now both sisters
+      feared the old lady had discovered it somehow, or why that strange thing
+      she had said to the oak-tree? But Dr. Aubertin caught their remarks, and
+      laid down his immortal MS. on French insects, to express his hope that
+      they were putting a forced interpretation on the baroness&rsquo;s words.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I think,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;she merely meant how short-lived are we all compared
+      with this ancient oak. I should be very sorry to adopt the other
+      interpretation; for if she knows she can at any moment be expelled from
+      Beaurepaire, it will be almost as bad for her as the calamity itself;
+      THAT, I think, would kill her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why so?&rdquo; said Rose, eagerly. &ldquo;What is this house or that? Mamma will
+      still have her daughters&rsquo; love, go where she will.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Aubertin replied, &ldquo;It is idle to deceive ourselves; at her age men and
+      women hang to life by their habits; take her away from her chateau, from
+      the little oratory where she prays every day for the departed, from her
+      place in the sun on the south terrace, and from all the memories that
+      surround her here; she would soon pine, and die.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Here the savant seeing a hobby-horse near, caught him and jumped on. He
+      launched into a treatise upon the vitality of human beings, and proved
+      that it is the mind which keeps the body of a man alive for so great a
+      length of time as fourscore years; for that he had in the earlier part of
+      his studies carefully dissected a multitude of animals,&mdash;frogs,
+      rabbits, dogs, men, horses, sheep, squirrels, foxes, cats, etc.,&mdash;and
+      discovered no peculiarity in man&rsquo;s organs to account for his singular
+      longevity, except in the brain or organ of mind. Thence he went to the
+      longevity of men with contented minds, and the rapid decay of the
+      careworn. Finally he succeeded in convincing them the baroness was so
+      constituted, physically and mentally, that she would never move from
+      Beaurepaire except into her grave. However, having thus terrified them, he
+      proceeded to console them. &ldquo;You have a friend,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;a powerful
+      friend; and here in my pocket&mdash;somewhere&mdash;is a letter that
+      proves it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The letter was from Mr. Perrin the notary. It appeared by it that Dr.
+      Aubertin had reminded the said Perrin of his obligations to the late
+      baron, and entreated him to use all his influence to keep the estate in
+      this ancient family.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Perrin had replied at first in a few civil lines; but his present letter
+      was a long and friendly one. It made both the daughters of Beaurepaire
+      shudder at the peril they had so narrowly escaped. For by it they now
+      learned for the first time that one Jaques Bonard, a small farmer, to whom
+      they owed but five thousand francs, had gone to the mayor and insisted, as
+      he had a perfect right, on the estate being put up to public auction. This
+      had come to Perrin&rsquo;s ears just in time, and he had instantly bought
+      Bonard&rsquo;s debt, and stopped the auction; not, however, before the very
+      bills were printed; for which he, Perrin, had paid, and now forwarded the
+      receipt. He concluded by saying that the government agent was personally
+      inert, and would never move a step in the matter unless driven by a
+      creditor.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But we have so many,&rdquo; said Rose in dismay. &ldquo;We are not safe a day.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Aubertin assured her the danger was only in appearance. &ldquo;Your large
+      creditors are men of property, and such men let their funds lie unless
+      compelled to move them. The small mortgagee, the petty miser, who has,
+      perhaps, no investment to watch but one small loan, about which he is as
+      anxious and as noisy as a hen with one chicken, he is the clamorous
+      creditor, the harsh little egoist, who for fear of risking a crown piece
+      would bring the Garden of Eden to the hammer. Now we are rid of that
+      little wretch, Bonard, and have Perrin on our side; so there is literally
+      nothing to fear.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The sisters thanked him warmly, and Rose shared his hopes; and said so;
+      but Josephine was silent and thoughtful. Nothing more worth recording
+      passed that night. But the next day was the first of May, Josephine&rsquo;s
+      birthday.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Now they always celebrated this day as well as they could; and used to
+      plant a tree, for one thing. Dard, well spurred by Jacintha, had got a
+      little acacia; and they were all out in the Pleasaunce to plant it.
+      Unhappily, they were a preposterous time making up their feminine minds
+      where to have it set; so Dard turned rusty and said the park was the best
+      place for it. There it could do no harm, stick it where you would.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And who told you to put in your word?&rdquo; inquired Jacintha. &ldquo;You&rsquo;re here to
+      dig the hole where mademoiselle chooses; not to argufy.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine whispered Rose, &ldquo;I admire the energy of her character. Could she
+      be induced to order once for all where the poor thing is to be planted?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then where WILL you have it, mademoiselle?&rdquo; asked Dard, sulkily.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Here, I think, Dard,&rdquo; said Josephine sweetly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Dard grinned malignantly, and drove in his spade. &ldquo;It will never be much
+      bigger than a stinging nettle,&rdquo; thought he, &ldquo;for the roots of the oak have
+      sucked every atom of heart out of this.&rdquo; His black soul exulted secretly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Jacintha stood by Dard, inspecting his work; the sisters intertwined, a
+      few feet from him. The baroness turned aside, and went to look for a
+      moment at the chaplet she had placed yesterday on the oak-tree bough.
+      Presently she uttered a slight ejaculation; and her daughters looked up
+      directly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come here, children,&rdquo; said she. They glided to her in a moment; and found
+      her eyes fixed upon an object that lay on the knights&rsquo; bough.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was a sparkling purse.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      I dare say you have noticed that the bark on the boughs of these very
+      ancient trees is as deeply furrowed as the very stem of an oak tree that
+      boasts but a few centuries; and in one of these deep furrows lay a green
+      silk purse with gold coins glittering through the glossy meshes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine and Rose eyed it a moment like startled deer; then Rose pounced
+      on it. &ldquo;Oh, how heavy!&rdquo; she cried. This brought up Dard and Jacintha, in
+      time to see Rose pour ten shining gold pieces out of the purse into her
+      pink-white palm, while her face flushed and her eyes glittered with
+      excitement. Jacintha gave a scream of joy; &ldquo;Our luck is turned,&rdquo; she
+      cried, superstitiously. Meanwhile, Josephine had found a slip of paper
+      close to the purse. She opened it with nimble fingers; it contained one
+      line in a hand like that of a copying clerk: FROM A FRIEND: IN PART
+      PAYMENT OF A GREAT DEBT.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Keen, piquant curiosity now took the place of surprise. Who could it be?
+      The baroness&rsquo;s suspicion fell at once on Dr. Aubertin. But Rose maintained
+      he had not ten gold pieces in the world. The baroness appealed to
+      Josephine. She only blushed in an extraordinary way, and said nothing.
+      They puzzled, and puzzled, and were as much in the dark as ever, when lo!
+      one of the suspected parties delivered himself into the hands of justice
+      with ludicrous simplicity. It happened to be Dr. Aubertin&rsquo;s hour of
+      out-a-door study; and he came mooning along, buried in a book, and walked
+      slowly into the group&mdash;started, made a slight apology, and was
+      mooning off, lost in his book again. Then the baroness, who had eyed him
+      with grim suspicion all the time, said with well-affected nonchalance,
+      &ldquo;Doctor, you dropped your purse; we have just picked it up.&rdquo; And she
+      handed it to him. &ldquo;Thank you, madame,&rdquo; said he, and took it quietly
+      without looking at it, put it in his pocket, and retired, with his soul in
+      his book. They stared comically at one another, and at this cool hand.
+      &ldquo;It&rsquo;s no more his than it&rsquo;s mine,&rdquo; said Jacintha, bluntly. Rose darted
+      after the absorbed student, and took him captive. &ldquo;Now, doctor,&rdquo; she
+      cried, &ldquo;be pleased to come out of the clouds.&rdquo; And with the word she
+      whipped the purse out of his coat pocket, and holding it right up before
+      his eye, insisted on his telling her whether that was his purse or not,
+      money and all. Thus adjured, he disowned the property mighty coolly, for a
+      retired physician, who had just pocketed it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, my dear,&rdquo; said he; &ldquo;and, now I think of it, I have not carried a
+      purse this twenty years.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness, as a last resource, appealed to his honor whether he had not
+      left a purse and paper on the knights&rsquo; bough. The question had to be
+      explained by Josephine, and then the doctor surprised them all by being
+      rather affronted&mdash;for once in his life.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Baroness,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;I have been your friend and pensioner nearly twenty
+      years; if by some strange chance money were to come into my hands, I
+      should not play you a childish trick like this. What! have I not the right
+      to come to you, and say, &lsquo;My old friend, here I bring you back a very
+      small part of all I owe you?&rsquo;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What geese we are,&rdquo; remarked Rose. &ldquo;Dear doctor, YOU tell us who it is.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Dr. Aubertin reflected a single moment; then said he could make a shrewd
+      guess.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Who? who? who?&rdquo; cried the whole party.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Perrin the notary.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      It was the baroness&rsquo;s turn to be surprised; for there was nothing romantic
+      about Perrin the notary. Aubertin, however, let her know that he was in
+      private communication with the said Perrin, and this was not the first
+      friendly act the good notary had done her in secret.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      While he was converting the baroness to his view, Josephine and Rose
+      exchanged a signal, and slipped away round an angle of the chateau.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Who is it?&rdquo; said Rose.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is some one who has a delicate mind.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Clearly, and therefore not a notary.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Rose, dear, might it not be some person who has done us some wrong, and
+      is perhaps penitent?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Certainly; one of our tenants, or creditors, you mean; but then, the
+      paper says &lsquo;a friend.&rsquo; Stay, it says a debtor. Why a debtor? Down with
+      enigmas!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Rose, love,&rdquo; said Josephine, coaxingly, &ldquo;think of some one that might&mdash;since
+      it is not the doctor, nor Monsieur Perrin, might it not be&mdash;for after
+      all, he would naturally be ashamed to appear before me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Before you? Who do you mean?&rdquo; asked Rose nervously, catching a glimpse
+      now.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He who once pretended to love me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Josephine, you love that man still.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, no. Spare me!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You love him just the same as ever. Oh, it is wonderful; it is terrible;
+      the power he has over you; over your judgment as well as your heart.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No! for I believe he has forgotten my very name; don&rsquo;t you think so?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dear Josephine, can you doubt it? Come, you do doubt it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sometimes.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But why? for what reason?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Because of what he said to me as we parted at that gate; the words and
+      the voice seem still to ring like truth across the weary years. He said,
+      &lsquo;I am to join the army of the Pyrenees, so fatal to our troops; but say to
+      me what you never yet have said, Camille, I love you: and I swear I will
+      come back alive.&rsquo; So then I said to him, &lsquo;I love you,&rsquo;&mdash;and he never
+      came back.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How could he come here? a deserter, a traitor!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is not true; it is not in his nature; inconstancy may be. Tell me that
+      he never really loved me, and I will believe you; but not that he is a
+      traitor. Let me weep over my past love, not blush for it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Past? You love him to-day as you did three years ago.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; said Josephine, &ldquo;no; I love no one. I never shall love any one
+      again.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But him. It is that love which turns your heart against others. Oh, yes,
+      you love him, dearest, or why should you fancy our secret benefactor COULD
+      be that Camille?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why? Because I was mad: because it is impossible; but I see my folly. I
+      am going in.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What! don&rsquo;t you care to know who I think it was, perhaps?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; said Josephine sadly and doggedly; she added with cold nonchalance,
+      &ldquo;I dare say time will show.&rdquo; And she went slowly in, her hand to her head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Her birthday!&rdquo; sighed Rose.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The donor, whoever he was, little knew the pain he was inflicting on this
+      distressed but proud family, or the hard battle that ensued between their
+      necessities and their delicacy. The ten gold pieces were a perpetual
+      temptation: a daily conflict. The words that accompanied the donation
+      offered a bait. Their pride and dignity declined it; but these bright bits
+      of gold cost them many a sharp pang. You must know that Josephine and Rose
+      had worn out their mourning by this time; and were obliged to have
+      recourse to gayer materials that lay in their great wardrobes, and were
+      older, but less worn. A few of these gold pieces would have enabled the
+      poor girls to be neat, and yet to mourn their father openly. And it went
+      through and through those tender, simple hearts, to think that they must
+      be disunited, even in so small a thing as dress; that while their mother
+      remained in her weeds, they must seem no longer to share her woe.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness knew their feeling, and felt its piety, and yet could not bow
+      her dignity to say, &ldquo;Take five of these bits of gold, and let us all look
+      what we are&mdash;one.&rdquo; Yet in this, as in everything else, they supported
+      each other. They resisted, they struggled, and with a wrench they
+      conquered day by day. At last, by general consent, Josephine locked up the
+      tempter, and they looked at it no more. But the little bit of paper met a
+      kinder fate. Rose made a little frame for it, and it was kept in a drawer,
+      in the salon: and often looked at and blessed. Just when they despaired of
+      human friendship, this paper with the sacred word &ldquo;friend&rdquo; written on it,
+      had fallen all in a moment on their aching hearts.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They could not tell whence it came, this blessed word.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But men dispute whence comes the dew?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then let us go with the poets, who say it comes from heaven.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And even so that sweet word, friend, dropped like the dew from heaven on
+      these afflicted ones.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      So they locked the potent gold away from themselves, and took the kind
+      slip of paper to their hearts.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The others left off guessing: Aubertin had it all his own way: he upheld
+      Perrin as their silent benefactor, and bade them all observe that the
+      worthy notary had never visited the chateau openly since the day the purse
+      was left there. &ldquo;Guilty conscience,&rdquo; said Aubertin dryly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      One day in his walks he met a gaunt figure ambling on a fat pony: he
+      stopped him, and, holding up his finger, said abruptly, &ldquo;We have found you
+      out, Maitre Perrin.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The notary changed color.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, never be ashamed,&rdquo; said Aubertin; &ldquo;a good action done slyly is none
+      the less a good action.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The notary wore a puzzled air.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Aubertin admired his histrionic powers in calling up this look.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come, come, don&rsquo;t overdo it,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;Well, well; they cannot profit by
+      your liberality; but you will be rewarded in a better world, take my word
+      for that.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The notary muttered indistinctly. He was a man of moderate desires; would
+      have been quite content if there had been no other world in perspective.
+      He had studied this one, and made it pay: did not desire a better;
+      sometimes feared a worse.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah!&rdquo; said Aubertin, &ldquo;I see how it is; we do not like to hear ourselves
+      praised, do we? When shall we see you at the chateau?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I propose to call on the baroness the moment I have good news to bring,&rdquo;
+       replied Perrin; and to avoid any more compliments spurred the dun pony
+      suddenly; and he waddled away.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Now this Perrin was at that moment on the way to dine with a character who
+      plays a considerable part in the tale&mdash;Commandant Raynal. Perrin had
+      made himself useful to the commandant, and had become his legal adviser.
+      And, this very day after dinner, the commandant having done a good day&rsquo;s
+      work permitted himself a little sentiment over the bottle, and to a man he
+      thought his friend. He let out that he had a heap of money he did not know
+      what to do with, and almost hated it now his mother was gone and could not
+      share it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The man of law consoled him with oleaginous phrases: told him he very much
+      underrated the power of money. His hoard, directed by a judicious adviser,
+      would make him a landed proprietor, and the husband of some young lady,
+      all beauty, virtue, and accomplishment, whose soothing influence would
+      soon heal the sorrow caused by an excess of filial sentiment.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Halt!&rdquo; shouted Raynal: &ldquo;say that again in half the words.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Perrin was nettled, for he prided himself on his colloquial style.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You can buy a fine estate and a chaste wife with the money,&rdquo; snapped this
+      smooth personage, substituting curt brutality for honeyed prolixity.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The soldier was struck by the propositions the moment they flew at him
+      small and solid, like bullets.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve no time,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;to be running after women. But the estate I&rsquo;ll
+      certainly have, because you can get that for me without my troubling my
+      head.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is it a commission, then?&rdquo; asked the other sharply.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of course. Do you think I speak for the sake of talking?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And so Perrin received formal instructions to look out for a landed
+      estate; and he was to receive a handsome commission as agent.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Now to settle this affair, and pocket a handsome percentage for himself,
+      he had only to say &ldquo;Beaurepaire.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Well, he didn&rsquo;t. Never mentioned the place; nor the fact that it was for
+      sale.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Such are all our agents, when rival speculators. Mind that. Still it is a
+      terrible thing to be so completely in the power of any man of the world,
+      as from this hour Beaurepaire was in the power of Perrin the notary.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0004" id="link2HCH0004">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER IV.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Edouard Riviere was unhappy. She never came out now. This alone made the
+      days dark to him. And then he began to fear it was him she shunned. She
+      must have seen him lie in wait for her; and so she would come out no more.
+      He prowled about and contrived to fall in with Jacintha; he told her his
+      grief. She assured him the simple fact was their mourning was worn out,
+      and they were ashamed to go abroad in colors. This revelation made his
+      heart yearn still more.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;O Jacintha,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;if I could only make a beginning; but here we
+      might live a century in the same parish, and not one chance for a poor
+      wretch to make acquaintance.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Jacintha admitted this, and said gentlefolks were to be pitied. &ldquo;Why, if
+      it was the likes of me, you and I should have made friends long before
+      now.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Jacintha herself was puzzled what to do; she would have told Rose if she
+      had felt sure it would be well received; but she could not find out that
+      the young lady had even noticed the existence of Edouard. But her brain
+      worked, and lay in wait for an opportunity.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      One came sooner than she expected. One morning at about six o&rsquo;clock, as
+      she came home from milking the cow, she caught sight of young Riviere
+      trying to open the iron gate. &ldquo;What is up now?&rdquo; thought she; suddenly the
+      truth flashed upon her, clear as day. She put her pail down and stole upon
+      him. &ldquo;You want to leave us another purse,&rdquo; said she. He colored all over
+      and panted.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How did you know? how could you know? you won&rsquo;t betray me? you won&rsquo;t be
+      so cruel? you promised.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Me betray you,&rdquo; said Jacintha; &ldquo;why, I&rsquo;ll help you; and then they will be
+      able to buy mourning, you know, and then they will come out, and give you
+      a chance. You can&rsquo;t open that gate, for it&rsquo;s locked. But you come round to
+      the lane, and I&rsquo;ll get you the key; it is hanging up in the kitchen.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The key was in her pocket. But the sly jade wanted him away from that
+      gate; it commanded a view of the Pleasaunce. He was no sooner safe in the
+      lane, than she tore up-stairs to her young ladies, and asked them with
+      affected calm whether they would like to know who left the purse.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, yes, yes!&rdquo; screamed Rose.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then come with me. You ARE dressed; never mind your bonnets, or you will
+      be too late.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Questions poured on her; but she waived all explanation, and did not give
+      them time to think, or Josephine, for one, she knew would raise
+      objections. She led the way to the Pleasaunce, and, when she got to the
+      ancestral oak, she said hurriedly, &ldquo;Now, mesdemoiselles, hide in there,
+      and as still as mice. You&rsquo;ll soon know who leaves the purses.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      With this she scudded to the lane, and gave Edouard the key. &ldquo;Look sharp,&rdquo;
+       said she, &ldquo;before they get up; it&rsquo;s almost their dressing time.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;YOU&rsquo;LL SOON KNOW WHO LEAVES THE PURSES!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Curiosity, delicious curiosity, thrilled our two daughters of Eve.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      This soon began to alternate with chill misgivings at the novelty of the
+      situation.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She is not coming back,&rdquo; said Josephine ruefully.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; said Rose, &ldquo;and suppose when we pounce out on him, it should be a
+      stranger.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pounce on him? surely we are not to do that?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, y-yes; that is the p-p-programme,&rdquo; quavered Rose.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A key grated, and the iron gate creaked on its hinges. They ran together
+      and pinched one another for mutual support, but did not dare to speak.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Presently a man&rsquo;s shadow came slap into the tree. They crouched and
+      quivered, and expected to be caught instead of catching, and wished
+      themselves safe back in bed, and all this a nightmare, and no worse.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At last they recovered themselves enough to observe that this shadow, one
+      half of which lay on the ground, while the head and shoulders went a
+      little way up the wall of the tree, represented a man&rsquo;s profile, not his
+      front face. The figure, in short, was standing between them and the sun,
+      and was contemplating the chateau, not the tree.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The shadow took off its hat to Josephine, in the tree. Then would she have
+      screamed if she had not bitten her white hand instead, and made a red mark
+      thereon.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It wiped its brow with a handkerchief; it had walked fast, poor thing! The
+      next moment it was away.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They looked at one another and panted. They scarcely dared do it before.
+      Then Rose, with one hand on her heaving bosom, shook her little white fist
+      viciously at where the figure must be, and perhaps a comical desire of
+      vengeance stimulated her curiosity. She now glided through the fissure
+      like a cautious panther from her den; and noiseless and supple as a
+      serpent began to wind slowly round the tree. She soon came to a great
+      protuberance in the tree, and twining and peering round it with diamond
+      eye, she saw a very young, very handsome gentleman, stealing on tiptoe to
+      the nearest flower-bed. Then she saw him take a purse out of his bosom,
+      and drop it on the bed. This done, he came slowly past the tree again, and
+      was even heard to vent a little innocent chuckle of intense satisfaction:
+      but of brief duration; for, when Rose saw the purse leave his hand, she
+      made a rapid signal to Josephine to wheel round the other side of the
+      tree, and, starting together with admirable concert, both the daughters of
+      Beaurepaire glided into sight with a vast appearance of composure.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Two women together are really braver than fifteen separate; but still,
+      most of this tranquillity was merely put on, but so admirably that Edouard
+      Riviere had no chance with them. He knew nothing about their tremors; all
+      he saw or heard was, a rustle, then a flap on each side of him as of great
+      wings, and two lovely women were upon him with angelic swiftness. &ldquo;Ah!&rdquo; he
+      cried out with a start, and glanced from the first-comer, Rose, to the
+      gate. But Josephine was on that side by this time, and put up her hand, as
+      much as to say, &ldquo;You can&rsquo;t pass here.&rdquo; In such situations, the mind works
+      quicker than lightning. He took off his hat, and stammered an excuse&mdash;&ldquo;Come
+      to look at the oak.&rdquo; At this moment Rose pounced on the purse, and held it
+      up to Josephine. He was caught. His only chance now was to bolt for the
+      mark and run; but it was not the notary, it was a novice who lost his
+      presence of mind, or perhaps thought it rude to run when a lady told him
+      to stand still. All he did was to crush his face into his two hands, round
+      which his cheeks and neck now blushed red as blood. Blush? they could both
+      see the color rush like a wave to the very roots of his hair and the tips
+      of his fingers.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The moment our heroines, who, in that desperation which is one of the
+      forms of cowardice, had hurled themselves on the foe, saw this, flash&mdash;the
+      quick-witted poltroons exchanged purple lightning over Edouard&rsquo;s drooping
+      head, and enacted lionesses in a moment.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was with the quiet composure of lofty and powerful natures that
+      Josephine opened on him. &ldquo;Compose yourself, sir; and be so good as to tell
+      us who you are.&rdquo; Edouard must answer. Now he could not speak through his
+      hands; and he could not face a brace of tranquil lionesses: so he took a
+      middle course, removed one hand, and shading himself from Josephine with
+      the other, he gasped out, &ldquo;I am&mdash;my name is Riviere; and I&mdash;I&mdash;ladies!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am afraid we frighten you,&rdquo; said Josephine, demurely.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t be frightened,&rdquo; said Rose, majestically; &ldquo;we are not VERY angry,
+      only a LITTLE curious to know why you water our flowers with gold.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At this point-blank thrust, and from her, Edouard was so confounded and
+      distressed, they both began to pity him. He stammered out that he was so
+      confused he did not know what to say. He couldn&rsquo;t think how ever he could
+      have taken such a liberty; might he be permitted to retire? and with this
+      he tried to slip away.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Let me detain you one instant,&rdquo; said Josephine, and made for the house.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Left alone so suddenly with the culprit, the dignity, and majesty, and
+      valor of Rose seemed to ooze gently out; and she stood blushing, and had
+      not a word to say; no more had Edouard. But he hung his head, and she hung
+      her head. And, somehow or other, whenever she raised her eyes to glance at
+      him, he raised his to steal a look at her, and mutual discomfiture
+      resulted.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      This awkward, embarrassing delirium was interrupted by Josephine&rsquo;s return.
+      She now held another purse in her hand, and quietly poured the rest of the
+      coin into it. She then, with a blush, requested him to take back the
+      money.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At that he found his tongue. &ldquo;No, no,&rdquo; he cried, and put up his hands in
+      supplication. &ldquo;Ladies, do let me speak ONE word to you. Do not reject my
+      friendship. You are alone in the world; your father is dead; your mother
+      has but you to lean on. After all, I am your neighbor, and neighbors
+      should be friends. And I am your debtor; I owe you more than you could
+      ever owe me; for ever since I came into this neighborhood I have been
+      happy. No man was ever so happy as I, ever since one day I was walking,
+      and met for the first time an angel. I don&rsquo;t say it was you, Mademoiselle
+      Rose. It might be Mademoiselle Josephine.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How pat he has got our names,&rdquo; said Rose, smiling.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A look from that angel has made me so good, so happy. I used to vegetate,
+      but now I live. Live! I walk on wings, and tread on roses. Yet you insist
+      on declining a few miserable louis d&rsquo;or from him who owes you so much.
+      Well, don&rsquo;t be angry; I&rsquo;ll take them back, and throw them into the nearest
+      pond, for they are really no use to me. But then you will be generous in
+      your turn. You will accept my devotion, my services. You have no brother,
+      you know; well, I have no sisters; let me be your brother, and your
+      servant forever.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At all this, delivered in as many little earnest pants as there were
+      sentences, the water stood in the fair eyes he was looking into so
+      piteously.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine was firm, but angelical. &ldquo;We thank you, Monsieur Riviere,&rdquo; said
+      she, softly, &ldquo;for showing us that the world is still embellished with
+      hearts like yours. Here is the money;&rdquo; and she held it out in her creamy
+      hand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But we are very grateful,&rdquo; put in Rose, softly and earnestly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That we are,&rdquo; said Josephine, &ldquo;and we beg to keep the purse as a souvenir
+      of one who tried to do us a kindness without mortifying us. And now,
+      Monsieur Riviere, you will permit us to bid you adieu.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Edouard was obliged to take the hint. &ldquo;It is I who am the intruder,&rdquo; said
+      he. &ldquo;Mesdemoiselles, conceive, if you can, my pride and my
+      disappointment.&rdquo; He then bowed low; they courtesied low to him in return;
+      and he retired slowly in a state of mixed feeling indescribable.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      With all their sweetness and graciousness, he felt overpowered by their
+      high breeding, their reserve, and their composure, in a situation that had
+      set his heart beating itself nearly out of his bosom. He acted the scene
+      over again, only much more adroitly, and concocted speeches for past use,
+      and was very hot and very cold by turns.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      I wish he could have heard what passed between the sisters as soon as ever
+      he was out of earshot. It would have opened his eyes, and given him a
+      little peep into what certain writers call &ldquo;the sex.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Poor boy,&rdquo; murmured Josephine, &ldquo;he has gone away unhappy.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, I dare say he hasn&rsquo;t gone far,&rdquo; replied Rose, gayly. &ldquo;I shouldn&rsquo;t if
+      I was a boy.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine held up her finger like an elder sister; then went on to say she
+      really hardly knew why she had dismissed him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, dear,&rdquo; said Rose, dryly, &ldquo;since you admit so much, I must say I
+      couldn&rsquo;t help thinking&mdash;while you were doing it&mdash;we were letting
+      &lsquo;the poor boy&rsquo; off ridiculously cheap.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;At least I did my duty?&rdquo; suggested Josephine, inquiringly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Magnificently; you overawed even me. So now to business, as the gentlemen
+      say. Which of us two takes him?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Takes whom?&rdquo; inquired Josephine, opening her lovely eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Edouard,&rdquo; murmured Rose, lowering hers.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine glared on the lovely minx with wonder and comical horror.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh! you shall have him,&rdquo; said Rose, &ldquo;if you like. You are the eldest, you
+      know.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fie!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do now; TO OBLIGE ME.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;For shame! Rose. Is this you? talking like that!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh! there&rsquo;s no compulsion, dear; I never force young ladies&rsquo; 
+      inclinations. So you decline him?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of course I decline him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then, oh, you dear, darling Josephine, this is the prettiest present you
+      ever made me,&rdquo; and she kissed her vehemently.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine was frightened now. She held Rose out at arm&rsquo;s length with both
+      hands, and looked earnestly into her, and implored her not to play with
+      fire. &ldquo;Take warning by me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose recommended her to keep her pity for Monsieur Riviere, &ldquo;who had
+      fallen into nice hands,&rdquo; she said. That no doubt might remain on that
+      head, she whispered mysteriously, but with much gravity and conviction, &ldquo;I
+      am an Imp;&rdquo; and aimed at Josephine with her forefinger to point the
+      remark. For one second she stood and watched this important statement sink
+      into her sister&rsquo;s mind, then set-to and gambolled elfishly round her as
+      she moved stately and thoughtful across the grass to the chateau.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Two days after this a large tree was blown down in Beaurepaire park, and
+      made quite a gap in the prospect. You never know what a big thing a leafy
+      tree is till it comes down. And this ill wind blew Edouard good; for it
+      laid bare the chateau to his inquiring telescope. He had not gazed above
+      half an hour, when a female figure emerged from the chateau. His heart
+      beat. It was only Jacintha. He saw her look this way and that, and
+      presently Dard appeared, and she sent him with his axe to the fallen tree.
+      Edouard watched him hacking away at it. Presently his heart gave a violent
+      leap; for why? two ladies emerged from the Pleasaunce and walked across
+      the park. They came up to Dard, and stood looking at the tree and Dard
+      hacking it, and Edouard watched them greedily. You know we all love to
+      magnify her we love. And this was a delightful way of doing it. It is &ldquo;a
+      system of espionage&rdquo; that prevails under every form of government. How he
+      gazed, and gazed, on his now polar star; studied every turn, every
+      gesture, with eager delight, and tried to gather what she said, or at
+      least the nature of it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But by and by they left Dard and strolled towards the other end of the
+      park. Then did our astronomer fling down his tube, and come running out in
+      hopes of intercepting them, and seeming to meet them by some strange
+      fortuity. Hope whispered he should be blessed with a smile; perhaps a word
+      even. So another minute and he was running up the road to Beaurepaire. But
+      his good heart was doomed to be diverted to a much humbler object than his
+      idol; as he came near the fallen tree he heard loud cries for help,
+      followed by groans of pain. He bounded over the hedge, and there was Dard
+      hanging over his axe, moaning. &ldquo;What is the matter? what is the matter?&rdquo;
+       cried Edouard, running to him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh! oh! cut my foot. Oh!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Edouard looked, and turned sick, for there was a gash right through Dard&rsquo;s
+      shoe, and the blood welling up through it. But, recovering himself by an
+      effort of the will, he cried out, &ldquo;Courage, my lad! don&rsquo;t give in. Thank
+      Heaven there&rsquo;s no artery there. Oh, dear, it is a terrible cut! Let us get
+      you home, that is the first thing. Can you walk?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Lord bless you, no! nor stand neither without help.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Edouard flew to the wheelbarrow, and, reversing it, spun a lot of billet
+      out. &ldquo;Ye must not do that,&rdquo; said Dard with all the energy he was capable
+      of in his present condition. &ldquo;Why, that is Jacintha&rsquo;s wood.&rdquo;&mdash;&ldquo;To the
+      devil with Jacintha and her wood too!&rdquo; cried Edouard, &ldquo;a man is worth more
+      than a fagot. Come, I shall wheel you home: it is only just across the
+      park.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      With some difficulty he lifted him into the barrow. Luckily he had his
+      shooting-jacket on with a brandy-flask in it: he administered it with
+      excellent effect.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The ladies, as they walked, saw a man wheeling a barrow across the park,
+      and took no particular notice; but, as Riviere was making for the same
+      point they were, though at another angle, presently the barrow came near
+      enough for them to see Dard&rsquo;s head and arms in it. Rose was the first to
+      notice this. &ldquo;Look! look! if he is not wheeling Dard in the barrow now.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Who?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Can you ask? Who provides all our excitement?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine instantly divined there was something amiss. &ldquo;Consider,&rdquo; said
+      she, &ldquo;Monsieur Riviere would not wheel Dard all across the park for
+      amusement.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose assented; and in another minute, by a strange caprice of fate, those
+      Edouard had come to intercept, quickened their pace to intercept him. As
+      soon as he saw their intention he thrilled all over, but did not slacken
+      his pace. He told Dard to take his coat and throw it over his foot, for
+      here were the young ladies coming.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What for?&rdquo; said Dard sulkily. &ldquo;No! let them see what they have done with
+      their little odd jobs: this is my last for one while. I sha&rsquo;n&rsquo;t go on two
+      legs again this year.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The ladies came up with them.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;O monsieur!&rdquo; said Josephine, &ldquo;what is the matter?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We have met with a little accident, mademoiselle, that is all. Dard has
+      hurt his foot; nothing to speak of, but I thought he would be best at
+      home.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose raised the coat which Riviere, in spite of Dard, had flung over his
+      foot.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He is bleeding! Dard is bleeding! Oh, my poor Dard. Oh! oh!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hush, Rose!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, don&rsquo;t put him out of heart, mademoiselle. Take another pull at the
+      flask, Dard. If you please, ladies, I must have him home without delay.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh yes, but I want him to have a surgeon,&rdquo; cried Josephine. &ldquo;And we have
+      no horses nor people to send off as we used to have.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But you have me, mademoiselle,&rdquo; said Edouard tenderly. &ldquo;Me, who would go
+      to the world&rsquo;s end for you.&rdquo; He said this to Josephine, but his eye sought
+      Rose. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m a famous runner,&rdquo; he added, a little bumptiously; &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll be at
+      the town in half an hour, and send a surgeon up full gallop.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have a good heart,&rdquo; said Rose simply.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He bowed his blushing, delighted face, and wheeled Dard to his cottage
+      hard by with almost more than mortal vigor. How softly, how nobly, that
+      frolicsome girl could speak! Those sweet words rang in his ears and ran
+      warm round and round his heart, as he straightened his arms and his back
+      to the work. When they had gone about a hundred yards, a single snivel
+      went off in the wheelbarrow. Five minutes after, Dard was at home in
+      charge of his grandmother, his shoe off, his foot in a wet linen cloth;
+      and Edouard, his coat tied round the neck, squared his shoulders, and ran
+      the two short leagues out. He ran them in forty minutes, found the surgeon
+      at home, told the case, pooh-poohed that worthy&rsquo;s promise to go to the
+      patient presently, darted into his stable, saddled the horse, brought him
+      round, saw the surgeon into the saddle, started him, dined at the
+      restaurateur&rsquo;s, strolled back, and was in time to get a good look at the
+      chateau of Beaurepaire just as the sun set on it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Jacintha came into Dard&rsquo;s cottage that evening.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So you have been at it, my man,&rdquo; cried she cheerfully and rather roughly,
+      then sat down and rocked herself, with her apron over her head. She
+      explained this anomalous proceeding to his grandmother privately. &ldquo;I
+      thought I would keep his heart up anyway, but you see I was not fit.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Next morning, as Riviere sat writing, he received an unexpected visit from
+      Jacintha. She came in with her finger to her lips, and said, &ldquo;You prowl
+      about Dard&rsquo;s cottage. They are sure to go and see him every day, and him
+      wounded in their service.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, you good girl! you dear girl!&rdquo; cried Edouard.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She did not reply in words, but, after going to the door, returned and
+      gave him a great kiss without ceremony. &ldquo;Dare say you know what that&rsquo;s
+      for,&rdquo; said she, and went off with a clear conscience and reddish cheeks.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Dard&rsquo;s grandmother had a little house, a little land, a little money, and
+      a little cow. She could just maintain Dard and herself, and her resources
+      enabled Dard to do so many little odd jobs for love, yet keep his main
+      organ tolerably filled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Go to bed, my little son, since you have got hashed,&rdquo; said she.&mdash;&ldquo;Bed
+      be hanged,&rdquo; cried he. &ldquo;What good is bed? That&rsquo;s a silly old custom wants
+      doing away with. It weakens you: it turns you into train oil: it is the
+      doctor&rsquo;s friend, and the sick man&rsquo;s bane. Many a one dies through taking
+      to bed, that could have kept his life if he had kept his feet like a man.
+      If I had cut myself in two I would not go to bed,&mdash;till I go to the
+      bed with a spade in it. No! sit up like Julius Caesar; and die as you
+      lived, in your clothes: don&rsquo;t strip yourself: let the old women strip you;
+      that is their delight laying out a chap; that is the time they brighten
+      up, the old sorceresses.&rdquo; He concluded this amiable rhapsody, the latter
+      part of which was levelled at a lugubrious weakness of his grandmother&rsquo;s
+      for the superfluous embellishment of the dead, by telling her it was bad
+      enough to be tied by the foot like an ass, without settling down on his
+      back like a cast sheep. &ldquo;Give me the armchair. I&rsquo;ll sit in it, and, if I
+      have any friends, they will show it now: they will come and tell me what
+      is going on in the village, for I can&rsquo;t get out to see it and hear it,
+      they must know that.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Seated in state in his granny&rsquo;s easy-chair, the loss of which after thirty
+      years&rsquo; use made her miserable, she couldn&rsquo;t tell why, le Sieur Dard
+      awaited his friends.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They did not come.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The rain did, and poured all the afternoon. Night succeeded, and solitude.
+      Dard boiled over with bitterness. &ldquo;They are a lot of pigs then, all those
+      fellows I have drunk with at Bigot&rsquo;s and Simmet&rsquo;s. Down with all
+      fair-weather friends.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The next day the sun shone, the air was clear, and the sky blue. &ldquo;Ah! let
+      us see now,&rdquo; cried Dard.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Alas! no fellow-drinkers, no fellow-smokers, came to console their hurt
+      fellow. And Dard, who had boiled with anger yesterday, was now sad and
+      despondent. &ldquo;Down with egotists,&rdquo; he groaned.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      About three in the afternoon came a tap at the door.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah! at last,&rdquo; cried Dard: &ldquo;come in!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The door was slowly opened, and two lovely faces appeared at the
+      threshold. The demoiselles De Beaurepaire wore a tender look of interest
+      and pity when they caught sight of Dard, and on the old woman courtesying
+      to them they courtesied to her and Dard. The next moment they were close
+      to him, one a little to his right, the other to his left, and two pair of
+      sapphire eyes with the mild lustre of sympathy playing down incessantly
+      upon him. How was he? How had he slept? Was he in pain? Was he in much
+      pain? tell the truth now. Was there anything to eat or drink he could
+      fancy? Jacintha should make it and bring it, if it was within their means.
+      A prince could not have had more solicitous attendants, nor a fairy king
+      lovelier and less earthly ones.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He looked in heavy amazement from one to the other. Rose bent, and was by
+      some supple process on one knee, taking the measure of the wounded foot.
+      When she first approached it he winced: but the next moment he smiled. He
+      had never been touched like this&mdash;it was contact and no contact&mdash;she
+      treated his foot as the zephyr the violets&mdash;she handled it as if it
+      had been some sacred thing. By the help of his eye he could just know she
+      was touching him. Presently she informed him he was measured for a list
+      shoe: and she would run home for the materials. During her absence came a
+      timid tap to the door; and Edouard Riviere entered. He was delighted to
+      see Josephine, and made sure Rose was not far off. It was Dard who let out
+      that she was gone to Beaurepaire for some cloth to make him a shoe. This
+      information set Edouard fidgeting on his chair. He saw such a chance as
+      was not likely to occur again. He rose with feigned nonchalance, and
+      saying, &ldquo;I leave you in good hands; angel visitors are best enjoyed
+      alone,&rdquo; slowly retired, with a deep obeisance. Once outside the door,
+      dignity vanished in alacrity; he flew off into the park, and ran as hard
+      as he could towards the chateau. He was within fifty yards of the little
+      gate, when sure enough Rose emerged. They met; his heart beat violently.
+      &ldquo;Mademoiselle,&rdquo; he faltered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah! it is Monsieur Riviere, I declare,&rdquo; said Rose, coolly; all over
+      blushes though.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, mademoiselle, and I am so out of breath. Mademoiselle Josephine
+      awaits you at Dard&rsquo;s house.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She sent you for me?&rdquo; inquired Rose, demurely.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not positively. But I could see I should please her by coming for you;
+      there is, I believe, a bull or so about.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A bull or two! don&rsquo;t talk in that reckless way about such things. She has
+      done well to send you; let us make haste.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But I am a little out of breath.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, never mind that! I abhor bulls.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But, mademoiselle, we are not come to them yet, and the faster we go now
+      the sooner we shall.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes; but I always like to get a disagreeable thing over as soon as
+      possible,&rdquo; said Rose, slyly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah,&rdquo; replied Edouard, mournfully, &ldquo;in that case let us make haste.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      After a little spurt, mademoiselle relaxed the pace of her own accord, and
+      even went slower than before. There was an awkward silence. Edouard eyed
+      the park boundary, and thought, &ldquo;Now what I have to say I must say before
+      we get to you;&rdquo; and being thus impressed with the necessity of immediate
+      action, he turned to lead.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose eyed him and the ground, alternately, from under her long lashes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At last he began to color and flutter. She saw something was coming, and
+      all the woman donned defensive armor.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mademoiselle.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is it quite decided that your family refuse my acquaintance, my services,
+      which I still&mdash;forgive me&mdash;press on you? Ah! Mademoiselle Rose,
+      am I never to have the happiness of&mdash;of&mdash;even speaking to you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It seems so,&rdquo; said Rose, ironically.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Have you then decided against me too?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I?&rdquo; asked Rose. &ldquo;What have I to do with questions of etiquette? I am only
+      a child: so considered at least.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You a child&mdash;an angel like you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ask any of them, they will tell you I am a child; and it is to that I owe
+      this conversation, no doubt; if you did not look on me as a child, you
+      would not take this liberty with me,&rdquo; said the young cat, scratching
+      without a moment&rsquo;s notice.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mademoiselle, do not be angry. I was wrong.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh! never mind. Children are little creatures without reserve, and
+      treated accordingly, and to notice them is to honor them.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Adieu then, mademoiselle. Try to believe no one respects you more than I
+      do.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, let us part, for there is Dard&rsquo;s house; and I begin to suspect that
+      Josephine never sent you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I confess it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There, he confesses it. I thought so all along; WHAT A DUPE I HAVE BEEN!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I will offend no more,&rdquo; said poor silly Edouard. &ldquo;Adieu, mademoiselle.
+      May you find friends as sincere as I am, and more to your taste!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Heaven hear your prayers!&rdquo; replied the malicious thing, casting up her
+      eyes with a mock tragic air.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Edouard sighed; a chill conviction that she was both heartless and empty
+      fell on him. He turned away without another word. She called to him with a
+      sudden airy cheerfulness that made him start. &ldquo;Stay, monsieur, I forgot&mdash;I
+      have a favor to ask you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I wish I could believe that:&rdquo; and his eyes brightened.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose stopped, and began to play with her parasol. &ldquo;You seem,&rdquo; said she
+      softly, &ldquo;to be pretty generous in bestowing your acquaintance on
+      strangers. I should be glad if I might secure you for a dear friend of
+      mine, Dr. Aubertin. He will not discredit my recommendation; and he will
+      not make so many difficulties as we do; shall I tell you why? Because he
+      is really worth knowing. In short, believe me, it will be a valuable
+      acquaintance for you&mdash;and for him,&rdquo; added she with all the grace of
+      the De Beaurepaires.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Many a man, inferior in a general way to Edouard Riviere, would have made
+      a sensible reply to this. Such as, &ldquo;Oh, any friend of yours, mademoiselle,
+      must be welcome to me,&rdquo; or the like. But the proposal caught Edouard on
+      his foible, his vanity, to wit; and our foibles are our manias. He was
+      mortified to the heart&rsquo;s core. &ldquo;She refuses to know me herself,&rdquo; thought
+      he, &ldquo;but she will use my love to make me amuse that old man.&rdquo; His heart
+      swelled against her injustice and ingratitude, and his crushed vanity
+      turned to strychnine. &ldquo;Mademoiselle,&rdquo; said he, bitterly and doggedly, but
+      sadly, &ldquo;were I so happy as to have your esteem, my heart would overflow,
+      not only on the doctor but on every honest person around. But if I must
+      not have the acquaintance I value more than life, suffer me to be alone in
+      the world, and never to say a word either to Dr. Aubertin, or to any human
+      creature if I can help it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The imperious young beauty drew herself up directly. &ldquo;So be it, monsieur;
+      you teach me how a child should be answered that forgets herself, and asks
+      a favor of a stranger&mdash;a perfect stranger,&rdquo; added she, maliciously.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Could one of the dog-days change to mid-winter in a second, it would
+      hardly seem so cold and cross as Rose de Beaurepaire turned from the
+      smiling, saucy fairy of the moment before. Edouard felt as it were a
+      portcullis of ice come down between her and him. She courtesied and glided
+      away. He bowed and stood frozen to the spot.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He felt so lonely and so bitter, he must go to Jacintha for comfort.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He took advantage of the ladies being with Dard, and marched boldly into
+      the kitchen of Beaurepaire.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, I never,&rdquo; cried Jacintha. &ldquo;But, after all, why not?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He hurled himself on the kitchen table (clean as china), and told her it
+      was all over. &ldquo;She hates me now; but it is not my fault,&rdquo; and so poured
+      forth his tale, and feeling sure of sympathy, asked Jacintha whether it
+      was not bitterly unjust of Rose to refuse him her own acquaintance, yet
+      ask him to amuse that old fogy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Jacintha stood with her great arms akimbo, taking it all in, and looking
+      at him with a droll expression of satirical wonder.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now you listen to a parable,&rdquo; said she. &ldquo;Once there was a little boy
+      madly in love with raspberry jam.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A thing I hate.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t tell me! Who hates raspberry jam? He came to the store closet,
+      where he knew there were jars of it, and&mdash;oh! misery&mdash;the door
+      was locked. He kicked the door, and wept bitterly. His mamma came and
+      said, &lsquo;Here is the key,&rsquo; and gave him the key. And what did he do? Why, he
+      fell to crying and roaring, and kicking the door. &lsquo;I don&rsquo;t wa-wa-wa-wa-nt
+      the key-ey-ey. I wa-a-ant the jam&mdash;oh! oh! oh! oh!&rsquo;&rdquo; and Jacintha
+      mimicked, after her fashion, the mingled grief and ire of infancy debarred
+      its jam. Edouard wore a puzzled air, but it was only for a moment; the
+      next he hid his face in his hands, and cried, &ldquo;Fool!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I shall not contradict you,&rdquo; said his Mentor.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She was my best friend. Once acquainted with the doctor, I could visit at
+      Beaurepaire.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Parbleu!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She had thought of a way to reconcile my wishes with this terrible
+      etiquette that reigns here.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She thinks to more purpose than you do; that is clear.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nothing is left now but to ask her pardon, and to consent; I am off.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, you are not,&rdquo; and Jacintha laid a grasp of iron on him. &ldquo;Will you be
+      quiet?&mdash;is not one blunder a day enough? If you go near her now, she
+      will affront you, and order the doctor not to speak to you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;O Jacintha! your sex then are fiends of malice?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;While it lasts. Luckily with us nothing lasts very long. Now you don&rsquo;t go
+      near her till you have taken advantage of her hint, and made the doctor&rsquo;s
+      acquaintance; that is easy done. He walks two hours on the east road every
+      day, with his feet in the puddles and his head in the clouds. Them&rsquo;s HIS
+      two tastes.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But how am I to get him out of the clouds and the puddles?&rdquo; inquired
+      Riviere half peevishly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How?&rdquo; asked Jacintha, with a dash of that contempt uneducated persons
+      generally have for any one who does not know some little thing they happen
+      to know themselves. &ldquo;How? Why, with the nearest blackbeetle, to be sure.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A blackbeetle?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Black or brown; it matters little. Have her ready for use in your
+      handkerchief: pull a long face: and says you&mdash;&lsquo;Excuse me, sir, I have
+      THE MISFORTUNE not to know the Greek name of this merchandise here.&rsquo; Say
+      that, and behold him launched. He will christen you the beast in Hebrew
+      and Latin as well as Greek, and tell you her history down from the flood:
+      next he will beg her of you, and out will come a cork and a pin, and
+      behold the creature impaled. For that is how men love beetles. He has a
+      thousand pinned down at home&mdash;beetles, butterflies, and so forth.
+      When I go near the rubbish with my duster he trembles like an aspen. I
+      pretend to be going to clean them, but it is only to see the face he
+      makes, for even a domestic must laugh now and then&mdash;or die. But I
+      never do clean them, for after all he is more stupid than wicked, poor
+      man: I have not therefore the sad courage to make him wretched.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Let us return to our beetle&mdash;what will his tirades about its
+      antiquity advance me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh! one begins about a beetle, but one ends Heaven knows where.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Riviere profited by this advice. He even improved on it. In due course he
+      threw himself into Aubertin&rsquo;s way. He stopped the doctor reverentially,
+      and said he had heard he was an entomologist. WOULD he be kind enough to
+      tell him what was this enormous chrysalis he had just found?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The death&rsquo;s head moth!&rdquo; cried Aubertin with enthusiasm&mdash;&ldquo;the death&rsquo;s
+      head moth! a great rarity in this district. Where found you this?&rdquo; Riviere
+      undertook to show him the place.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was half a league distant. Coming and going he had time to make friends
+      with Aubertin, and this was the easier that the old gentleman, who was a
+      physiognomist as well as ologist, had seen goodness and sensibility in
+      Edouard&rsquo;s face. At the end of the walk he begged the doctor to accept the
+      chrysalis. The doctor coquetted. &ldquo;That would be a robbery. You take an
+      interest in these things yourself&mdash;at least I hope so.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The young rogue confessed modestly to the sentiment of entomology, but
+      &ldquo;the government worked him so hard as to leave him no hopes of shining in
+      so high a science,&rdquo; said he sorrowfully.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The doctor pitied him. &ldquo;A young man of your attainments and tastes to be
+      debarred from the everlasting secrets of nature, by the fleeting politics
+      of the day.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Riviere shrugged his shoulders. &ldquo;Somebody must do the dirty work,&rdquo; said
+      he, chuckling inwardly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The chrysalis went to Beaurepaire in the pocket of a grateful man, who
+      that same evening told the whole party his conversation with young
+      Riviere, on whom he pronounced high encomiums. Rose&rsquo;s saucy eyes sparkled
+      with fun: you might have lighted a candle at one and exploded a mine at
+      the other; but not a syllable did she utter.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The doctor proved a key, and opened the enchanted castle. One fine day he
+      presented his friend in the Pleasaunce to the baroness and her daughters.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They received him with perfect politeness. Thus introduced, and as he was
+      not one to let the grass grow under his feet, he soon obtained a footing
+      as friend of the family, which, being now advised by Josephine, he took
+      care not to compromise by making love to Rose before the baroness.
+      However, he insisted on placing his financial talent at their service. He
+      surveyed and valued their lands, and soon discovered that all their farms
+      were grossly underlet. Luckily most of the leases were run out. He
+      prepared a new rent roll, and showed it Aubertin, now his fast friend.
+      Aubertin at his request obtained a list of the mortgages, and Edouard drew
+      a balance-sheet founded on sure data, and proved to the baroness that in
+      able hands the said estate was now solvent.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      This was a great comfort to the old lady: and she said to Aubertin,
+      &ldquo;Heaven has sent us a champion, a little republican&mdash;with the face of
+      an angel.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Descending to practice, Edouard actually put three of the farms into the
+      market, and let them at an advance of twenty per cent on the expired
+      leases. He brought these leases signed; and the baroness had scarcely done
+      thanking him, when her other secret friend, Monsieur Perrin, was
+      announced. Edouard exchanged civilities with him, and then retired to the
+      Pleasaunce. There he found both sisters, who were all tenderness and
+      gratitude to him. By this time he had learned to value Josephine: she was
+      so lovely and so good, and such a true womanly friend to him. Even Rose
+      could not resist her influence, and was obliged to be kind to him, when
+      Josephine was by. But let Josephine go, and instead of her being more
+      tender, as any other girl would, left alone with her lover, sauciness
+      resumed its empire till sweet Josephine returned. Whereof cometh an
+      example; for the said Josephine was summoned to a final conference with
+      the baroness and Monsieur Perrin.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t be long,&rdquo; said Rose, as Josephine glided away, and (taking the
+      precaution to wait till she was quite out of hearing), &ldquo;I shall be so
+      dull, dear, till you come back.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I shall not though,&rdquo; said Edouard.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am not so sure of that. Now then.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now then, what?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Begin.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Begin what?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Amusing me.&rdquo; And she made herself look sullen and unamusable all over.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I will try,&rdquo; said Riviere. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll tell you what they say of you: that you
+      are too young to love.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So I am, much.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, no, no! I made a mistake. I mean too young to be loved.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, I am not too young for that, not a bit.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      This point settled, she suggested that, if he could not amuse her, he had
+      better do THE NEXT BEST THING, and that was, talk sense.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I think I had better not talk at all,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;for I am no match for
+      such a nimble tongue. And then you are so remorseless. I&rsquo;ll hold my
+      tongue, and make a sketch of this magnificent oak.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay, do: draw it as it appeared on a late occasion: with two ladies flying
+      out of it, and you rooted with dismay.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There is no need; that scene is engraved.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Where? in all the shops?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No; on all our memories.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not on mine; not on mine. How terrified you were&mdash;ha, ha! and how
+      terrified we should have been if you had not. Listen: once upon a time&mdash;don&rsquo;t
+      be alarmed: it was long after Noah&mdash;a frightened hare ran by a pond;
+      the frogs splashed in the water, smit with awe. Then she said, &lsquo;Ah ha!
+      there are people in the world I frighten in my turn; I am the thunderbolt
+      of war.&rsquo; Excuse my quoting La Fontaine: I am not in &lsquo;Charles the Twelfth
+      of Sweden&rsquo; yet. I am but a child.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And it&rsquo;s a great mercy, for when you grow up, you will be too much for
+      me, that is evident. Come, then, Mademoiselle the Quizzer, come and adorn
+      my sketch.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur, shall I make you a confession? You will not be angry: I could
+      not support your displeasure. I have a strange inclination to walk up and
+      down this terrace while you go and draw that tree in the Pleasaunce.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Resist that inclination; perhaps it will fly from you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No; you fly from me, and draw. I will rejoin you in a few minutes.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thank you, I&rsquo;m not so stupid. You will step indoors directly.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you doubt my word, sir?&rdquo; asked she haughtily.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He had learned to obey all her caprices; so he went and placed himself on
+      the west side of the oak and took out his sketch-book, and worked
+      zealously and rapidly. He had done the outlines of the tree and was
+      finishing in detail a part of the huge trunk, when his eyes were suddenly
+      dazzled: in the middle of the rugged bark, deformed here and there with
+      great wart-like bosses, and wrinkled, seamed, and ploughed all over with
+      age, burst a bit of variegated color; bright as a poppy on a dungeon wall,
+      it glowed and glittered out through a large hole in the brown bark; it was
+      Rose&rsquo;s face peeping. To our young lover&rsquo;s eye how divine it shone! None of
+      the half tints of common flesh were there, but a thing all rose, lily,
+      sapphire, and soul. His pencil dropped, his mouth opened, he was downright
+      dazzled by the glowing, bewitching face, sparkling with fun, in the gaunt
+      tree. Tell me, ladies, did she know, even at that age, the value of that
+      sombre frame to her brightness? The moment she found herself detected, the
+      gaunt old tree rang musical with a crystal laugh, and out came the
+      arch-dryad. &ldquo;I have been there all the time. How solemn you looked! Now
+      for the result of such profound study.&rdquo; He showed her his work; she
+      altered her tone. &ldquo;Oh, how clever!&rdquo; she cried, &ldquo;and how rapid! What a
+      facility you have! Monsieur is an artist,&rdquo; said she gravely; &ldquo;I will be
+      more respectful,&rdquo; and she dropped him a low courtesy. &ldquo;Mind you promised
+      it me,&rdquo; she added sharply.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You will accept it, then?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That I will, now it is worth having: dear me, I never reckoned on that.
+      Finish it directly,&rdquo; cried this peremptory young person.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;First I must trouble you to stand out there near the tree.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Me? what for?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Because art loves contrasts. The tree is a picture of age and gradual
+      decay; by its side then I must place a personification of youth and
+      growing loveliness.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She did not answer, but made a sort of defiant pirouette, and went where
+      she was bid, and stood there with her back to the artist. &ldquo;That will never
+      do,&rdquo; said he; &ldquo;you really must be so good as to turn round.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, very well.&rdquo; And when she came round, behold her color had risen
+      mightily. Flattery is sweet.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      This child of nature was delighted, and ashamed it should be seen that she
+      was.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And so he drew her, and kept looking off the paper at her, and had a right
+      in his character of artist to look her full in the face; and he did so
+      with long lingering glances. To be sure, they all began severe and
+      businesslike with half-closed eyes, and the peculiar hostile expression
+      art puts on; but then they always ended open-eyed, and so full and tender,
+      that she, poor girl, who was all real gold, though sham brass, blushed and
+      blushed, and did not know which way to look not to be scorched up by his
+      eye like a tender flower, or blandly absorbed like the pearly dew. Ah,
+      happy hour! ah, happy days of youth and innocence and first love!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Trouble loves to intrude on these halcyon days.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The usually quiet Josephine came flying from the house, pale and agitated,
+      and clung despairingly to Rose, and then fell to sobbing and lamenting
+      piteously.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      I shall take leave to relate in my own words what had just occurred to
+      agitate her so. When she entered her mother&rsquo;s room, she found the baroness
+      and Perrin the notary seated watching for her. She sat down after the
+      usual civilities, and Perrin entered upon the subject that had brought
+      him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He began by confessing to them that he had not overcome the refractory
+      creditor without much trouble; and that he had since learned there was
+      another, a larger creditor, likely to press for payment or for sale of the
+      estate. The baroness was greatly troubled by this communication: the
+      notary remained cool as a cucumber, and keenly observant. After a pause he
+      went on to say all this had caused him grave reflections. &ldquo;It seems,&rdquo; said
+      he with cool candor, &ldquo;a sad pity the estate should pass from a family that
+      has held it since the days of Charlemagne.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now God forbid!&rdquo; cried the baroness, lifting her eyes and her quivering
+      hands to heaven.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The notary held the republican creed in all its branches. &ldquo;Providence,
+      madame, does not interfere&mdash;in matters of business,&rdquo; said he.
+      &ldquo;Nothing but money can save the estate. Let us then be practical. Has any
+      means occurred to you of raising money to pay off these incumbrances?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No. What means can there be? The estate is mortgaged to its full value:
+      so they say, at least.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And they say true,&rdquo; put in the notary quickly. &ldquo;But do not distress
+      yourself, madame: confide in me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, my good friend, may Heaven reward you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madame, up to the present time I have no complaint to make of Heaven. I
+      am on the rise: here, mademoiselle, is a gimcrack they have given me;&rdquo; and
+      he unbuttoned his overcoat, and showed them a piece of tricolored ribbon
+      and a clasp. &ldquo;As for me, I look to &lsquo;the solid;&rsquo; I care little for these
+      things,&rdquo; said he, swelling visibly, &ldquo;but the world is dazzled by them.
+      However, I can show you something better.&rdquo; He took out a letter. &ldquo;This is
+      from the Minister of the Interior to a client of mine: a promise I shall
+      be the next prefect; and the present prefect&mdash;I am happy to say&mdash;is
+      on his death-bed. Thus, madame, your humble servant in a few short months
+      will be notary no longer, but prefect; I shall then sell my office of
+      notary: and I flatter myself when I am a prefect you will not blush to own
+      me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then, as now, monsieur,&rdquo; said the baroness politely, &ldquo;we shall recognize
+      your merit. But&rdquo;&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I understand, madame: like me you look to &lsquo;the solid.&rsquo; Thus then it is; I
+      have money.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah! all the better for you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have a good deal of money. But it is dispersed in a great many small
+      but profitable investments: to call it in suddenly would entail some loss.
+      Nevertheless, if you and my young lady there have ever so little of that
+      friendly feeling towards me of which I have so much towards you, all my
+      investments shall be called in, and two-thirds of your creditors shall be
+      paid off at once. A single client of mine, no less a man than the
+      Commandant Raynal, will, I am sure, advance me the remaining third at an
+      hour&rsquo;s notice; and so Beaurepaire chateau, park, estate, and grounds, down
+      to the old oak-tree, shall be saved; and no power shall alienate them from
+      you, mademoiselle, and from the heirs of your body.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness clasped her hands in ecstasy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But what are we to do for this?&rdquo; inquired Josephine calmly, &ldquo;for it seems
+      to me that it can only be effected by a sacrifice on your part.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I thank you, mademoiselle, for your penetration in seeing that I must
+      make sacrifices. I would never have told you, but you have seen it; and I
+      do not regret that you have seen it. Madame&mdash;mademoiselle&mdash;those
+      sacrifices appear little to me; will seem nothing; will never be
+      mentioned, or even alluded to after this day, if you, on your part, will
+      lay me under a far heavier obligation, if in short&rdquo;&mdash;here the
+      contemner of things unsubstantial reopened his coat, and brought his
+      ribbon to light again&mdash;&ldquo;if you, madame, will accept me for your
+      son-in-law&mdash;if you, mademoiselle, will take me for your husband.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness and her daughter looked at one another in silence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is it a jest?&rdquo; inquired the former of the latter.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Can you think so? Answer Monsieur Perrin. He has just done us a kind
+      office, mother.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I shall remember it. Monsieur, permit me to regret that having lately won
+      our gratitude and esteem, you have taken this way of modifying those
+      feelings. But after all,&rdquo; she added with gentle courtesy, &ldquo;we may well put
+      your good deeds against this&mdash;this error in judgment. The balance is
+      in your favor still, provided you never return to this topic. Come, is it
+      agreed?&rdquo; The baroness&rsquo;s manner was full of tact, and the latter sentences
+      were said with an open kindliness of manner. There was nothing to prevent
+      Perrin from dropping the subject, and remaining good friends. A gentleman
+      or a lover would have so done. Monsieur Perrin was neither. He said
+      bitterly, &ldquo;You refuse me, then.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The tone and the words were each singly too much for the baroness&rsquo;s pride.
+      She answered coldly but civilly,&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I do not refuse you. I do not take an affront into consideration.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Be calm, mamma; no affront whatever was intended.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah! here is one that is more reasonable,&rdquo; cried Perrin.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There are men,&rdquo; continued Josephine without noticing him, &ldquo;who look to
+      but one thing&mdash;interest. It was an offer made politely in the way of
+      business: decline it in the same spirit; that is what you have to do.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur, you hear what mademoiselle says? She carries politeness a long
+      way. After all it is a good fault. Well, monsieur, I need not answer you,
+      since Mademoiselle de Beaurepaire has answered you; but I detain you no
+      longer.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Strictly a weasel has no business with the temper of a tiger, but this one
+      had, and the long vindictiveness of a Corsican. &ldquo;Ah! my little lady, you
+      turn me out of the house, do you?&rdquo; cried he, grinding his teeth.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Turn him out of the house? what a phrase! where has this man lived?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A man!&rdquo; snarled Perrin, &ldquo;whom none ever yet insulted without repenting
+      it, and repenting in vain. You are under obligations to me, and you think
+      to turn me out! You are at my mercy, and you think I will let you turn me
+      to your door! In less than a mouth I will stand here, and say to you,
+      Beaurepaire is mine. Begone from it!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      When he uttered these terrible words, each of which was like a
+      sword-stroke to the baroness, the old lady, whose courage was not equal to
+      her strength, shrank over the side of her arm-chair, and cried piteously&mdash;&ldquo;He
+      threatens me! he threatens me! I am frightened;&rdquo; and put up her trembling
+      hands, for the notary&rsquo;s eloquence, being accompanied with abundance of
+      gesture, bordered upon physical violence. His brutality received an
+      unexpected check. Imagine that a sparrow-hawk had seized a trembling
+      pigeon, and that a royal falcon swooped, and with one lightning-like
+      stroke of body and wing, buffeted him away, and sent him gaping and
+      glaring and grasping at pigeonless air with his claws. So swift and
+      majestic, Josephine de Beaurepaire came from her chair with one gesture of
+      her body between her mother and the notary, who was advancing with arms
+      folded in a brutal, menacing way&mdash;not the Josephine we have seen her,
+      the calm languid beauty, but the demoiselle de Beaurepaire&mdash;her great
+      heart on fire&mdash;her blood up&mdash;not her own only, but all the blood
+      of all the De Beaurepaires&mdash;pale as ashes with great wrath, her
+      purple eyes on fire, and her whole panther-like body full of spring.
+      &ldquo;Wretch! you dare to insult her, and before me! Arriere miserable! or I
+      soil my hand with your face.&rdquo; And her hand was up with the word, up, up,
+      higher it seemed than ever a hand was raised before. And if he had
+      hesitated one moment, I really believe it would have come down; not
+      heavily, perhaps&mdash;the lightning is not heavy. But there was no need.
+      The towering threat and the flaming eye and the swift rush buffeted the
+      caitiff away: he recoiled. She followed him as he went, strong, FOR A
+      MOMENT OR TWO, as Hercules, beautiful and terrible as Michael driving
+      Satan. He dared not, or could not stand before her: he writhed and cowered
+      and recoiled all down the room, while she marched upon him. But the driven
+      serpent hissed horribly as it wriggled away.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You shall both be turned out of Beaurepaire by me, and forever; I swear
+      it, parole de Perrin.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He had not been gone a minute when Josephine&rsquo;s courage oozed away, and she
+      ran, or rather tottered, into the Pleasaunce, and clung like a drowning
+      thing to Rose, and, when Edouard took her hand, she clung to him. They had
+      to gather what had happened how they could: the account was constantly
+      interrupted with her sobs and self-reproaches. She said she had ruined all
+      she loved: ruined her sister, ruined her mother, ruined the house of
+      Beaurepaire. Why was she ever born? Why had she not died three years ago?
+      (Query, what was the date at which Camille&rsquo;s letters suddenly stopped?)
+      &ldquo;That coward,&rdquo; said she, &ldquo;has the heart of a fiend. He told us he never
+      forgave an affront; and he holds our fate in his hands. He will drive our
+      mother from her home, and she will die: murdered by her own daughter.
+      After all, why did I refuse him? What should I have sacrificed by marrying
+      him? Rose, write to him, and say&mdash;say&mdash;I was taken by surprise,
+      I&mdash;I&rdquo;&mdash;a violent flood of tears interrupted the sentence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose flung her arms round her neck. &ldquo;My beautiful Josephine marry that
+      creature? Let house and lands go a thousand times sooner. I love my sister
+      a thousand times better than the walls of this or any other house.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come, come,&rdquo; cried Edouard, &ldquo;you are forgetting ME all this time. Do you
+      really think I am the sort of man to stand by with my hands in my pockets,
+      and let her marry that cur, or you be driven out of Beaurepaire? Neither,
+      while I live.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Alas! dear boy,&rdquo; sighed Josephine, &ldquo;what can you do?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll soon show you. From this hour forth it is a duel between that Perrin
+      and me. Now, Josephine&mdash;Rose&mdash;don&rsquo;t you cry and fret like that:
+      but just look quietly on, and enjoy the fight, both of you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine shook her head with a sad smile: but Rose delivered herself
+      thus, after a sob, &ldquo;La, yes; I forgot: we have got a gentleman now; that&rsquo;s
+      one comfort.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Edouard rose to the situation: he saw that Perrin would lose no time; and
+      that every day, or even hour, might be precious. He told them that the
+      first thing he must do for them was to leave the company he loved best on
+      earth, and run down to the town to consult Picard the rival notary: he
+      would be back by supper-time, when he hoped they would do him the honor,
+      in a matter of such importance, to admit him to a family council.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine assented with perfect simplicity; Rose with a deep blush, for
+      she was too quick not to see all the consequences of admitting so brisk a
+      wooer into a family council.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was a wet evening, and a sad and silent party sat round a wood fire in
+      the great dining-hall. The baroness was almost prostrated by the scene
+      with Perrin; and a sombre melancholy and foreboding weighed on all their
+      spirits, when presently Edouard Riviere entered briskly, and saluted them
+      all profoundly, and opened the proceedings with a little favorite
+      pomposity. &ldquo;Madame the baroness, and you Monsieur Aubertin, who honor me
+      with your esteem, and you Mademoiselle de Beaurepaire, whom I adore, and
+      you Mademoiselle Rose, whom I hoped to be permitted&mdash;you have this
+      day done me the honor to admit me as your adviser. I am here to lay my
+      plans before you. I believe, madame, I have already convinced you that
+      your farms are under-let, and your property lowered in value by general
+      mismanagement; this was doubtless known to Perrin, and set him scheming.
+      Well, I rely on the same circumstance to defeat him. I have consulted
+      Picard and shown him the rent-roll and balance-sheet I had already shown
+      you. He has confessed that the estate is worth more than its debts, so
+      capitalists can safely advance the money. To-morrow morning, then, I ride
+      to Commandant Raynal for a week&rsquo;s leave of absence; then, armed with
+      Picard&rsquo;s certificate, shall proceed to my uncle and ask him to lend the
+      money. His estate is very small compared with Beaurepaire, but he has
+      always farmed it himself. &lsquo;I&rsquo;ll have no go-between,&rsquo; says he, &lsquo;to
+      impoverish both self and soil.&rsquo; He is also a bit of a misanthrope, and has
+      made me one. I have a very poor opinion of my fellow-creatures, very.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, but,&rdquo; said Rose, &ldquo;if he is all that, he will not sympathize with
+      us, who have so mismanaged Beaurepaire. Will he not despise us?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Edouard was a little staggered, but Aubertin came to his aid.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Permit me, Josephine,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;Natural history steps in here, and
+      teaches by me, its mouth-piece. A misanthrope hates all mankind, but is
+      kind to every individual, generally too kind. A philanthrope loves the
+      whole human race, but dislikes his wife, his mother, his brother, and his
+      friends and acquaintances. Misanthrope is the potato: rough and repulsive
+      outside, but good to the core. Philanthrope is a peach: his manner all
+      velvet and bloom, his words sweet juice, his heart of hearts a stone. Let
+      me read Philanthrope&rsquo;s book, and fall into the hands of Misanthrope.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Edouard admitted the shrewdness of this remark.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And so,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;my misanthrope will say plenty of biting words,&mdash;which,
+      by-the-by, will not hurt you, who will not hear them, only me,&mdash;and
+      then he&rsquo;ll lend us the money, and Beaurepaire will be free, and I shall
+      have had a hand in it. Hurrah!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Then came a delicious hour to Edouard Riviere. Young and old poured out
+      their glowing thanks and praises upon him till his checks burned like
+      fire.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness was especially grateful, and expressed a gentle regret that
+      she could see no way of showing her gratitude except in words. &ldquo;What can
+      we do for this little angel?&rdquo; said she, turning to Josephine.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Leave that to me, mamma,&rdquo; replied Josephine, turning her lovely eyes full
+      on Edouard, with a look the baroness misunderstood directly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She sat and watched Josephine and Edouard with comical severity all the
+      rest of the time she was there; and, when she retired, she kissed Rose
+      affectionately, but whispered her eldest daughter, &ldquo;I hope you are not
+      serious. A mere boy compared with you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But such a sweet one,&rdquo; suggested Josephine, apologetically.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What will the world come to?&rdquo; said the baroness out loud, and retreated
+      with a sour glance at all of them&mdash;except Rose.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She had not been gone five minutes when a letter came by messenger to
+      Edouard. It was from Picard. He read it out.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Perrin has been with me, to raise money. He wants it in forty-eight
+      hours. Promises good legal security. I have agreed to try and arrange the
+      matter for him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They were all astonished at this.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The double-faced traitor!&rdquo; cried Edouard. &ldquo;Stay; wait a minute. Let us
+      read it to an end.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This promise is, of course, merely to prevent his going elsewhere. At the
+      end of the forty-eight hours I shall begin to make difficulties. Meantime,
+      as Perrin is no fool, you had better profit to the full by this temporary
+      delay.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well done, Picard!&rdquo; shouted Edouard. &ldquo;Notary cut notary. I won&rsquo;t lose an
+      hour. I&rsquo;ll start at five; Commandant Raynal is an early riser himself.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Accordingly, at five he was on the road; Raynal&rsquo;s quarters lay in the
+      direct line to his uncle&rsquo;s place. He found the commandant at home, and was
+      well received. Raynal had observed his zeal, and liked his manners. He
+      gave him the week&rsquo;s leave, and kept him to breakfast, and had his horse
+      well fed. At eight o&rsquo;clock Edouard rode out of the premises in high
+      spirits. At the very gate he met a gaunt figure riding in on a squab pony.
+      It was Perrin the notary coming in hot haste to his friend and employer,
+      Commandant Raynal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0005" id="link2HCH0005">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER V.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      After Edouard&rsquo;s departure, Josephine de Beaurepaire was sad, and weighed
+      down with presentiments. She felt as soldiers sometimes feel who know the
+      enemy is undermining them; no danger on the surface; nothing that can be
+      seen, met, baffled, attacked, or evaded; in daily peril, all the more
+      horrible that it imitates perfect serenity, they await the fatal match.
+      She imparted her misgivings to Aubertin; but he assured her she
+      exaggerated the danger.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We have a friend still more zealous and active than our enemy; believe
+      me, your depression is really caused by his absence; we all miss the
+      contact of that young heroic spirit; we are a body, and he its soul.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine was silent, for she said to herself, &ldquo;Why should I dash their
+      spirits? they are so happy and confident.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Edouard had animated Rose and Aubertin with his own courage, and had even
+      revived the baroness.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It had been agreed between him and Picard that the latter should
+      communicate with Dr. Aubertin direct, should anything fresh occur. And on
+      the third day after Edouard&rsquo;s departure, Picard sent up a private message:
+      &ldquo;Perrin has just sent me a line to say he will not trouble us, as he is
+      offered the money in another quarter.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      This was a heavy blow, and sent them all to bed more or less despondent.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The next day brought a long letter from Edouard to Rose, telling her he
+      had found his uncle crusty at first; but at last with a little patience,
+      and the co-operation of Martha, his uncle&rsquo;s old servant, and his nurse,
+      the old boy had come round. They might look on the affair as all but
+      settled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The contents of this letter were conveyed to the baroness. The house
+      brightened under it: the more so that there was some hope of their
+      successful champion returning in person next day. Meantime Perrin had
+      applied to Raynal for the immediate loan of a large sum of money on
+      excellent security. Raynal refused plump. Perrin rode away disconsolate.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But the next day he returned to the charge with another proposal: and the
+      nature of this second proposal we shall learn from events.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The day Edouard was expected opened deliciously. It was a balmy morning,
+      and tempted the sisters out before breakfast. They strolled on the south
+      terrace with their arms round each other&rsquo;s waists, talking about Edouard,
+      and wondering whether they should really see him before night. Rose owned
+      she had missed him, and confessed for the first time she was a proud and
+      happy girl.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;May I tell him so?&rdquo; asked Josephine.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not for all the world. Would you dare?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Further discussion of that nice point was stopped by the baroness coming
+      out, leaning on Dr. Aubertin.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then&mdash;how we young people of an unceremonious age should have stared&mdash;the
+      demoiselles de Beaurepaire, inasmuch as this was their mother&rsquo;s first
+      appearance, lowered their fair heads at the same time like young poplars
+      bowing to the wind, and so waited reverently till she had slightly lifted
+      her hands, and said, &ldquo;God bless you, my children!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      It was done in a moment on both sides, but full of grace and piety, and
+      the charm of ancient manners.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How did our dear mother sleep?&rdquo; inquired Josephine. Aubertin interposed
+      with a theory that she slept very well indeed if she took what he gave
+      her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay, IF,&rdquo; suggested Rose, saucily.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I slept,&rdquo; said the baroness, &ldquo;and I wish I had not for I dreamed an ugly
+      dream.&rdquo; They all gathered round her, and she told her dream.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I thought I was with you all in this garden. I was admiring the flowers
+      and the trees, and the birds were singing with all their might. Suddenly a
+      dark cloud came; it cleared almost directly; but flowers, trees, sky, and
+      birds were gone now, and I could see the chateau itself no more. It means
+      that I was dead. An ugly dream, my children, an ugly dream.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But only a dream, dear mother,&rdquo; said Rose: then with a sweet, consoling
+      smile, &ldquo;See, here is your terrace and your chateau.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And here are your daughters,&rdquo; said Josephine; and they both came and
+      kissed her to put their existence out of doubt. &ldquo;And here is your
+      Aesculapius,&rdquo; said Aubertin. &ldquo;And here is your Jacintha.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Breakfast, madame,&rdquo; said Jacintha. &ldquo;Breakfast, mesdemoiselles. Breakfast,
+      monsieur:&rdquo; dropping each a distinct courtesy in turn.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She has turned the conversation very agreeably,&rdquo; said the baroness, and
+      went in leaning on her old friend.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But the sisters lagged behind and took several turns in silence. Rose was
+      the first to speak. &ldquo;How superstitious of you!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I said nothing.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No; but you looked volumes at me while mamma was telling her dream. For
+      my part I feel sure love is stronger than hate; and we shall stay all our
+      days in this sweet place: and O Josey! am I not a happy girl that it&rsquo;s all
+      owing to HIM!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At this moment Jacintha came running towards them. They took it for a
+      summons to breakfast, and moved to meet her. But they soon saw she was
+      almost as white as her apron, and she came open-mouthed and wringing her
+      hands. &ldquo;What shall I do? what shall I do? Oh, don&rsquo;t let my poor mistress
+      know!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They soon got from her that Dard had just come from the town, and learned
+      the chateau was sold, and the proprietor coming to take possession this
+      very day. The poor girls were stupefied by the blow.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      If anything, Josephine felt it worst. &ldquo;It is my doing,&rdquo; she gasped, and
+      tottered fainting. Rose supported her: she shook it off by a violent
+      effort. &ldquo;This is no time for weakness,&rdquo; she cried, wildly; &ldquo;come to the
+      Pleasaunce; there is water there. I love my mother. What will I not do for
+      her? I love my mother.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Muttering thus wildly she made for the pond in the Pleasaunce. She had no
+      sooner turned the angle of the chateau than she started back with a
+      convulsive cry, and her momentary feebleness left her directly; she
+      crouched against the wall and griped the ancient corner-stone with her
+      tender hand till it powdered, and she spied with dilating eye into the
+      Pleasaunce, Rose and Jacintha panting behind her. Two men stood with their
+      backs turned to her looking at the oak-tree; one an officer in full
+      uniform, the other the human snake Perrin. Though the soldier&rsquo;s back was
+      turned, his off-handed, peremptory manner told her he was inspecting the
+      place as its master.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The baroness! the baroness!&rdquo; cried Jacintha, with horror. They looked
+      round, and the baroness was at their very backs.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What is it?&rdquo; cried she, gayly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nothing, mamma.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Let me see this nothing.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They glanced at one another, and, idle as the attempt was, the habit of
+      sparing her prevailed, and they flung themselves between her and the blow.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Josephine is not well,&rdquo; said Rose. &ldquo;She wants to go in.&rdquo; Both girls faced
+      the baroness.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Jacintha,&rdquo; said the baroness, &ldquo;fetch Dr. Aubertin. There, I have sent her
+      away. So now tell me, why do you drive me back so? Something has
+      happened,&rdquo; and she looked keenly from one to the other.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;O mamma! do not go that way: there are strangers in the Pleasaunce.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Let me see. So there are. Call Jacintha back that I may order these
+      people out of my premises.&rdquo; Josephine implored her to be calm.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Be calm when impertinent intruders come into my garden?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mother, they are not intruders.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What do you mean?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;They have a right to be in our Pleasaunce. They have bought the chateau.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is impossible. HE was to buy it for us&mdash;there is some mistake&mdash;what
+      man would kill a poor old woman like me? I will speak to this gentleman:
+      he wears a sword. Soldiers do not trample on women. Ah! that man.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The notary, attracted by her voice, was coming towards her, a paper in his
+      hand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Raynal coolly inspected the tree, and tapped it with his scabbard, and
+      left Perrin to do the dirty work. The notary took off his hat, and, with a
+      malignant affectation of respect, presented the baroness with a paper.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The poor old thing took it with a courtesy, the effect of habit, and read
+      it to her daughters as well as her emotion permitted, and the language,
+      which was as new to her as the dialect of Cat Island to Columbus.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Jean Raynal, domiciled by right, and lodging in fact at the Chateau of
+      Beaurepaire, acting by the pursuit and diligence of Master Perrin, notary;
+      I, Guillaume Le Gras, bailiff, give notice to Josephine Aglae St. Croix de
+      Beaurepaire, commonly called the Baroness de Beaurepaire, having no known
+      place of abode&rdquo;&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But lodging wrongfully at the said Chateau of Beaurepaire, that she is
+      warned to decamp within twenty-four hours&rdquo;&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To decamp!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Failing which that she will be thereto enforced in the manner for that
+      case made and provided with the aid of all the officers and agents of the
+      public force.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah! no, messieurs, pray do not use force. I am frightened enough already.
+      I did not know I was doing anything wrong. I have been here thirty years.
+      But, since Beaurepaire is sold, I comprehend perfectly that I must go. It
+      is just. As you say, I am not in my own house. I will go, gentlemen, I
+      will go. Whither shall I go, my children? The house where you were born to
+      me is ours no longer. Excuse me, gentlemen&mdash;this is nothing to you.
+      Ah! sir, you have revenged yourself on two weak women&mdash;may Heaven
+      forgive you!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The notary turned on his heel. The poor baroness, all whose pride the iron
+      law, with its iron gripe, had crushed into dismay and terror, appealed to
+      him. &ldquo;O sir! send me from the house, but not from the soil where my Henri
+      is laid! is there not in all this domain a corner where she who was its
+      mistress may lie down and die? Where is the NEW BARON, that I may ask this
+      favor of him on my knees?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She turned towards Raynal and seemed to be going towards him with
+      outstretched arms. But Rose checked her with fervor. &ldquo;Mamma! do not lower
+      yourself. Ask nothing of these wretches. Let us lose all, but not forget
+      ourselves.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness had not her daughter&rsquo;s spirit. Her very person tottered under
+      this blow. Josephine supported her, and the next moment Aubertin came out
+      and hastened to her side. Her head fell back; what little strength she had
+      failed her; she was half lifted, half led, into the house.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Commandant Raynal was amazed at all this, and asked what the deuce was the
+      matter.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh!&rdquo; said the notary, &ldquo;we are used to these little scenes in our
+      business.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But I am not,&rdquo; replied the soldier. &ldquo;You never told me there was to be
+      all this fuss.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He then dismissed his friend rather abruptly and strode up and down the
+      Pleasaunce. He twisted his mustaches, muttered, and &ldquo;pested,&rdquo; and was ill
+      at ease. Accustomed to march gayly into a town, and see the regiment, that
+      was there before, marching gayly out, or vice versa, and to strike tents
+      twice a quarter at least, he was little prepared for such a scene as this.
+      True, he did not hear all the baroness&rsquo;s words, but more than one tone of
+      sharp distress reached him where he stood, and the action of the whole
+      scene was so expressive, there was little need of words. He saw the notice
+      given; the dismay it caused, and the old lady turn imploringly towards him
+      with a speaking gesture, and above all he saw her carried away, half
+      fainting, her hands clasped, her reverend face pale. He was not a man of
+      quick sensibilities. He did not thoroughly take the scene in at first: it
+      grew upon him afterwards.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Confound it,&rdquo; thought he, &ldquo;I am the proprietor. They all say so. Instead
+      of which I feel like a thief. Fancy her getting so fond of a PLACE as all
+      this.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Presently it occurred to him that the shortness of the notice might have
+      much to do with her distress. &ldquo;These notaries,&rdquo; said he to himself,
+      &ldquo;understand nothing save law: women have piles of baggage, and can&rsquo;t
+      strike tents directly the order comes, as we can. Perhaps if I were to
+      give them twenty-four days instead of hours?&mdash;hum!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      With this the commandant fell into a brown study. Now each of us has his
+      attitude of brown study. One runs about the room like hyena in his den;
+      another stands stately with folded arms (this one seldom thinks to the
+      purpose); another sits cross-legged, brows lowered: another must put his
+      head into his hand, and so keep it up to thinking mark: another must
+      twiddle a bit of string, or a key; grant him this, he can hatch an epic.
+      This commandant must draw himself up very straight, and walk six paces and
+      back very slowly, till the problem was solved: I suspect he had done a
+      good bit of sentinel work in his time.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Now whilst he was guarding the old oak-tree, for all the world as if it
+      had been the gate of the Tuileries or the barracks, Josephine de
+      Beaurepaire came suddenly out from the house and crossed the Pleasaunce:
+      her hair was in disorder, her manner wild: she passed swiftly into the
+      park.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Raynal recognized her as one of the family; and after a moment&rsquo;s
+      reflection followed her into the park with the good-natured intention of
+      offering her a month to clear out instead of a day.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But it was not so easy to catch her: she flew. He had to take his scabbard
+      in his left hand and fairly run after her. Before he could catch her, she
+      entered the little chapel. He came up and had his foot on the very step to
+      go in, when he was arrested by that he heard within.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine had thrown herself on her knees and was praying aloud: praying
+      to the Virgin with sighs and sobs and all her soul: wrestling so in prayer
+      with a dead saint as by a strange perversity men cannot or will not
+      wrestle with Him, who alone can hear a million prayers at once from a
+      million different places,&mdash;can realize and be touched with a sense of
+      all man&rsquo;s infirmities in a way no single saint with his partial experience
+      of them can realize and be touched by them; who unasked suspended the laws
+      of nature that had taken a stranger&rsquo;s only son, and she a widow; and wept
+      at another great human sorrow, while the eyes of all the great saints that
+      stood around it and Him were dry.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Well, the soldier stood, his right foot on the step and his sword in his
+      left hand, transfixed: listening gravely to the agony of prayer the
+      innocent young creature poured forth within:&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;O Madonna! hear me: it is for my mother&rsquo;s life. She will die&mdash;she
+      will die. You know she cannot live if she is taken away from her house and
+      from this holy place where she prays to you this many years. O Queen of
+      Heaven! put out your hand to us unfortunates! Virgin, hear a virgin:
+      mother, listen to a child who prays for her mother&rsquo;s life! The doctor says
+      she will not live away from here. She is too old to wander over the world.
+      Let them drive us forth: we are young, but not her, mother, oh, not her!
+      Forgive the cruel men that do this thing!&mdash;they are like those who
+      crucified your Son&mdash;they know not what they are doing. But you, Queen
+      of Heaven, you know all; and, sweet mother, if you have kind sentiments
+      towards me, poor Josephine, ah! show them now: for you know that it was I
+      who insulted that wicked notary, and it is out of hatred to me he has sold
+      our beloved house to a hard stranger. Look down on me, a child who loves
+      her mother, yet will destroy her unless you pity me and help me. Oh! what
+      shall I say?&mdash;what shall I do? mercy! mercy! for my poor mother, for
+      me!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Here her utterance was broken by sobs.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The soldier withdrew his foot quietly. Her words had knocked against his
+      very breast-bone. He marched slowly to and fro before the chapel, upright
+      as a dart, and stiff as a ramrod, and actually pale: for even our nerves
+      have their habits; a woman&rsquo;s passionate grief shook him as a cannon fired
+      over his head could not.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine little thought who was her sentinel. She came to the door at
+      last, and there he was marching backwards and forwards, upright and stiff.
+      She gave a faint scream and drew back with a shudder at the sight of their
+      persecutor. She even felt faintish at him, as women will in such cases.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Not being very quick at interpreting emotion, Raynal noticed her alarm,
+      but not her repugnance; he saluted her with military precision by touching
+      his cap as only a soldier can, and said rather gently for him, &ldquo;A word
+      with you, mademoiselle.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She replied only by trembling.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t be frightened,&rdquo; said Raynal, in a tone not very reassuring. &ldquo;I
+      propose an armistice.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am at your disposal, sir,&rdquo; said Josephine, now assuming a calmness that
+      was belied by the long swell of her heaving bosom.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of course you look on me as an enemy.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How can I do otherwise, sir? yet perhaps I ought not. You did not know
+      us. You just wanted an estate, I suppose&mdash;and&mdash;oh!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, don&rsquo;t cry; and let us come to the point, since I am a man of few
+      words.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If you please, sir. My mother may miss me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, I was in position on your flank when the notary delivered his fire.
+      And I saw the old woman&rsquo;s distress.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, sir!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;When you came flying out I followed to say a good word to you. I could
+      not catch you. I listened while you prayed to the Virgin. That was not a
+      soldier-like trick, you will say. I confess it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It matters little, sir, and you heard nothing I blush for.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No! by St. Denis; quite the contrary. Well, to the point. Young lady, you
+      love your mother.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What has she on earth now but her children&rsquo;s love?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now look here, young lady, I had a mother; I loved her in my humdrum way
+      very dearly. She promised me faithfully not to die till I should be a
+      colonel; and she went and died before I was a commandant, even; just
+      before, too.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then I pity you,&rdquo; murmured Josephine; and her soft purple eye began to
+      dwell on him with less repugnance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thank you for that word, my good young lady,&rdquo; said Raynal. &ldquo;Now, I
+      declare, you are the first that has said that word to me about my losing
+      the true friend, that nursed me on her knee, and pinched and pinched to
+      make a man of me. I should like to tell you about her and me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I shall feel honored,&rdquo; said Josephine, politely, but with considerable
+      restraint.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then he told her all about how he had vexed her when he was a boy, and
+      gone for a soldier, though she was all for trade, and how he had been the
+      more anxious to see her enjoy his honors and success. &ldquo;And, mademoiselle,&rdquo;
+       said he, appealingly, &ldquo;the day this epaulet was put on my shoulder in
+      Italy, she died in Paris. Ah! how could you have the heart to do that, my
+      old woman?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The soldier&rsquo;s mustache quivered, and he turned away brusquely, and took
+      several steps. Then he came back to Josephine, and to his infinite
+      surprise saw that her purple eyes were thick with tears. &ldquo;What? you are
+      within an inch of crying for my mother, you who have your own trouble at
+      this hour.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur, our situations are so alike, I may well spare some little
+      sympathy for your misfortune.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thank you, my good young lady. Well, then, to business; while you were
+      praying to the Virgin, I was saying a word or two for my part to her who
+      is no more.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sir!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh! it was nothing beautiful like the things you said to the other. Can I
+      turn phrases? I saw her behind her little counter in the Rue Quincampoix;
+      for she is a woman of the people, is my mother. I saw myself come to the
+      other side of the counter, and I said, &lsquo;Look here, mother, here is the
+      devil to pay about this new house. The old woman talks of dying if we take
+      her from her home, and the young one weeps and prays to all the saints in
+      paradise; what shall we do, eh?&rsquo; Then I thought my old woman said to me,
+      &lsquo;Jean, you are a soldier, a sort of vagabond; what do you want with a
+      house in France? you who are always in a tent in Italy or Austria, or who
+      knows where. Have you the courage to give honest folk so much pain for a
+      caprice? Come now,&rsquo; says she, &lsquo;the lady is of my age, say you, and I can&rsquo;t
+      keep your fine house, because God has willed it otherwise; so give her my
+      place; so then you can fancy it is me you have set down at your hearth:
+      that will warm your heart up a bit, you little scamp,&rsquo; said my old woman
+      in her rough way. She was not well-bred like you, mademoiselle. A woman of
+      the people, nothing more.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She was a woman of God&rsquo;s own making, if she was like that,&rdquo; cried
+      Josephine, the tears now running down her cheeks.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, that she was, she was. So between her and me it is settled&mdash;what
+      are you crying for NOW? why, you have won the day; the field is yours;
+      your mother and you remain; I decamp.&rdquo; He whipped his scabbard up with his
+      left hand, and was going off without another word, if Josephine had not
+      stopped him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But, sir, what am I to think? what am I to hope? it is impossible that in
+      this short interview&mdash;and we must not forget what is due to you. You
+      have bought the estate.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;True; well, we will talk over that, to-morrow; but being turned out of
+      the house, that was the bayonet thrust to the old lady. So you run in and
+      put her heart at rest about it. Tell her that she may live and die in this
+      house for Jean Raynal; and tell her about the old woman in the Rue
+      Quincampoix.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;God bless you, Jean Raynal!&rdquo; cried Josephine, clasping her hands.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Are you going?&rdquo; said he, peremptorily.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, yes!&rdquo; and she darted towards the chateau.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But when she had taken three steps she paused, and seemed irresolute. She
+      turned, and in a moment she had glided to Raynal again and had taken his
+      hand before he could hinder her, and pressed two velvet lips on it, and
+      was away again, her cheeks scarlet at what she had done, and her wet eyes
+      beaming with joy. She skimmed the grass like a lapwing; you would have
+      taken her at this minute for Rose, or for Virgil&rsquo;s Camilla; at the gate
+      she turned an instant and clasped her hands together, with such a look, to
+      show Raynal she blessed him again, then darted into the house.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Aha, my lady,&rdquo; said he, as he watched her fly, &ldquo;behold you changed a
+      little since you came out.&rdquo; He was soon on the high road marching down to
+      the town at a great rate, his sword clanking, and thus ran his thoughts:
+      &ldquo;This does one good; you are right, my old woman. Your son&rsquo;s bosom feels
+      as warm as toast. Long live the five-franc pieces! And they pretend money
+      cannot make a fellow happy. They lie; it is because they do not know how
+      to spend it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Meantime at the chateau, as still befalls in emergencies and trials, the
+      master spirit came out and took its real place. Rose was now the mistress
+      of Beaurepaire; she set Jacintha, and Dard, and the doctor, to pack up
+      everything of value in the house. &ldquo;Do it this moment!&rdquo; she cried; &ldquo;once
+      that notary gets possession of the house, it may be too late. Enough of
+      folly and helplessness. We have fooled away house and lands; our movables
+      shall not follow them.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The moment she had set the others to work, she wrote a single line to
+      Riviere to tell him the chateau and lands were sold, and would he come to
+      Beaurepaire at once? She ran with it herself to Bigot&rsquo;s auberge, the
+      nearest post-office, and then back to comfort her mother.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness was seated in her arm-chair, moaning and wringing her hands,
+      and Rose was nursing and soothing her, and bathing her temples with her
+      last drop of eau de Cologne, and trying in vain to put some of her own
+      courage into her, when in came Josephine radiant with happiness, crying
+      &ldquo;Joy! joy! joy!&rdquo; and told her strange tale, with this difference, that she
+      related her own share in it briefly and coldly, and was more eloquent than
+      I about the strange soldier&rsquo;s goodness, and the interest her mother had
+      awakened in his heart. And she told about the old woman in the Rue
+      Quincampoix, her rugged phrases, and her noble, tender heart. The
+      baroness, deaf to Rose&rsquo;s consolations, brightened up directly at
+      Josephine&rsquo;s news, and at her glowing face, as she knelt pouring the good
+      news, and hope, and comfort, point blank into her. But Rose chilled them
+      both.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is a generous offer,&rdquo; said, she, &ldquo;but one we cannot accept. We cannot
+      live under so great an obligation. Is all the generosity to be on the side
+      of this Bonapartist? Are we noble in name only? What would our father have
+      said to such a proposal?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine hung her head. The baroness groaned.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, mother,&rdquo; continued Rose; &ldquo;let house and land go, but honor and true
+      nobility remain.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What shall I do? you are cruel to me, Rose.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mamma,&rdquo; cried the enthusiastic girl, &ldquo;we need depend on no one. Josephine
+      and I have youth and spirit.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But no money.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We have plenty of jewels, and pictures, and movables. We can take a
+      farm.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A farm!&rdquo; shrieked the baroness.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, his uncle has a farm, and we have had recourse to him for help:
+      better a farmhouse than an almshouse, though that almshouse were a palace
+      instead of a chateau.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine winced and held up her hand deprecatingly. The baroness paled:
+      it was a terrible stroke of language to come from her daughter. She said
+      sternly, &ldquo;There is no answer to that. We were born nobles, let us die
+      farmers: only permit me to die first.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Forgive me, mother,&rdquo; said Rose, kneeling. &ldquo;I was wrong; it is for me to
+      obey you, not to dictate. I speak no more.&rdquo; And, after kissing her mother
+      and Josephine, she crept away, but she left her words sticking in both
+      their consciences.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;HIS uncle,&rdquo; said the shrewd old lady. &ldquo;She is no longer a child; and she
+      says his uncle. This makes me half suspect it is her that dear boy&mdash;Josephine,
+      tell me the truth, which of you is it?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dear mother, who should it be? they are nearly of an age: and what man
+      would not love our sweet Rose, that had eyes or a heart?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness sighed deeply; and was silent. After awhile she said, &ldquo;The
+      moment they have a lover, he detaches their hearts from their poor old
+      mother. She is no longer what my Josephine is to me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mamma, she is my superior. I see it more and more every day. She is
+      proud: she is just; she looks at both sides. As for me, I am too apt to
+      see only what will please those I love.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And that is the daughter for me,&rdquo; cried the poor baroness, opening her
+      arms wide to her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The next morning when they were at breakfast, in came Jacintha to say the
+      officer was in the dining-room and wanted to speak with the young lady he
+      talked to yesterday. Josephine rose and went to him. &ldquo;Well, mademoiselle,&rdquo;
+       said he gayly, &ldquo;the old woman was right. Here I have just got my orders to
+      march: to leave France in a month. A pretty business it would have been if
+      I had turned your mother out. So you see there is nothing to hinder you
+      from living here.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In your house, sir?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why not, pray?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Forgive us. But we feel that would be unjust to you, humiliating to us:
+      the poor are sometimes proud.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of course they are,&rdquo; said Raynal: &ldquo;and I don&rsquo;t want to offend your pride.
+      Confound the house: why did I go and buy it? It is no use to me except to
+      give pain to worthy people.&rdquo; He then, after a moment&rsquo;s reflection, asked
+      her if the matter could not be arranged by some third party, a mutual
+      friend. &ldquo;Then again,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t know any friend of yours.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, sir,&rdquo; said Josephine; &ldquo;we have one friend, who knows you, and
+      esteems you highly.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She wanted to name Edouard; but she hesitated, and asked her conscience if
+      it was fair to name him: and while she blushed and hesitated, lo and
+      behold a rival referee hove in sight. Raynal saw him, suddenly opened a
+      window, and shouted, &ldquo;Hallo come in here: you are wanted.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Perrin had ridden up to complete the exodus of the De Beaurepaires, and
+      was strolling about inspecting the premises he had expelled them from.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Here was a pretty referee!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine almost screamed&mdash;&ldquo;What are you doing? that is our enemy,
+      our bitterest enemy. He has only sold you the estate to spite us, not for
+      the love of you. I had&mdash;we had&mdash;we mortified his vanity. It was
+      not our fault: he is a viper. Sir, pray, pray, pray be on your guard
+      against his counsels.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      These words spoken with rare fire and earnestness carried conviction: but
+      it was too late to recall the invitation. The notary entered the room, and
+      was going to bow obsequiously to Raynal, when he caught sight of
+      Josephine, and almost started. Raynal, after Josephine&rsquo;s warning, was a
+      little at a loss how to make him available; and even that short delay gave
+      the notary&rsquo;s one foible time to lead him into temptation. &ldquo;Our foibles are
+      our manias.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;you have taken possession, commandant. These military men
+      are prompt, are they not, mademoiselle?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do not address yourself to me, sir, I beg,&rdquo; said Josephine quietly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Perrin kept his self-command. &ldquo;It is only as Commandant Raynal&rsquo;s agent I
+      presume to address so distinguished a lady: in that character I must
+      inform you that whatever movables you have removed are yours: those we
+      find in the house on entering we keep.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come, come, not so fast,&rdquo; cried Raynal; &ldquo;bother the chairs and tables!
+      that is not the point.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Commandant,&rdquo; said the notary with dignity, &ldquo;have I done anything to merit
+      this? have I served your interests so ill that you withdraw your
+      confidence from me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, no, my good fellow; but you exceed your powers. Just now I want you
+      to take orders, not give them.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That is only just,&rdquo; said Perrin, &ldquo;and I recall my hasty remark: excuse
+      the susceptibility of a professional man, who is honored with the esteem
+      of his clients; and favor me with your wishes.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;All right,&rdquo; said Raynal heartily. &ldquo;Well, then&mdash;I want mademoiselle
+      and her family to stay here while I go to Egypt with the First Consul.
+      Mademoiselle makes difficulties; it offends her delicacy.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Comedy!&rdquo; said the notary contemptuously.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Though her mother&rsquo;s life depends on her staying here.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Comedy!&rdquo; said Perrin. Raynal frowned.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Her pride (begging her pardon) is greater than her affection.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Farce!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have pitched upon you to reconcile the two.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then you have pitched upon the wrong man,&rdquo; said Perrin bluntly. He added
+      obsequiously, &ldquo;I am too much your friend. She has been talking you over,
+      no doubt; but you have a friend, an Ulysses, who is deaf to the siren&rsquo;s
+      voice. I will be no party to such a transaction. I will not co-operate to
+      humbug my friend and rob him of his rights.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      If Josephine was inferior to the notary in petty sharpness, she was his
+      superior in the higher kinds of sagacity; and particularly in instinctive
+      perception of character. Her eye flashed with delight at the line Perrin
+      was now taking with Raynal. The latter speedily justified her
+      expectations: he just told Perrin to be off, and send him a more
+      accommodating notary.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A more accommodating notary!&rdquo; screamed Perrin, stung to madness by this
+      reproach. &ldquo;There is not a more accommodating notary in Europe. Ungrateful
+      man! is this the return for all my zeal, my integrity, my unselfishness?
+      Is there another agent in the world who would have let such a bargain as
+      Beaurepaire fall into your hands? It serves me right for deviating from
+      the rules of business. Send me another agent&mdash;oh!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The honest soldier was confused. The lawyer&rsquo;s eloquence overpowered him.
+      He felt guilty. Josephine saw his simplicity, and made a cut with a
+      woman&rsquo;s two-edged sword. &ldquo;Sir,&rdquo; said she coolly, &ldquo;do you not see it is an
+      affair of money? This is his way of saying, Pay me handsomely for so
+      unusual a commission.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And I&rsquo;ll pay him double,&rdquo; cried Raynal, catching the idea; &ldquo;don&rsquo;t be
+      alarmed, I&rsquo;ll pay you for it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And my zeal, my devotion?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Put &lsquo;em in figures.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And my prob&mdash;?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Add it up.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And my integ&mdash;?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Add them together: and don&rsquo;t bother me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I see! I see! my poor soldier. You are no match for a woman&rsquo;s tongue.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nor, for a notary&rsquo;s. Go to h&mdash;-, and send in your bill!&rdquo; roared the
+      soldier in a fury. &ldquo;Well, will you go?&rdquo; and he marched at him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The notary scuttled out, with something between a snarl and a squeak.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine hid her face in her hands.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What is the matter with you?&rdquo; inquired Raynal. &ldquo;Not crying again,
+      surely!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Me! I never cry&mdash;hardly. I hid my face because I could not help
+      laughing. You frightened me, sir,&rdquo; said she: then very demurely, &ldquo;I was
+      afraid you were going to beat him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, no; a good soldier never leathers a civilian if he can possibly help
+      it; it looks so bad; and before a lady!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, I would have forgiven you, monsieur,&rdquo; said Josephine benignly, and
+      something like a little sun danced in her eye.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now, mademoiselle, since my referee has proved a pig, it is your turn.
+      Choose you a mutual friend.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine hesitated. &ldquo;Ours is so young. You know him very well. You are
+      doubtless the commandant of whom I once heard him speak with such
+      admiration: his name is Riviere, Edouard Riviere.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Know him? he is my best officer, out and out.&rdquo; And without a moment&rsquo;s
+      hesitation he took Edouard&rsquo;s present address, and accepted that youthful
+      Daniel as their referee; then looked at his watch and marched off to his
+      public duties with sabre clanking at his heels.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The notary went home gnashing his teeth. His sweet revenge was turned to
+      wormwood this day. Raynal&rsquo;s parting commissions rang in his ear; in his
+      bitter mood the want of logical sequence in the two orders disgusted him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      So he inverted them.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He sent in a thundering bill the very next morning, but postponed the
+      other commission till his dying day.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      As for Josephine, she came into the drawing-room beaming with love and
+      happiness, and after kissing both her mother and Rose with gentle
+      violence, she let them know the strange turn things had taken.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And she whispered to Rose, &ldquo;Only think, YOUR Edouard to be OUR referee!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose blushed and bent over her work; and wondered how Edouard would
+      discharge so grave an office.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The matter approached a climax; for, as the reader is aware, Edouard was
+      hourly expected at Beaurepaire.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He did not come; but it was not his fault. On receiving Rose&rsquo;s letter he
+      declined to stay another hour at his uncle&rsquo;s.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He flung himself on his horse; and, before he was well settled on the
+      stirrups, the animal shied violently at a wheelbarrow some fool had left
+      there; and threw Edouard on the stones of the courtyard. He jumped up in a
+      moment and laughed at Marthe&rsquo;s terror; meantime a farm-servant caught the
+      nag and brought him back to his work.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But when Edouard went to put his hand on the saddle, he found it would not
+      obey him. &ldquo;Wait a minute,&rdquo; said he; &ldquo;my arm is benumbed.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Let me see!&rdquo; said the farmer, and examined the limb himself; &ldquo;benumbed?
+      yes; and no wonder. Jacques, get on the brute and ride for the surgeon.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Are you mad, uncle?&rdquo; cried Edouard. &ldquo;I can&rsquo;t spare my horse, and I want
+      no surgeon; it will be well directly.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It will be worse before it is better.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t know what you mean, uncle; it is only numbed, ah! it hurts when I
+      rub it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is worse than numbed, boy; it is broken.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Broken? nonsense:&rdquo; and he looked at it in piteous bewilderment: &ldquo;how can
+      it be broken? it does not hurt except when I touch it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It WILL hurt: I know all about it. I broke mine fifteen years ago: fell
+      off a haystack.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, how unfortunate I am!&rdquo; cried Edouard, piteously. &ldquo;But I will go to
+      Beaurepaire all the same. I can have the thing mended there, as well as
+      here.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You will go to bed,&rdquo; said the old man, quietly; &ldquo;that is where YOU&rsquo;LL
+      go.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll go to blazes sooner,&rdquo; yelled the young one.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The old man made a signal to his myrmidons, whom Marthe&rsquo;s cries had
+      brought around, and four stout fellows took hold of Edouard by the legs
+      and the left shoulder and carried him up-stairs raging and kicking; and
+      deposited him on a bed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Presently he began to feel faint, and so more reasonable. They cut his
+      coat off, and put him in a loose wrapper, and after considerable delay the
+      surgeon came, and set his arm skilfully, and behold this ardent spirit
+      caged. He chafed and fretted sadly. Fortitude was not his forte.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was two days after his accident. He was lying on his back, environed by
+      slops and cursing his evil fate, and fretting his soul out of its fleshly
+      prison, when suddenly he heard a cheerful trombone saying three words to
+      Marthe, then came a clink-clank, and Marthe ushered into the sickroom the
+      Commandant Raynal. The sick man raised himself in bed, with great surprise
+      and joy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;O commandant! this is kind to come and see your poor officer in
+      purgatory.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah,&rdquo; cried Raynal, &ldquo;you see I know what it is. I have been chained down
+      by the arm, and the leg, and all: it is deadly tiresome.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tiresome! it is&mdash;it is&mdash;oh, dear commandant, Heaven bless you
+      for coming!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ta! ta! ta! I am come on my own business.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;All the better. I have nothing to do; that is what kills me. I&rsquo;m eating
+      my own heart.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Cannibal! Well, my lad, since you are in that humor, cheer up, for I
+      bring you a job, and a tough one; it has puzzled me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What is it, commandant? What is it?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, do you know a house and a family called Beaurepaire?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do I know Beaurepaire?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And the pale youth turned very red; and stared with awe at this wizard of
+      a commandant. He thought he was going to be called over the coals for
+      frequenting a disaffected family. &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said Raynal, &ldquo;I have been and
+      bought this Beaurepaire.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Edouard uttered a loud exclamation. &ldquo;It was YOU bought it! she never told
+      me that.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said Raynal, &ldquo;I am the culprit; and we have fixed on you to undo my
+      work without hurting their pride too much, poor souls; but let us begin
+      with the facts.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Then Raynal told him my story after his fashion. Of course I shall not go
+      and print his version; you might like his concise way better than my
+      verbose; and I&rsquo;m not here to hold up any man&rsquo;s coat-tails. Short as he
+      made it, Edouard&rsquo;s eyes were moist more than once; and at the end he
+      caught Raynal&rsquo;s hand and kissed it. Then he asked time to reflect; &ldquo;for,&rdquo;
+       said he, &ldquo;I must try and be just.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll give you an hour,&rdquo; said Raynal, with an air of grand munificence.
+      The only treasure he valued was time.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In less than an hour Edouard had solved the knot, to his entire
+      satisfaction; he even gave the commandant particular instructions for
+      carrying out his sovereign decree. Raynal received these orders from his
+      subordinate with that simplicity which formed part of his amazing
+      character, and rode home relieved of all responsibility in the matter.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      COMMANDANT RAYNAL TO MADEMOISELLE DE BEAUREPAIRE.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Mademoiselle,&mdash;Before I could find time to write to our referee, news
+      came in that he had just broken his arm;&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh! oh, dear! our poor Edouard!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And if poor Edouard had seen the pale faces, and heard the faltering
+      accents, it would have reconciled him to his broken arm almost. This
+      hand-grenade the commandant had dropped so coolly among them, it was a
+      long while ere they could recover from it enough to read the rest of the
+      letter,&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      So I rode over to him, and found him on his back, fretting for want of
+      something to do. I told him the whole story. He undertook the business. I
+      have received his instructions, and next week shall be at his quarters to
+      clear off his arrears of business, and make acquaintance with all your
+      family, if they permit.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      RAYNAL.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      As the latter part of this letter seemed to require a reply, the baroness
+      wrote a polite note, and Jacintha sent Dard to leave it for the commandant
+      at Riviere&rsquo;s lodgings. But first they all sat down and wrote kind and
+      pitying and soothing letters to Edouard. Need I say these letters fell
+      upon him like balm?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They all inquired carelessly in their postscripts what he had decided as
+      their referee. He replied mysteriously that they would know that in a week
+      or two. Meantime, all he thought it prudent to tell them was that he had
+      endeavored to be just to both parties.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Little solemn puppy,&rdquo; said Rose, and was racked with curiosity.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Next week Raynal called on the baroness. She received him alone. They
+      talked about Madame Raynal. The next day he dined with the whole party,
+      and the commandant&rsquo;s manners were the opposite of what the baroness had
+      inculcated. But she had a strong prejudice in his favor. Had her feelings
+      been the other way his brusquerie would have shocked her. It amused her.
+      If people&rsquo;s hearts are with you, THAT for their heads!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He came every day for a week, chatted with the baroness, walked with the
+      young ladies; and when after work he came over in the evening, Rose used
+      to cross-examine him, and out came such descriptions of battles and
+      sieges, such heroism and such simplicity mixed, as made the evening pass
+      delightfully. On these occasions the young ladies fixed their glowing eyes
+      on him, and drank in his character as well as his narrative, in which were
+      fewer &ldquo;I&rsquo;s&rdquo; than in anything of the sort you ever read or heard.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At length Rose contrived to draw him aside, and, hiding her curiosity
+      under feigned nonchalance, asked him what the referee had decided. He told
+      her that was a secret for the present.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, but,&rdquo; said Rose, &ldquo;not from me. Edouard and I have no secrets.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come, that&rsquo;s good,&rdquo; said Raynal. &ldquo;Why, you are the very one he warned me
+      against the most; said you were as curious as Mother Eve, and as sharp as
+      her needle.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then he is a little scurrilous traitor,&rdquo; cried Rose, turning very red.
+      &ldquo;So that is how he talks of me behind my back, and calls me an angel to my
+      face; I&rsquo;ll pay him for this. Do tell me, commandant; never mind what HE
+      says.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What! disobey orders?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Orders? to you from that boy!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh!&rdquo; said Raynal, &ldquo;for that matter, we soldiers are used to command one
+      moment, and obey the next.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      In a word, this military pedant was impracticable, and Rose gave him up in
+      disgust, and began to call up a sulky look when the other two sang his
+      praises. For the old lady pronounced him charming, and Josephine said he
+      was a man of crystal; never said a word he did not mean, and she wished
+      she was like him. But the baroness thought this was going a little too
+      far.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, thank you,&rdquo; said she hastily; &ldquo;he is a man, a thorough man. He would
+      make an intolerable woman. A fine life if one had a parcel of women about,
+      all blurting out their real minds every moment, and never smoothing
+      matters.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mamma, what a horrid picture!&rdquo; chuckled Rose.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She then proposed that at his next visit they should all three make an
+      earnest appeal to him to let them know what Edouard had decided.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But Josephine begged to be excused, feared it would be hardly delicate;
+      and said languidly that for her part she felt they were in good hands, and
+      prescribed patience. The baroness acquiesced, and poor Rose and her
+      curiosity were baffled on every side.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At last, one fine day, her torments were relieved without any further
+      exertion on her part. Jacintha bounced into the drawing-room with a notice
+      that the commandant wanted to speak to Josephine a minute out in the
+      Pleasaunce.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How droll he is,&rdquo; said Rose; &ldquo;fancy sending in for a young lady like
+      that. Don&rsquo;t go, Josephine; how, he would stare.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My dear, I no more dare disobey him than if I was one of his soldiers.&rdquo;
+       And she laid down her work, and rose quietly to do what she was bid.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said Rose, superciliously, &ldquo;go to your commanding officer. And, O
+      Josephine, if you are worth anything at all, do get out of him what that
+      Edouard has settled.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine kissed her, and promised to try. After the first salutation,
+      there was a certain hesitation about Raynal which Josephine had never seen
+      a trace of in him before; so, to put him at his ease, and at the same time
+      keep her promise to Rose, she asked timidly if their mutual friend had
+      been able to suggest anything.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What! don&rsquo;t you know that I have been acting all along upon his
+      instructions?&rdquo; answered Raynal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, indeed! and you have not told us what he advised.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Told you? why, of course not; they were secret instructions. I have
+      obeyed one set, and now I come to the other; and there is the difficulty,
+      being a kind of warfare I know nothing about.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It must be savage warfare, then,&rdquo; suggested the lady politely.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not a bit of it. Now, who would have thought I was such a coward?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine was mystified; however, she made a shrewd guess. &ldquo;Do you fear a
+      repulse from any one of us? Then, I suppose, you meditate some extravagant
+      act of generosity.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not I.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of delicacy, then.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Just the reverse. Confound the young dog! why is he not here to help me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But, after all,&rdquo; suggested Josephine, &ldquo;you have only to carry out his
+      instructions.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That is true! that is true! but when a fellow is a coward, a poltroon,
+      and all that sort of thing.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      This repeated assertion of cowardice on the part of the living Damascus
+      blade that stood bolt-upright before her, struck Josephine as so funny
+      that she laughed merrily, and bade him fancy it was only a fort he was
+      attacking instead of the terrible Josephine; whom none but heroes feared,
+      she assured him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      This encouragement, uttered in jest, was taken in earnest. The soldier
+      thanked her, and rallied visibly at the comparison. &ldquo;All right,&rdquo; said he,
+      &ldquo;as you say, it is only a fort&mdash;so&mdash;mademoiselle!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hum! will you lend me your hand for a moment?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My hand! what for? there,&rdquo; and she put it out an inch a minute. He took
+      it, and inspected it closely.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A charming hand; the hand of a virtuous woman?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said Josephine as cool as a cucumber, too sublimely and absurdly
+      innocent even to blush.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is it your own?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sir!&rdquo; She blushed at that, I can tell you.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Because if it was, I would ask you to give it me. (I&rsquo;ve fired the first
+      shot anyway.)&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine whipped her hand off his palm, where it lay like cream spilt on
+      a trencher.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah! I see; you are not free: you have a lover.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, no!&rdquo; cried Josephine in distress; &ldquo;I love nobody but my mother and
+      sister: I never shall.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your mother,&rdquo; cried Raynal; &ldquo;that reminds me; he told me to ask her; by
+      Jove, I think he told me to ask her first;&rdquo; and Raynal up with his
+      scabbard and was making off.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine begged him to do nothing of the kind.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I can save you the trouble,&rdquo; said she.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, but my instructions! my instructions!&rdquo; cried the military pedant, and
+      ran off into the house, and left Josephine &ldquo;planted there,&rdquo; as they say in
+      France.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Raynal demanded a private interview of the baroness so significantly and
+      unceremoniously that Rose had no alternative but to retire, but not
+      without a glance of defiance at the bear. She ran straight, without her
+      bonnet, into the Pleasaunce to slake her curiosity at Josephine. That
+      young lady was walking pensively, but turned at sight of Rose, and the
+      sisters came together with a clash of tongues.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;O Rose! he has&rdquo;&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      So nimbly does the female mind run on its little beaten tracks, that it
+      took no more than those syllables for even these innocent young women to
+      communicate that Raynal had popped.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine apologized for this weakness in a hero. &ldquo;It wasn&rsquo;t his fault,&rdquo;
+       said she. &ldquo;It is your Edouard who set him to do it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My Edouard? Don&rsquo;t talk in that horrid way: I have no Edouard. You said
+      &lsquo;no&rsquo; of course.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Something of the kind.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What, did you not say &lsquo;no&rsquo; plump?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I did not say it brutally, dear.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Josephine, you frighten me. I know you can&rsquo;t say &lsquo;no&rsquo; to any one; and if
+      you don&rsquo;t say &lsquo;no&rsquo; plump to such a man as this, you might as well say
+      &lsquo;yes.&rsquo;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, love,&rdquo; said Josephine, &ldquo;you know our mother will relieve me of
+      this; what a comfort to have a mother!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They waited for Raynal&rsquo;s departure, to go to the baroness. They had to
+      wait a long time. Moreover, when he did leave the chateau he came straight
+      into the Pleasaunce. At sight of him Rose seized Josephine tight and bade
+      her hold her tongue, as she could not say &ldquo;no&rdquo; plump to any one. Josephine
+      was far from raising any objection to the arrangement.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur,&rdquo; said Rose, before he could get a word out, &ldquo;even if she had
+      not declined, I could not consent.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Raynal tapped his forehead reflectively, and drew forth from memory that
+      he had no instructions whatever to ask HER consent.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She colored high, but returned to the charge.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is her own consent to be dispensed with too? She declined the honor, did
+      she not?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of course she did; but this was anticipated in my instructions. I am to
+      be sure and not take the first two or three refusals.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;O Josephine, look at that insolent boy: he has found you out.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Insolent boy!&rdquo; cried Raynal; &ldquo;why, it is the referee of your own
+      choosing, and as well behaved a lad as ever I saw, and a zealous officer.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My kind friends,&rdquo; put in Josephine with a sweet languor, &ldquo;I cannot let
+      you quarrel about a straw.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is not about a straw,&rdquo; said Raynal, &ldquo;it is about you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The distinction involves a compliment, sir,&rdquo; said Josephine; then she
+      turned to Rose, &ldquo;Is it possible you do not see Monsieur Raynal&rsquo;s strange
+      proposal in its true light? and you so shrewd in general. He has no
+      personal feeling whatever in this eccentric proceeding: he wants to make
+      us all happy, especially my mother, without seeming to lay us under too
+      great an obligation. Surely good-nature was never carried so far before;
+      ha, ha! Monsieur, I will encumber you with my friendship forever, if you
+      permit me, but farther than that I will not abuse your generosity.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now look here, mademoiselle,&rdquo; began Raynal bluntly, &ldquo;I did start with a
+      good motive at first, that there&rsquo;s no denying. But, since I have been
+      every day in your company, and seen how good and kind you are to all about
+      you, I have turned selfish; and I say to myself, what a comfort such a
+      wife as you would be to a soldier! Why, only to have you to write letters
+      home to, would be worth half a fellow&rsquo;s pay. Do you know sometimes when I
+      see the fellows writing their letters it gives me a knock here to think I
+      have no one at all to write to.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine sighed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So you see I am not so mighty disinterested. Now, mademoiselle, you speak
+      so charmingly, I can&rsquo;t tell what you mean: can&rsquo;t tell whether you say &lsquo;no&rsquo; 
+      because you could never like me, or whether it is out of delicacy, and you
+      only want pressing. So I say no more at present: it is a standing offer.
+      Take a day to consider. Take two if you like. I must go to the barracks;
+      good-day.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh! this must be put an end to at once,&rdquo; said Rose.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;With all my heart,&rdquo; replied Josephine; &ldquo;but how?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come to our mother, and settle that,&rdquo; said the impetuous sister, and
+      nearly dragged the languid one into the drawing-room.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      To their surprise they found the baroness walking up and down the room
+      with unusual alacrity for a person of her years. She no sooner caught
+      sight of Josephine than she threw her arms open to her with joyful
+      vivacity, and kissed her warmly. &ldquo;My love, you have saved us. I am a happy
+      old woman. If I had all France to pick from I could not have found a man
+      so worthy of my Josephine. He is brave, he is handsome, he is young, he is
+      a rising man, he is a good son, and good sons make good husbands&mdash;and&mdash;I
+      shall die at Beaurepaire, shall I not, Madame the Commandante?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine held her mother round the neck, but never spoke. After a silence
+      she held her tighter, and cried a little.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What is it?&rdquo; asked the baroness confidentially of Rose, but without
+      showing any very profound concern.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mamma! mamma! she does not love him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Love him? She would be no daughter of mine if she loved a man at sight. A
+      modest woman loves her husband only.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But she scarcely knows Monsieur Raynal.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She knows more of him than I knew of your father when I married him. She
+      knows his virtues and appreciates them. I have heard her, have I not,
+      love? Esteem soon ripens into love when they are once fairly married.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mother, does her silence then tell you nothing? Her tears&mdash;are they
+      nothing to you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Silly child! These are tears that do not scald. The sweet soul weeps
+      because she now for the first time sees she will have to leave her mother.
+      Alas! my eldest, it is inevitable. Mothers are not immortal. While they
+      are here it is their duty to choose good husbands for their daughters. My
+      youngest, I believe, has chosen for herself&mdash;like the nation. But for
+      my eldest I choose. We shall see which chooses the best. Meantime we stay
+      at Beaurepaire, thanks to my treasure here.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Josephine! Josephine! you don&rsquo;t say one word,&rdquo; cried Rose in dismay.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What CAN I say? I love my mother and I love you. You draw me different
+      ways. I want you to be both happy.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then if you will not speak out I must. Mother, do not deceive yourself:
+      it is duty alone that keeps her silent: this match is odious to her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then we are ruined. Josephine, is this match odious to you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not exactly odious: but I am very, very indifferent.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There!&rdquo; cried Rose triumphantly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There!&rdquo; cried the baroness in the same breath, triumphantly. &ldquo;She esteems
+      his character; but his person is indifferent to her: in other words, she
+      is a modest girl, and my daughter; and let me tell you, Rose, that but for
+      the misfortunes of our house, both my daughters would be married as I was,
+      without knowing half as much of their husbands as Josephine knows of this
+      brave, honest, generous, filial gentleman.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, then, since she will not speak out, I will. Pity me: I love her so.
+      If this stranger, whom she does not love, takes her away from us, he will
+      kill me. I shall die; oh!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine left her mother and went to console Rose.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness lost her temper at this last stroke of opposition. &ldquo;Now the
+      truth comes out, Rose; this is selfishness. Do not deceive YOURself&mdash;selfishness!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mamma!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are only waiting to leave me yourself. Yet your eldest sister,
+      forsooth, must be kept here for you,&mdash;till then.&rdquo; She added more
+      gently, &ldquo;Let me advise you to retire to your own room, and examine your
+      heart fairly. You will find there is a strong dash of egoism in all this.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If I do&rdquo;&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You will retract your opposition.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My heart won&rsquo;t let me; but I will despise myself, and be silent.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And the young lady, who had dried her eyes the moment she was accused of
+      selfishness, walked, head erect, from the room. Josephine cast a
+      deprecating glance at her mother. &ldquo;Yes, my angel!&rdquo; said the latter, &ldquo;I was
+      harsh. But we are no longer of one mind, and I suppose never shall be
+      again.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, yes, we shall. Be patient! Mother&mdash;you shall not leave
+      Beaurepaire.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness colored faintly at these four last words of her daughter, and
+      hung her head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine saw that, and darted to her and covered her with kisses.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      That day the doctor scolded them both. &ldquo;You have put your mother into a
+      high fever,&rdquo; said he; &ldquo;here&rsquo;s a pulse; I do wish you would be more
+      considerate.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The commandant did not come to dinner as usual. The evening passed
+      heavily; their hearts were full of uncertainty.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We miss our merry, spirited companion,&rdquo; said the baroness with a grim
+      look at Rose. Both young ladies assented with ludicrous eagerness.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      That night Rose came and slept with Josephine, and more than once she
+      awoke with a start and seized Josephine convulsively and held her tight.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Accused of egoism! at first her whole nature rose in arms against the
+      charge: but, after a while, coming as it did from so revered a person, it
+      forced her to serious self-examination. The poor girl said to herself,
+      &ldquo;Mamma is a shrewd woman. Am I after all deceiving myself? Would she be
+      happy, and am I standing in the way?&rdquo; In the morning she begged her sister
+      to walk with her in the park, so that they might be safe from
+      interruption.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      There, she said sadly, she could not understand her own sister. &ldquo;Why are
+      you so calm and cold, while am I in tortures of anxiety? Have you made
+      some resolve and not confided it to your Rose?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, love,&rdquo; was the reply; &ldquo;I am scarce capable of a resolution; I am a
+      mere thing that drifts.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Let me put it in other words, then. How will this end?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I hardly know.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you mean to marry Monsieur Raynal, then? answer me that.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No; but I should not wonder if he were to marry ME.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But you said &lsquo;no.&rsquo;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, I said &lsquo;no&rsquo; once.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And don&rsquo;t you mean to say it again, and again, and again, till kingdom
+      come?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What is the use? you heard him say he would not desist any the more, and
+      I care too little about the matter to go on persisting, and persisting,
+      and persisting.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why not, if he goes on pestering, and pestering, and pestering?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, he is like you, all energy, at all hours; but I have so little where
+      my heart is unconcerned: he seems, too, to have a wish! I have none either
+      way, and my conscience says &lsquo;marry him!&rsquo;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your conscience say marry one man when you love another?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Heaven forbid! Rose, I love no one: I HAVE loved; but now my heart is
+      dead and silent; only my conscience says, &lsquo;You are the cause of all your
+      mother&rsquo;s trouble; you are the cause that Beaurepaire was sold. Now you can
+      repair that mischief, and at the same time make a brave man happy, our
+      benefactor happy.&rsquo; It is a great temptation: I hardly know why I said &lsquo;no&rsquo; 
+      at all; surprise, perhaps&mdash;or to please you, pretty one.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose groaned: &ldquo;Are you then worth so little that you would throw yourself
+      away on a man who does not love you, nor want you, and is quite as happy
+      single?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No; not happy; he is only stout-hearted and good, and therefore content;
+      and he is a character that it would be easy&mdash;in short, I feel my
+      power here: I could make that man happy; he has nobody to write to even,
+      when he is away&mdash;poor fellow!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I shall lose all patience,&rdquo; cried Rose; &ldquo;you are at your old trick,
+      thinking of everybody but yourself: I let you do it in trifles, but I love
+      you too well to permit it when the happiness of your whole life is at
+      stake. I must be satisfied on one point, or else this marriage shall never
+      take place: just answer me this; if Camille Dujardin stood on one side,
+      and Monsieur Raynal on the other, and both asked your hand, which would
+      you take?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That will never be. Whose? Not his whom I despise. Esteem might ripen
+      into love, but what must contempt end in?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      This reply gave Rose great satisfaction. To exhaust all awkward
+      contingencies, she said, &ldquo;One question more, and I have done. Suppose
+      Camille should turn out&mdash;be not quite&mdash;what shall I say&mdash;inexcusable?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At this unlucky gush, Josephine turned pale, then red, then pale again,
+      and cried eagerly, &ldquo;Then all the world should not part us. Why torture me
+      with such a question? Ah! you have heard something.&rdquo; And in a moment the
+      lava of passion burst wildly through its thin sheet of ice. &ldquo;I was blind.
+      This is why you would save me from this unnatural marriage. You are
+      breaking the good news to me by degrees. There is no need. Quick&mdash;quick&mdash;let
+      me have it. I have waited three years; I am sick of waiting. Why don&rsquo;t you
+      speak? Why don&rsquo;t you tell me? Then I will tell YOU. He is alive&mdash;he
+      is well&mdash;he is coming. It was not he those soldiers saw; they were so
+      far off. How could they tell? They saw a uniform but not a face. Perhaps
+      he has been a prisoner, and so could not write; could not come: but he is
+      coming now. Why do you groan? why do you turn pale? ah! I see; I have once
+      more deceived myself. I was mad. He I love is still a traitor to France
+      and me, and I am wretched forever. Oh! that I were dead! oh! that I were
+      dead! No; don&rsquo;t speak to me: never mind me; this madness will pass as it
+      has before, and leave me a dead thing among the living. Ah! sister, why
+      did you wake me from my dream? I was drifting so calmly, so peacefully, so
+      dead, and painless, drifting over the dead sea of the heart towards the
+      living waters of gratitude and duty. I was going to make more than one
+      worthy soul happy; and seeing them happy, I should have been content and
+      useful&mdash;what am I now?&mdash;and comforted other hearts, and died
+      joyful&mdash;and young. For God is good; he releases the meek and patient
+      from their burdens.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      With this came a flood of tears; and she leaned against a bough with her
+      forehead on her arm, bowed like a wounded lily.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Accursed be that man&rsquo;s name, and MY tongue if ever I utter it again in
+      your hearing!&rdquo; cried Rose, weeping bitterly. &ldquo;You are wiser than I, and
+      every way better. O my darling, dry your tears! Here he comes: look!
+      riding across the park.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Rose,&rdquo; cried Josephine, hastily, &ldquo;I leave all to you. Receive Monsieur
+      Raynal, and decline his offer if you think proper. It is you who love me
+      best. My mother would give me up for a house; for an estate, poor dear.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I would not give you for all the world.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I know it. I trust all to you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, but don&rsquo;t go; stay and hear what I shall say.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, no; that poor man is intolerable to me NOW. Let me avoid his sight,
+      and think of his virtues.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose was left alone, mistress of her sister&rsquo;s fate. She put her head into
+      her hands and filled with anxiety and sudden doubt.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Like a good many more of us, she had been positive so long as the decision
+      did not rest with her. But with power comes responsibility, with
+      responsibility comes doubt. Easy to be an advocate in re incerta; hard to
+      be the judge. And she had but a few seconds to think in; for Raynal was at
+      hand. The last thing in her mind before he joined her was the terrible
+      power of that base Camille over her sister. She despaired of curing
+      Josephine, but a husband might. There&rsquo;s such divinity doth hedge a husband
+      in innocent girls&rsquo; minds.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, little lady,&rdquo; began Raynal, &ldquo;and how are you, and how is my
+      mother-in-law that is to be&mdash;or is not to be, as your sister pleases;
+      and how is SHE? have I frightened her away? There were two petticoats, and
+      now there is but one.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She left me to answer you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;All the worse for me: I am not to your taste.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do not say that,&rdquo; said Rose, almost hysterically.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh! it is no sacrilege. Not one in fifty likes me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But I do like you, sir.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then why won&rsquo;t you let me have your sister?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have not quite decided that you shall not have her,&rdquo; faltered poor
+      Rose. She murmured on, &ldquo;I dare say you think me very unkind, very selfish;
+      but put yourself in my place. I love my sister as no man can ever love
+      her, I know: my heart has been one flesh and one soul with hers all my
+      life. A stranger comes and takes her away from me as if she was I don&rsquo;t
+      know what; his portmanteau; takes her to Egypt, oh! oh! oh!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Raynal comforted her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What, do you think I am such a brute as to take that delicate creature
+      about fighting with me? why, the hot sand would choke her, to begin. No.
+      You don&rsquo;t take my manoeuvre. I have no family; I try for a wife that will
+      throw me in a mother and sister. You will live all together the same as
+      before, of course; only you must let me make one of you when I am at home.
+      And how often will that be? Besides, I am as likely to be knocked on the
+      head in Egypt as not; you are worrying yourself for nothing, little lady.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He uttered the last topic of consolation in a broad, hearty, hilarious
+      tone, like a trombone impregnated with cheerful views of fate.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Heaven forbid!&rdquo; cried Rose: &ldquo;and I will, for even I shall pray for you
+      now. What you will leave her at home? forgive me for not seeing all your
+      worth: of course I knew you were an angel, but I had no idea you were a
+      duck. You are just the man for my sister. She likes to obey: you are all
+      for commanding. So you see. Then she never thinks of herself; any other
+      man but you would impose on her good-nature; but you are too generous to
+      do that. So you see. Then she esteems you so highly. And one whom I esteem
+      (between you and me) has chosen you for her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then say yes, and have done with it,&rdquo; suggested the straightforward
+      soldier.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why should I say &lsquo;no?&rsquo; you will make one another happy some day: you are
+      both so good. Any other man but you would tear her from me; but you are
+      too just, too kind. Heaven will reward you. No! I will. I will give you
+      Josephine: ah, my dear brother-in-law, it is the most precious thing I
+      have to give in the world.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thank you, then. So that is settled. Hum! no, it is not quite; I forgot;
+      I have something for you to read; an anonymous letter. I got it this
+      morning; it says your sister has a lover.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The letter ran to this tune: a friend who had observed the commandant&rsquo;s
+      frequent visits at Beaurepaire wrote to warn him against traps. Both the
+      young ladies of Beaurepaire were doubtless at the new proprietor&rsquo;s service
+      to pick and choose from. But for all that each of them had a lover, and
+      though these lovers had their orders to keep out of the way till monsieur
+      should be hooked, he might be sure that if he married either, the man of
+      her heart would come on the scene soon after, perhaps be present at the
+      wedding.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In short, it was one of those poisoned arrows a coarse vindictive coward
+      can shoot.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was the first anonymous letter Rose had ever seen. It almost drove her
+      mad on the spot. Raynal was sorry he had let her see it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She turned red and white by turns, and gasped for breath.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why am I not a man?&mdash;why don&rsquo;t I wear a sword? I would pass it
+      through this caitiff&rsquo;s heart. The cowardly slave!&mdash;the fiend! for who
+      but a fiend could slander an angel like my Josephine? Hooked? Oh! she will
+      never marry you if she sees this.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then don&rsquo;t let her see it: and why take it to heart like that? I don&rsquo;t
+      trust to the word of a man who owns that his story is a thing he dares not
+      sign his name to; at all events, I shall not put his word against yours.
+      But it is best to understand one another in time. I am a plain man, but
+      not a soft one. I should not be an easygoing husband like some I see
+      about: I&rsquo;d have no wasps round my honey; if my wife took a lover I would
+      not lecture THE WOMAN&mdash;what is the use?&mdash;I&rsquo;d kill THE MAN then
+      and there, in-doors or out, as I would kill a snake. If she took another,
+      I&rsquo;d send him after the first, and so on till one killed me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And serve the wretches right.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes; but for my own sake I don&rsquo;t choose to marry a woman that loves any
+      other man. So tell me the plain truth; come.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose turned chill in her inside. &ldquo;I have no lover,&rdquo; she stammered. &ldquo;I have
+      a young fool that comes and teases me: but it is no secret. He is away,
+      but why? he is on a sickbed, poor little fellow!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But your sister? She could not have a lover unknown to you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I defy her. No, sir; I have not seen her speak three words to any young
+      man except Monsieur Riviere this three years past.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That is enough;&rdquo; and he tore the letter quietly to atoms.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then Rose saw she could afford a little more candor. &ldquo;Understand me; I
+      can&rsquo;t speak of what happened when I was a child. But if ever she had a
+      girlish attachment, he has not followed it up, or surely I should have
+      seen something of him all these years.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of course. Oh! as for flirtations, let them pass: a lovely girl does not
+      grow up without one or two whispering some nonsense into her ear. Why, I
+      myself should have flirted no doubt; but I never had the time. Bonaparte
+      gives you time to eat and drink, but not to sleep or flirt, and that
+      reminds me I have fifty miles to ride, so good-by, sister-in-law, eh?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Adieu, brother-in-law.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Left alone, Rose had some misgivings. She had equivocated with one whose
+      upright, candid nature ought to have protected him: but an enemy had
+      accused Josephine; and it came so natural to shield her. &ldquo;Did he really
+      think I would expose my own sister?&rdquo; said she to herself, angrily. Was not
+      this anger secret self-discontent?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, love,&rdquo; said Josephine, demurely, &ldquo;have you dismissed him?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine smiled feebly. &ldquo;It is easy to say &lsquo;say no;&rsquo; but it is not so
+      easy to say &lsquo;no,&rsquo; especially when you feel you ought to say &lsquo;yes,&rsquo; and
+      have no wish either way except to give pleasure to others.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But I am not such skim milk as all that,&rdquo; replied Rose: &ldquo;I have always a
+      strong wish where you are concerned, and your happiness. I hesitated
+      whilst I was in doubt, but I doubt no longer: I have had a long talk with
+      him. He has shown me his whole heart: he is the best, the noblest of
+      creatures: he has no littleness or meanness. And then he is a thorough
+      man; I know that by his being the very opposite of a woman in his ways.
+      Now you are a thorough woman, and so you will suit one another to a T. I
+      have decided: so no more doubts, love; no more tears; no more disputes. We
+      are all of one mind, and I do think I have secured your happiness. It will
+      not come in a day, perhaps, but it will come. So then in one little
+      fortnight you marry Monsieur Raynal.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What!&rdquo; said Josephine, &ldquo;you have actually settled that?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But are you sure I can make him as happy as he deserves?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Positive.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I think so too; still&rdquo;&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is settled, dear,&rdquo; said Rose soothingly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, the comfort of that! you relieve me of a weight; you give me peace. I
+      shall have duties; I shall do some good in the world. They were all for it
+      but you before, were they not?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, and now I am strongest for it of them all. Josephine, it is
+      settled.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine looked at her for a moment in silence, then said eagerly, &ldquo;Bless
+      you, dear Rose; you have saved your sister;&rdquo; then, after a moment, in a
+      very different voice, &ldquo;O Camille! Camille! why have you deserted me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And with this she fell to sobbing terribly. Rose wept on her neck, but
+      said nothing. She too was a woman, and felt that this was the last
+      despairing cry of love giving up a hopeless struggle.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They sat twined together in silence till Jacintha came to tell them it was
+      close upon dinner-time; so then they hastened to dry their tears and wash
+      their red eyes, for fear their mother should see what they had been at,
+      and worry herself.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, mademoiselle, these two consent; but what do you say? for after
+      all, it is you I am courting, and not them. Have you the courage to
+      venture on a rough soldier like me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      This delicate question was put point-blank before the three ladies.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sir,&rdquo; replied Josephine timidly, &ldquo;I will be as frank, as straightforward
+      as you are. I thank you for the honor you do me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Raynal looked perplexed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And does that mean &lsquo;yes&rsquo; or &lsquo;no&rsquo;?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Which you please,&rdquo; said Josephine, hanging her sweet head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The wedding was fixed for that day fortnight. The next morning wardrobes
+      were ransacked. The silk, muslin, and lace of their prosperous days were
+      looked out: grave discussions were held over each work of art. Rose was
+      active, busy, fussy. The baroness threw in the weight of her judgment and
+      experience.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine managed to smile whenever either Rose or the baroness looked at
+      all fixedly at her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      So glided the peaceful days. So Josephine drifted towards the haven of
+      wedlock.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0006" id="link2HCH0006">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER VI.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      At Bayonne, a garrison town on the south frontier of France, two sentinels
+      walked lethargically, crossing and recrossing before the governor&rsquo;s house.
+      Suddenly their official drowsiness burst into energy; for a pale, grisly
+      man, in rusty, defaced, dirty, and torn regimentals, was walking into the
+      courtyard as if it belonged to him. The sentinels lowered their muskets,
+      and crossed them with a clash before the gateway.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The scarecrow did not start back. He stopped and looked down with a smile
+      at the steel barrier the soldiers had improvised for him, then drew
+      himself a little up, carried his hand carelessly to his cap, which was
+      nearly in two, and gave the name of an officer in the French army.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      If you or I, dressed like a beggar who years ago had stolen regimentals
+      and worn them down to civil garments, had addressed these soldiers with
+      these very same words, the bayonets would have kissed closer, or perhaps
+      the points been turned against our sacred and rusty person: but there is a
+      freemasonry of the sword. The light, imperious hand that touched that
+      battered cap, and the quiet clear tone of command told. The sentinels
+      slowly recovered their pieces, but still looked uneasy and doubtful in
+      their minds. The battered one saw this, and gave a sort of lofty smile; he
+      turned up his cuffs and showed his wrists, and drew himself still higher.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The sentinels shouldered their pieces sharp, then dropped them
+      simultaneously with a clatter and ring upon the pavement.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pass, captain.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The rusty figure rang the governor&rsquo;s bell. A servant came and eyed him
+      with horror and contempt. He gave his name, and begged to see the
+      governor. The servant left him in the hall, and went up-stairs to tell his
+      master. At the name the governor reflected, then frowned, then bade his
+      servant reach him down a certain book. He inspected it. &ldquo;I thought so: any
+      one with him?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, your excellency.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Load my pistols, put them on the table, show him in, and then order a
+      guard to the door.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The governor was a stern veteran with a powerful brow, a shaggy eyebrow,
+      and a piercing eye. He never rose, but leaned his chin on his hand, and
+      his elbow on a table that stood between them, and eyed his visitor very
+      fixedly and strangely. &ldquo;We did not expect to see you on this side the
+      Pyrenees,&rdquo; said he gravely.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nor I myself, governor.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What do you come for?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A suit of regimentals, and money to take me to Paris.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And suppose, instead of that, I turn out a corporal&rsquo;s guard, and bid them
+      shoot you in the courtyard?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It would be the drollest thing you ever did, all things considered,&rdquo; said
+      the other coolly, but bitterly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The governor looked for the book he had lately consulted, found the page,
+      handed it to the rusty officer, and watched him keenly: the blood rushed
+      all over his face, and his lip trembled; but his eye dwelt stern yet
+      sorrowful on the governor.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have read your book, now read mine.&rdquo; He drew off his coat and showed
+      his wrists and arms, blue and waled. &ldquo;Can you read that, sir?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;All the better for you: Spanish fetters, general.&rdquo; He showed a white scar
+      on his shoulder. &ldquo;Can you read that? This is what I cut out of it,&rdquo; and he
+      handed the governor a little round stone as big and almost as regular as a
+      musket-ball.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Humph! that could hardly have been fired from a French musket.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Can you read this?&rdquo; and he showed him a long cicatrix on his other arm.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Knife I think,&rdquo; said the governor.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are right, sir: Spanish knife. Can you read this?&rdquo; and opening his
+      bosom he showed a raw wound on his breast.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, the devil!&rdquo; cried the governor.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The wounded man put his rusty coat on again, and stood erect, and haughty,
+      and silent.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The general eyed him, and saw his great spirit shining through this man.
+      The more he looked the less could the scarecrow veil the hero from his
+      practised eye. He said there must be some mistake, or else he was in his
+      dotage; after a moment&rsquo;s hesitation, he added, &ldquo;Be seated, if you please,
+      and tell me what you have been doing all these years.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Suffering.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not all the time, I suppose.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Without intermission.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But what? suffering what?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Cold, hunger, darkness, wounds, solitude, sickness, despair, prison, all
+      that man can suffer.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Impossible! a man would be dead at that rate before this.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I should have died a dozen deaths but for one thing; I had promised her
+      to live.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      There was a pause. Then the old soldier said gravely, but more kindly, to
+      the young one, &ldquo;Tell me the facts, captain&rdquo; (the first time he had
+      acknowledged his visitor&rsquo;s military rank).
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      An hour had scarce elapsed since the rusty figure was stopped by the
+      sentinels at the gate, when two glittering officers passed out under the
+      same archway, followed by a servant carrying a furred cloak. The sentinels
+      presented arms. The elder of these officers was the governor: the younger
+      was the late scarecrow, in a brand-new uniform belonging to the governor&rsquo;s
+      son. He shone out now in his true light; the beau ideal of a patrician
+      soldier; one would have said he had been born with a sword by his side and
+      drilled by nature, so straight and smart, yet easy he was in every
+      movement. He was like a falcon, eye and all, only, as it were, down at the
+      bottom of the hawk&rsquo;s eye lay a dove&rsquo;s eye. That compound and varying eye
+      seemed to say, I can love, I can fight: I can fight, I can love, as few of
+      you can do either.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The old man was trying to persuade him to stay at Bayonne, until his wound
+      should be cured.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, general, I have other wounds to cure of longer standing than this
+      one.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, promise me to lay up at Paris.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;General, I shall stay an hour at Paris.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;An hour in Paris! Well, at least call at the War Office and present this
+      letter.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      That same afternoon, wrapped in the governor&rsquo;s furred cloak, the young
+      officer lay at his full length in the coupe of the diligence, the whole of
+      which the governor had peremptorily demanded for him, and rolled day and
+      night towards Paris.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He reached it worn with fatigue and fevered by his wound, but his spirit
+      as indomitable as ever. He went to the War Office with the governor&rsquo;s
+      letter. It seemed to create some little sensation; one functionary came
+      and said a polite word to him, then another. At last to his infinite
+      surprise the minister himself sent down word he wished to see him; the
+      minister put several questions to him, and seemed interested in him and
+      touched by his relation.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I think, captain, I shall have to send to you: where do you stay in
+      Paris?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nowhere, monsieur; I leave Paris as soon as I can find an easy-going
+      horse.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But General Bretaux tells me you are wounded.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not dangerously.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pardon me, captain, but is this prudent? is it just to yourself and your
+      friends?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, I owe it to those who perhaps think me dead.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You can write to them.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I grudge so great, so sacred a joy to a letter. No! after all I have
+      suffered I claim to be the one to tell her I have kept my word: I promised
+      to live, and I live.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;HER? then I say no more, only tell me what road you take.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The road to Brittany.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      As the young officer was walking his horse by the roadside about a league
+      and a half from Paris, he heard a clatter behind him, and up galloped an
+      aide-de-camp and drew up alongside, bringing his horse nearly on his
+      haunches.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He handed him a large packet sealed with the arms of France. The other
+      tore it open; and there was his brevet as colonel. His cheek flushed and
+      his eye glittered with joy. The aide-de-camp next gave him a parcel: &ldquo;Your
+      epaulets, colonel! We hear you are going into the wilds where epaulets
+      don&rsquo;t grow. You are to join the army of the Rhine as soon as your wound is
+      well.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Wherever my country calls me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your address, then, colonel, that we may know where to put our finger on
+      a tried soldier when we want one.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am going to Beaurepaire.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Beaurepaire? I never heard of it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You never heard of Beaurepaire? it is in Brittany, forty-five leagues
+      from Paris, forty-three leagues and a half from here.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Good! Health and honor to you, colonel.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The same to you, lieutenant; or a soldier&rsquo;s death.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The new colonel read the precious document across his horse&rsquo;s mane, and
+      then he was going to put one of the epaulets on his right shoulder, bare
+      at present: but he reflected.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No; she should make him a colonel with her own dear hand. He put them in
+      his pocket. He would not even look at them till she had seen them. Oh, how
+      happy he was not only to come back to her alive, but to come back to her
+      honored.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      His wound smarted, his limbs ached, but no pain past or present could lay
+      hold of his mind. In his great joy he remembered past suffering and felt
+      present pain&mdash;yet smiled. Only every now and then he pined for wings
+      to shorten the weary road.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He was walking his horse quietly, drooping a little over his saddle, when
+      another officer well mounted came after him and passed him at a hand
+      gallop with one hasty glance at his uniform, and went tearing on like one
+      riding for his life.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t I know that face?&rdquo; said Dujardin.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He cudgelled his memory, and at last he remembered it was the face of an
+      old comrade. At least it strongly reminded him of one Jean Raynal who had
+      saved his life in the Arno, when they were lieutenants together.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Yes, it was certainly Raynal, only bronzed by service in some hot country.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah!&rdquo; thought Camille; &ldquo;I suppose I am more changed than he is; for he
+      certainly did not recognize me at all. Now I wonder what that fellow has
+      been doing all this time. What a hurry he was in! a moment more and I
+      should have hailed him. Perhaps I may fall in with him at the next town.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He touched his horse with the spur, and cantered gently on, for trotting
+      shook him more than he could bear. Even when he cantered he had to press
+      his hand against his bosom, and often with the motion a bitterer pang than
+      usual came and forced the water from his eyes; and then he smiled. His
+      great love and his high courage made this reply to the body&rsquo;s anguish. And
+      still his eyes looked straight forward as at some object in the distant
+      horizon, while he came gently on, his hand pressed to his bosom, his head
+      drooping now and then, smiling patiently, upon the road to Beaurepaire.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Oh! if anybody had told him that in five days his Josephine was to be
+      married; and that the bronzed comrade, who had just galloped past him, was
+      to marry her!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At Beaurepaire they were making and altering wedding-dresses. Rose was
+      excited, and even Josephine took a calm interest. Dress never goes for
+      nothing with her sex. The chairs and tables were covered, and the floor
+      was littered. The baroness was presiding over the rites of vanity, and
+      telling them what she wore at her wedding, under Louis XV., with strict
+      accuracy, and what we men should consider a wonderful effort of memory,
+      when the Commandant Raynal came in like a cannon-ball, without any
+      warning, and stood among them in a stiff, military attitude. Exclamations
+      from all the party, and then a kind greeting, especially from the
+      baroness.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We have been so dull without you, Jean.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And I have missed you once or twice, mother-in-law, I can tell you. Well,
+      I have got bad news; but you must consider we live in a busy time.
+      To-morrow I start for Egypt.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Loud ejaculations from the baroness and Rose. Josephine put down her work
+      quietly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness sighed deeply, and the tears came into her eyes. &ldquo;Oh, you
+      must not be down-hearted, old lady,&rdquo; shouted Raynal. &ldquo;Why, I am as likely
+      to come back from Egypt as not. It is an even chance, to say the least.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      This piece of consolation completed the baroness&rsquo;s unhappiness. She really
+      had conceived a great affection for Raynal, and her heart had been set on
+      the wedding.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Take away all that finery, girls,&rdquo; said she bitterly; &ldquo;we shall not want
+      it for years. I shall not be alive when he comes home from Egypt. I never
+      had a son&mdash;only daughters&mdash;the best any woman ever had; but a
+      mother is not complete without a son, and I shall never live to have one
+      now.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I hate General Bonaparte,&rdquo; said Rose viciously.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hate my general?&rdquo; groaned Raynal, looking down with a sort of
+      superstitious awe and wonder at the lovely vixen. &ldquo;Hate the best soldier
+      the world ever saw?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What do I care for his soldiership? He has put off our wedding. For how
+      many years did you say?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No; he has put it on.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      In answer to the astonished looks this excited, he explained that the
+      wedding was to have been in a week, but now it must be to-morrow at ten
+      o&rsquo;clock.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The three ladies set up their throats together. &ldquo;Tomorrow?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To-morrow. Why, what do you suppose I left Paris for yesterday? left my
+      duties even.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What, monsieur?&rdquo; asked Josephine, timidly, &ldquo;did you ride all that way,
+      and leave your duties MERELY TO MARRY ME?&rdquo; and she looked a little
+      pleased.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are worth a great deal more trouble than that,&rdquo; said Raynal simply.
+      &ldquo;Besides, I had passed my word, and I always keep my word.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So do I,&rdquo; said Josephine, a little proudly. &ldquo;I will not go from it now,
+      if you insist; but I confess to you, that such a proposal staggers me; so
+      sudden&mdash;no preliminaries&mdash;no time to reflect; in short, there
+      are so many difficulties that I must request you to reconsider the
+      matter.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Difficulties,&rdquo; shouted Raynal with merry disdain; &ldquo;there are none, unless
+      you sit down and make them; we do more difficult things than this every
+      day of our lives: we passed the bridge of Arcola in thirteen minutes; and
+      we had not the consent of the enemy, as we have yours&mdash;have we not?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Her only reply was a look at her mother, to which the baroness replied by
+      a nod; then turning to Raynal, &ldquo;This empressement is very flattering; but
+      I see no possibility: there is an etiquette we cannot altogether defy:
+      there are preliminaries before a daughter of Beaurepaire can become a
+      wife.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There used to be all that, madam,&rdquo; laughed Raynal, putting her down
+      good-humoredly; &ldquo;but it was in the days when armies came out and touched
+      their caps to one another, and went back into winter quarters. Then the
+      struggle was who could go slowest; now the fight is who can go fastest.
+      Time and Bonaparte wait for nobody; and ladies and other strong places are
+      taken by storm, not undermined a foot a month as under Noah Quartorze: let
+      me cut this short, as time is short.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He then drew a little plan of a wedding campaign. &ldquo;The carriages will be
+      here at 9 A.M.,&rdquo; said he; &ldquo;they will whisk us down to the mayor&rsquo;s house by
+      a quarter to ten: Picard, the notary, meets us there with the marriage
+      contract, to save time; the contract signed, the mayor will do the
+      marriage at quick step out of respect for me&mdash;half an hour&mdash;quarter
+      past ten; breakfast in the same house an hour and a quarter:&mdash;we
+      mustn&rsquo;t hurry a wedding breakfast&mdash;then ten minutes or so for the old
+      fogies to waste in making speeches about our virtues&mdash;my watch will
+      come out&mdash;my charger will come round&mdash;I rise from the table&mdash;embrace
+      my dear old mother&mdash;kiss my wife&rsquo;s hand&mdash;into the saddle&mdash;canter
+      to Paris&mdash;roll to Toulon&mdash;sail to Egypt. But I shall leave a
+      wife and a mother behind me: they will both send me a kind word now and
+      then; and I will write letters to you all from Egypt, and when I come
+      home, my wife and I will make acquaintance, and we will all be happy
+      together: and if I am killed out there, don&rsquo;t you go and fret your poor
+      little hearts about it; it is a soldier&rsquo;s lot sooner or later. Besides,
+      you will find I have taken care of you; nobody shall come and turn you out
+      of your quarters, even though Jean Raynal should be dead; I have got to
+      meet Picard at Riviere&rsquo;s on that very business&mdash;I am off.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He was gone as brusquely as he came.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mother! sister!&rdquo; cried Josephine, &ldquo;help me to love this man.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You need no help,&rdquo; cried the baroness, with enthusiasm, &ldquo;not love him, we
+      should all be monsters.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Raynal came to supper looking bright and cheerful. &ldquo;No more work to-day. I
+      have nothing to do but talk; fancy that.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      This evening Josephine de Beaurepaire, who had been silent and thoughtful,
+      took a quiet opportunity, and purred in his ear, &ldquo;Monsieur!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mademoiselle!&rdquo; rang the trombone.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Am I not to go to Egypt?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine drew back at this brusque reply like a sensitive plant. But she
+      returned to the attack.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But is it not a wife&rsquo;s duty to be by her husband&rsquo;s side to look after his
+      comfort&mdash;to console him when others vex him&mdash;to soothe him when
+      he is harassed?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Her first duty is to obey him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Certainly.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, when I am your husband, I shall bid you stay with your mother and
+      sister while I go to Egypt.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I shall obey you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He told her bluntly he thought none the worse of her for making the offer;
+      but should not accept it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Camille Dujardin slept that night at a roadside inn about twelve miles
+      from Beaurepaire, and not more than six from the town where the wedding
+      was to take place next day.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was a close race.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And the racers all unconscious of each other, yet spurred impartially by
+      events that were now hurrying to a climax.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0007" id="link2HCH0007">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER VII.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      The next day at sharp nine two carriages were at the door.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But the ladies were not ready. Thus early in the campaign did they throw
+      all into disorder. For so nicely had Raynal timed the several events that
+      this threw him all into confusion. He stamped backwards and forwards, and
+      twisted his mustaches, and swore. This enforced unpunctuality was a new
+      torture to him. Jacintha told them he was angry, and that made them
+      nervous and flurried, and their fingers strayed wildly among hooks and
+      eyes, and all sorts of fastenings; they were not ready till half-past
+      nine. Conscious they deserved a scolding, they sent Josephine down first
+      to mollify. She dawned upon the honest soldier so radiant, so dazzling in
+      her snowy dress, with her coronet of pearls (an heirloom), and her bridal
+      veil parted, and the flush of conscious beauty on her cheek, that instead
+      of scolding her, he actually blurted out, &ldquo;Well! by St. Denis it was worth
+      waiting half an hour for.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He recovered a quarter of an hour by making the driver gallop. Then
+      occasional shrieks issued from the carriage that held the baroness. That
+      ancient lady feared annihilation: she had not come down from a galloping
+      age.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They drove into the town, drew up at the mayor&rsquo;s house, were received with
+      great ceremony by that functionary and Picard, and entered the house.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      When their carriages rattled into the street from the north side, Colonel
+      Dujardin had already entered it from the south, and was riding at a foot&rsquo;s
+      pace along the principal street. The motion of his horse now shook him
+      past endurance. He dismounted at an inn a few doors from the mayor&rsquo;s
+      house, and determined to do the rest of the short journey on foot. The
+      landlord bustled about him obsequiously. &ldquo;You are faint, colonel; you have
+      travelled too far. Let me order you an excellent breakfast.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No. I want a carriage; have you one?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have two; but, unluckily, they are both engaged for the day, and by
+      people of distinction. Commandant Raynal is married to-day.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah! I wish him joy,&rdquo; said Camille, heartily. He then asked the landlord
+      to open the window, as he felt rather faint. The landlord insisted on
+      breakfast, and Camille sat down to an omelet and a bottle of red wine.
+      Then he lay awhile near the window, revived by the air, and watched the
+      dear little street he had not seen for years. He felt languid, but happy,
+      celestially happy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She was a few doors from him, and neither knew it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A pen was put into her white hand, and in another moment she had signed a
+      marriage contract.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now to the church,&rdquo; cried the baroness, gayly. To get to the church, they
+      must pass by the window Camille reclined at.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0008" id="link2HCH0008">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER VIII.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh! there&rsquo;s no time for that,&rdquo; said Raynal. And as the baroness looked
+      horrified and amazed, Picard explained: &ldquo;The state marries its citizens
+      now, with reason: since marriage is a civil contract.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Marriage a civil contract!&rdquo; repeated the baroness. &ldquo;What, is it then no
+      longer one of the holy sacraments? What horrible impiety shall we come to
+      next? Unhappy France! Such a contract would never be a marriage in my
+      eyes: and what would become of an union the Church had not blessed?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madame,&rdquo; said Picard, &ldquo;the Church can bless it still; but it is only the
+      mayor here that can DO it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      All this time Josephine was blushing scarlet, and looking this way and
+      that, with a sort of instinctive desire to fly and hide, no matter where,
+      for a week or so.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Haw! haw! haw!&rdquo; roared Raynal; &ldquo;here is a pretty mother. Wants her
+      daughter to be unlawfully married in a church, instead of lawfully in a
+      house. Give me the will!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Look here, mother-in-law: I have left Beaurepaire to my lawful wife.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Otherwise,&rdquo; put in Picard, &ldquo;in case of death, it would pass to his
+      heir-at-law.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And HE would turn you all out, and that does not suit me. Now there
+      stands the only man who can make mademoiselle my LAWFUL wife. So quick
+      march, monsieur the mayor, for time and Bonaparte wait for no man.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Stay a minute, young people,&rdquo; said the mayor. &ldquo;We should soothe
+      respectable prejudices, not crush them. Madam, I am at least as old as
+      you, and have seen many changes. I perfectly understand your feelings.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, monsieur! oh!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Calm yourself, dear madam; the case is not so bad as you think. It is
+      perfectly true that in republican France the civil magistrate alone can
+      bind French citizens in lawful wedlock. But this does not annihilate the
+      religious ceremony. You can ask the Church&rsquo;s blessing on my work; and be
+      assured you are not the only one who retains that natural prejudice. Out
+      of every ten couples that I marry, four or five go to church afterwards
+      and perform the ancient ceremonies. And they do well. For there before the
+      altar the priest tells them what it is not my business to dilate upon&mdash;the
+      grave moral and religious duties they have undertaken along with this
+      civil contract. The state binds, but the Church still blesses, and piously
+      assents to that&rdquo;&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;From which she has no power to dissent.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur Picard, do you consider it polite to interrupt the chief
+      magistrate of the place while he is explaining the law to a citizen?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      (This closed Picard.)
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I married a daughter last year,&rdquo; continued the worthy mayor.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What, after this fashion?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I married her myself, as I will marry yours, if you will trust me with
+      her. And after I have made them one, there is nothing to prevent them
+      adjourning to the church.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I beg your pardon,&rdquo; cried Raynal, &ldquo;there are two things to prevent it: a
+      couple that wait for no man: Time and Bonaparte. Come, sir; marry us, and
+      have done with it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The mayor assented. He invited Josephine to stand before him. She trembled
+      and wept a little: Rose clung to her and wept, and the good mayor married
+      the parties off hand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is that all?&rdquo; asked the baroness; &ldquo;it is terribly soon done.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is done effectively, madam,&rdquo; said the mayor, with a smile. &ldquo;Permit me
+      to tell you that his Holiness the Pope cannot undo my work.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Picard grinned slyly, and whispered something into Raynal&rsquo;s ear.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh! indeed,&rdquo; said Raynal aloud and carelessly. &ldquo;Come, Madame Raynal, to
+      breakfast: follow us, the rest of you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They paired, and followed the bride and bridegroom into the
+      breakfast-room.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The light words Picard whispered were five in number.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Now if the mayor had not snubbed Picard just before, he would have uttered
+      those jocose but true words aloud. There was no particular reason why he
+      should not. And if he had,&mdash;The threads of the web of life, how
+      subtle they are! The finest cotton of Manchester, the finer meshes of the
+      spider, seem three-inch cables by comparison with those moral gossamers
+      which vulgar eyes cannot see at all, the &ldquo;somethings, nothings,&rdquo; on which
+      great fates have hung.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was a cheerful breakfast, thanks to Raynal, who would be in high
+      spirits, and would not allow a word of regret from any one. Madame Raynal
+      sat by his side, looking up at him every now and then with innocent
+      admiration. A merry wedding breakfast.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But if men and women could see through the walls of houses!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Two doors off sat the wounded colonel alone, recruiting the small remnant
+      of his sore tried strength, that he might struggle on to Beaurepaire, and
+      lose in one moment years of separation, pain, prison, anguish, martyrdom,
+      in one great gush of joy without compare.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The wedding breakfast was ended. The time was drawing near to part. There
+      was a silence. It was broken by Madame Raynal. She asked Raynal very
+      timidly if he had reflected. &ldquo;On what?&rdquo; said he.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;About taking me to Egypt.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No: I have not given it a thought since I said &lsquo;no.&rsquo;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yet permit me to say that it is my duty to be by your side, my husband.&rdquo;
+       And she colored at this word, being the first time she had ever used it.
+      Raynal was silent. She murmured on, &ldquo;I would not be an encumbrance to you,
+      sir: I should not be useless. Gentlemen, I could add more to his comfort
+      than he gives me credit for.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Warm assent of the mayor and notary to this hint.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I give you credit for being an angel,&rdquo; said Raynal warmly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He hesitated. Rose was trembling, her fork shaking in her poor little
+      hand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She cast a piteous glance at him. He saw it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You shall go with me next time,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;Let us speak of it no more.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine bowed her head. &ldquo;At least give me something to do for you while
+      you are away. Tell me what I can do for my absent friend to show my
+      gratitude, my regard, my esteem.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, let me think. I saw a plain gray dress at Beaurepaire.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, monsieur. My gray silk, Rose.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I like that dress.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you? Then the moment I reach home after losing you I shall put it on,
+      and it shall be my constant wear. I see; you are right; gray becomes a
+      wife whose husband is not dead, but is absent, and alas! in hourly
+      danger.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now look at that!&rdquo; cried Raynal to the company. &ldquo;That is her all over:
+      she can see six meanings where another would see but one. I never thought
+      of that, I swear. I like modest colors, that is all. My mother used to be
+      all for modest wives wearing modest colors.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am of her mind, sir. Is there nothing more difficult you will be so
+      good as give me to do?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No; there is only one order more, and that will be easier still to such a
+      woman as you. I commit to your care the name of Raynal. It is not so high
+      a name as yours, but it is as honest. I am proud of it: I am jealous of
+      it. I shall guard it for you in Egypt: you guard it in France for me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;With my life,&rdquo; cried Josephine, lifting her eyes and her hand to heaven.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Soon after this Raynal ordered his charger.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness began to cry. &ldquo;The young people may hope to see you again,&rdquo;
+       said she; &ldquo;but there are two chances against your poor old mother.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Courage, mother!&rdquo; cried the stout soldier. &ldquo;No, no; you won&rsquo;t play me
+      such a trick: once is enough for that game.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Brother!&rdquo; cried Rose, &ldquo;do not go without kissing your little sister, who
+      loves you and thanks you.&rdquo; He kissed her. &ldquo;Bravo, generous soul!&rdquo; she
+      cried, with her arms round his neck. &ldquo;God protect you, and send you back
+      safe to us!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Amen!&rdquo; cried all present by one impulse, even the cold notary.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Raynal&rsquo;s mustache quivered. He kissed Josephine hastily on the brow, the
+      baroness on both cheeks; shook the men&rsquo;s hands warmly but hastily, and
+      strode out without looking behind him. He was moved for once.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They all followed him to the door of the house. He was tightening his
+      horse&rsquo;s girths. He flung himself with all the resolution of his steel
+      nature into the saddle, and, with one grand wave of his cocked hat to the
+      tearful group, he spurred away for Egypt.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0009" id="link2HCH0009">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER IX.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      The baroness took the doctor a-shopping; she must buy Rose a gray silk. In
+      doing this she saw many other tempting things. I say no more.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But the young ladies went up to Beaurepaire in the other carriage, for
+      Josephine wished to avoid the gaze of the town, and get home and be quiet.
+      The driver went very fast. He had drunk the bride&rsquo;s health at the mayor&rsquo;s,
+      item the bridegroom&rsquo;s, the bridesmaid&rsquo;s, the mayor&rsquo;s, etc., and &ldquo;a spur in
+      the head is worth two in the heel,&rdquo; says the proverb. The sisters leaned
+      back on the soft cushions, and enjoyed the smooth and rapid motion once so
+      familiar to them, so rare of late.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then Rose took her sister gently to task for having offered to go to
+      Egypt. She had forgotten her poor sister.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, love,&rdquo; replied Josephine, &ldquo;did you not see I dared not look towards
+      you? I love you better than all the world; but this was my duty. I was his
+      wife: I had no longer a feeble inclination and a feeble disinclination to
+      decide between, but right on one side, wrong on the other.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh! I know where your ladyship&rsquo;s strength lies: my force is&mdash;in&mdash;my
+      inclinations.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, Rose,&rdquo; continued Josephine thoughtfully, &ldquo;duty is a great comfort:
+      it is so tangible; it is something to lay hold of for life or death; a
+      strong tower for the weak but well disposed.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose assented, and they were silent a minute; and when she spoke again it
+      was to own she loved a carriage. &ldquo;How fast we glide! Now lean back with
+      me, and take my hand, and as we glide shut your eyes and think: whisper me
+      all your feelings, every one of them.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, then,&rdquo; said Josephine, half closing her eyes, &ldquo;in the first place I
+      feel a great calm, a heavenly calm. My fate is decided. No more suspense.
+      My duties are clear. I have a husband I am proud of. There is no perfidy
+      with him, no deceit, no disingenuousness, no shade. He is a human sun. He
+      will make me a better, truer woman, and I him a happier man. Yes, is it
+      not nice to think that great and strong as he is I can teach him a
+      happiness he knows not as yet?&rdquo; And she smiled with the sense of her
+      delicate power, but said no more; for she was not the one to talk much
+      about herself. But Rose pressed her. &ldquo;Yes, go on, dear,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;I seem
+      to see your pretty little thoughts rising out of your heart like a
+      bubbling fountain: go on.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Thus encouraged, Josephine thought on aloud, &ldquo;And then, gratitude!&rdquo; said
+      she. &ldquo;I have heard it said, or read it somewhere, that gratitude is a
+      burden: I cannot understand that sentiment; why, to me gratitude is a
+      delight, gratitude is a passion. It is the warmest of all the tender
+      feelings I have for dear Monsieur Raynal. I feel it glow here, in my
+      bosom. I think I shall love him as I ought long before he comes back.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;BEFORE?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; murmured Josephine, her eyes still half closed. &ldquo;His virtues will
+      always be present to me. His little faults of manner will not be in sight.
+      Good Raynal! The image of those great qualities I revere so, perhaps
+      because I fail in them myself, will be before my mind; and ere he comes
+      home I shall love him dearly. I&rsquo;ll tell you one reason why I wished to go
+      home at once was&mdash;no&mdash;you must guess.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Guess?&rdquo; said Rose, contemptuously. &ldquo;As if I did not see it was to put on
+      your gray silk.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine smiled assent, and said almost with fervor, &ldquo;Good Raynal! I feel
+      prouder of his honest name than of our noble one. And I am so calm, dear,
+      thanks to you, so tranquil; so pleased that my mother&rsquo;s mind is at rest,
+      so convinced all is for the best, so contented with my own lot; so hap&mdash;py.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      A gentle tear stole from beneath her long lashes. Rose looked at her
+      wistfully: then laid her cheek to hers. They leaned back hand in hand,
+      placid and silent.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The carriage glided fast. Beaurepaire was almost in sight.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Suddenly Josephine&rsquo;s hand tightened on Rose&rsquo;s, and she sat up in the
+      carriage like a person awakened from a strange dream.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What is it?&rdquo; asked Rose.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Some one in uniform.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, is that all? Ah! you thought it was a message from Raynal.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh! no! on foot&mdash;walking very slowly. Coming this way, too. Coming
+      this way!&rdquo; and she became singularly restless, and looked round in the
+      carriage. It was one of those old chariots with no side windows, but a
+      peep hole at the back. This aperture, however, had a flap over it.
+      Josephine undid the flap with nimble though agitated fingers; and saw&mdash;nothing.
+      The road had taken a turn. &ldquo;Oh,&rdquo; said Rose, carelessly, &ldquo;for that matter
+      the roads are full of soldiers just now.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay, but not of officers on foot.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose gave her such a look, and for the first time this many a day spoke
+      sternly to her, and asked her what on earth she had to do with uniforms or
+      officers except one, the noblest in the world, her husband.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A month ago that word was almost indifferent to Josephine, or rather she
+      uttered it with a sort of mild complacency. Now she started at it, and it
+      struck chill upon her. She did not reply, however, and the carriage rolled
+      on.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He seemed to be dragging himself along.&rdquo; This was the first word
+      Josephine had spoken for some time. &ldquo;Oh, did he?&rdquo; replied Rose carelessly;
+      &ldquo;well, let him. Here we are, at home.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am glad of it,&rdquo; said Josephine, &ldquo;very glad.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      On reaching Beaurepaire she wanted to go up-stairs at once and put on her
+      gray gown. But the day was so delightful that Rose begged her to stroll in
+      the Pleasaunce for half an hour and watch for their mother&rsquo;s return. She
+      consented in an absent way, and presently began to walk very fast,
+      unconscious of her companion. Rose laid a hand upon her playfully to
+      moderate her, and found her skin burning.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, what is the matter?&rdquo; said she, anxiously.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nothing, nothing,&rdquo; was the sharp reply.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There&rsquo;s a fretful tone; and how excited you look, and feel too. Well, I
+      thought you were unnaturally calm after such an event.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I only saw his back,&rdquo; said Josephine. &ldquo;Did not you see him?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;See who? Oh, that tiresome officer. Why, how much more are we to hear
+      about him? I don&rsquo;t believe there WAS one.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At this moment a cocked hat came in sight, bobbing up and down above the
+      palings that divided the park from the road. Josephine pointed to it
+      without a word.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose got a little cross at being practically confuted, and said coldly,
+      &ldquo;Come, let us go in; the only cocked hat we can see is on the way to
+      Paris.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine assented eagerly. But she had not taken two steps towards the
+      house ere she altered her mind, and said she felt faint, she wanted air;
+      no, she should stay out a little longer. &ldquo;Look, Rose,&rdquo; said she, in a
+      strangely excited way, &ldquo;what a shame! They put all manner of rubbish into
+      this dear old tree: I will have it all turned out.&rdquo; And she looked with
+      feigned interest into the tree: but her eyes seemed turned inward.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose gave a cry of surprise. &ldquo;He is waving his hat to me! What on earth
+      does that mean?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Perhaps he takes you for me,&rdquo; said Josephine.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Who is it? What do you mean?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;IT IS HE! I knew his figure at a glance.&rdquo; And she blushed and trembled
+      with joy; she darted behind the tree and peered round at him unseen:
+      turning round a moment she found Rose at her back pale and stern. She
+      looked at her, and said with terrible simplicity, &ldquo;Ah, Rose, I forgot.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Are you mad, Josephine? Into the house this moment; if it IS he, I will
+      receive him and send him about his business.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      But Josephine stood fascinated, and pale as ashes; for now the cocked hat
+      stopped, and a pale face with eyes whose eager fire shone even at that
+      distance, rose above the palings. Josephine crouched behind Rose, and
+      gasped out, &ldquo;Something terrible is coming, terrible! terrible!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Say something hateful,&rdquo; said Rose, trembling in her turn, but only with
+      anger. &ldquo;The heartless selfish traitor! He never notices you till you are
+      married to the noblest of mankind; and then he comes here directly to ruin
+      your peace. No; I have altered my mind. He shall not see you, of course;
+      but YOU shall hear HIM. I&rsquo;ll soon make you know the wretch and loathe him
+      as I do. There, now he has turned the corner; hide in the oak while he is
+      out of sight. Hide, quick, quick.&rdquo; Josephine obeyed mechanically; and
+      presently, through that very aperture whence her sister had smiled on her
+      lover she hissed out, in a tone of which one would not have thought her
+      capable, &ldquo;Be wise, be shrewd; find out who is the woman that has seduced
+      him from me, and has brought two wretches to this. I tell you it is some
+      wicked woman&rsquo;s doing. He loved me once.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not so loud!&mdash;one word: you are a wife. Swear to me you will not let
+      him see you, come what may.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh! never! never!&rdquo; cried Josephine with terror. &ldquo;I would rather die. When
+      you have heard what he has to say, then tell him I am dead. No, tell him I
+      adore my husband, and went to Egypt this day with him. Ah! would to God I
+      had!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sh! sh!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sh!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Camille was at the little gate.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose stood still, and nerved herself in silence. Josephine panted in her
+      hiding-place.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose&rsquo;s only thought now was to expose the traitor to her sister, and
+      restore her peace. She pretended not to see Camille till he was near her.
+      He came eagerly towards her, his pale face flushing with great joy, and
+      his eyes like diamonds.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Josephine! It is not Josephine, after all,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;Why, this must be
+      Rose, little Rose, grown up to a fine lady, a beautiful lady.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What do you come here for, sir?&rdquo; asked Rose in a tone of icy
+      indifference.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What do I come here for? is that the way to speak to me? but I am too
+      happy to mind. Dear Beaurepaire! do I see you once again!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And madame?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What madame?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madame Dujardin that is or was to be.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This is the first I have ever heard of her,&rdquo; said Camille, gayly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This is odd, for we have heard all about it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Are you jesting?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If I understand you right, you imply that I have broken faith with
+      Josephine?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Certainly.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then you lie, Mademoiselle Rose de Beaurepaire.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Insolent!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No. It is you who have insulted your sister as well as me. She was not
+      made to be deserted for meaner women. Come, mademoiselle, affront me, and
+      me alone, and you shall find me more patient. Oh! who would have thought
+      Beaurepaire would receive me thus?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is your own fault. You never sent her a line for all these years.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, how could I?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, sir, the information you did not supply others did. We know that
+      you were seen in a Spanish village drinking between two guerillas.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That is true,&rdquo; said Camille.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;An honest French soldier fired at you. Why, he told us so himself.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He told you true,&rdquo; said Camille, sullenly. &ldquo;The bullet grazed my hand;
+      see, here is the mark. Look!&rdquo; She did look, and gave a little scream; but
+      recovering herself, said she wished it had gone through his heart. &ldquo;Why
+      prolong this painful interview?&rdquo; said she; &ldquo;the soldier told us all.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I doubt that,&rdquo; said Camille. &ldquo;Did he tell you that under the table I was
+      chained tight down to the chair I sat in? Did he tell you that my hand was
+      fastened to a drinking-horn, and my elbow to the table, and two fellows
+      sitting opposite me with pistols quietly covering me, ready to draw the
+      trigger if I should utter a cry? Did he tell you that I would have uttered
+      that cry and died at that table but for one thing, I had promised her to
+      live?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not he; he told me nothing so incredible. Besides, what became of you all
+      these years? You are a double traitor, to your country and to her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Camille literally gasped for breath. &ldquo;You are a most cruel young lady to
+      insult me so,&rdquo; said he, and scalding tears forced themselves from his
+      eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose eyed him with merciless scorn.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He fought manfully against this weakness, with which his wound and his
+      fatigue had something to do, as well as Rose&rsquo;s bitter words; and after a
+      gallant struggle he returned her her haughty stare, and addressed her
+      thus: &ldquo;Mademoiselle, I feel myself blush, but it is for you I blush, not
+      for myself. This is what BECAME of me. I went out alone to explore; I fell
+      into an ambuscade; I shot one of the enemy, and pinked another, but my arm
+      being broken by a bullet, and my horse killed under me, the rascals got
+      me. They took me about, tried to make a decoy of me as I have told you,
+      and ended by throwing me into a dungeon. They loaded me with chains, too,
+      though the walls were ten feet thick, and the door iron, and bolted and
+      double-bolted outside. And there for months and years, in spite of wounds,
+      hunger, thirst, and all the tortures those cowards made me suffer, I
+      lived, because, Rose, I had promised some one at that gate there (and he
+      turned suddenly and pointed to it) that I would come back alive. At last,
+      one night, my jailer came to my cell drunk. I seized him by the throat and
+      throttled him till he was insensible; his keys unlocked my fetters, and
+      locked him in the cell, and I got safely outside. But there a sentinel saw
+      me, and fired at me. He missed me but ran after me, and caught me. You see
+      I was stiff, confined so long. He gave me a thrust of his bayonet; I flung
+      my heavy keys fiercely in his face; he staggered; I wrested his piece from
+      him, and disabled him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I crossed the frontier in the night, and got to Bayonne; and thence, day
+      and night, to Paris. There I met a reward for all my anguish. They gave me
+      the epaulets of a colonel. See, here they are. France does not give these
+      to traitors, young lady.&rdquo; He held them out to her in both hands. She eyed
+      them half stupidly; all her thoughts were on the oak-tree hard by. She
+      began to shudder. Camille was telling the truth. She felt that; she saw
+      it; and Josephine was hearing it. &ldquo;Ay! look at them, you naughty girl,&rdquo;
+       said Camille, trying to be jocose over it all with his poor trembling lip.
+      He went on to say that from the moment he had left dark Spain, and entered
+      fair France everybody was so kind, so sympathizing. &ldquo;They felt for the
+      poor worn soldier coming back to his love. All but you, Rose. You told me
+      I was a traitor to her and to France.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I was told so,&rdquo; said Rose, faintly. She was almost at her wits&rsquo; end what
+      to say or do.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, are you sorry or not sorry for saying such a cruel thing to a poor
+      fellow?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sorry, very sorry,&rdquo; whispered Rose. She could not persist in injustice,
+      yet she did not want Josephine to hear.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then say no more about it; there&rsquo;s my hand. You are not a soldier, and
+      did not know what you were talking about.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am very sorry I spoke so harshly to you. But you understand. How you
+      look; how you pant.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There, I will show you I forgive you. These epaulets, dear, I have never
+      put them on. I said, no; Josephine shall put them on for me. I will take
+      honor as well as happiness from her dear hand. But you are her sister, and
+      what are epaulets compared with what she will give me? You shall put them
+      on, dear. Come, then you will be sure I bear no malice.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose, faint at heart, consented in silence, and fastened on the epaulets.
+      &ldquo;Yes, Camille!&rdquo; she cried, with sudden terror, &ldquo;think of glory, now;
+      nothing but glory.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No one thinks of it more. But to-day how can I think of it, how can I
+      give her a rival? To-day I am all love. Rose, no man ever loved a human
+      creature as I love Josephine. Your mother is well, dear? All are well at
+      Beaurepaire? Oh, where is she all this time? in the house?&rdquo; He was moving
+      quickly towards the house; but Rose instinctively put out her hand to stop
+      him. He recoiled a little and winced.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What is the matter?&rdquo; cried she.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nothing, dear girl; you put your hand on my wound, that is all. What is
+      that noise in the tree? Anybody listening to us?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll see,&rdquo; said Rose, with all a woman&rsquo;s wit, and whipped hastily round
+      to hinder Camille from going. She found Josephine white as death,
+      apparently fainting, and clutching at the tree convulsively with her
+      nails. Such was the intensity of the situation that she left her beloved
+      sister in that piteous state, and even hoped she would faint dead away,
+      and so hear no more. She came back white, and told Camille it was only a
+      bird got into the tree. &ldquo;And to think you should be wounded,&rdquo; said she, to
+      divert his attention from the tree.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;and it is rather inflamed, and has worried me all the
+      way. You need not go telling Josephine, though. They wanted me to stop and
+      lay up at Bayonne. How could I? And again at Paris. How could I? They
+      said, &lsquo;You will die.&rsquo;&mdash;&lsquo;Not before I get to Beaurepaire,&rsquo; said I. I
+      could bear the motion of a horse no longer, so at the nearest town I asked
+      for a carriage. Would you believe it? both his carriages were OUT AT A
+      WEDDING. I could not wait till they came back. I had waited an eternity. I
+      came on foot. I dragged my self along; the body was weak, but the heart
+      was strong. A little way from here my wound seemed inclined to open. I
+      pressed it together tight with my hand; you see I could not afford to lose
+      any more blood, and so struggled on. &lsquo;Die?&rsquo; said I, &lsquo;not before
+      Beaurepaire.&rsquo; And, O Rose! now I could be content to die&mdash;at her
+      feet; for I am happy. Oh! I am happy beyond words to utter. What I have
+      gone through! But I kept my word, and this is Beaurepaire. Hurrah!&rdquo; and
+      his pale cheek flushed, and his eye gleamed, and he waved his hat feebly
+      over his head, &ldquo;hurrah! hurrah! hurrah!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, don&rsquo;t!&mdash;don&rsquo;t!&mdash;don&rsquo;t!&rdquo; cried Rose wild with pity and
+      dismay.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How can I help?&mdash;I am mad with joy&mdash;hurrah! hurrah! hurrah!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No! no! no! no! no!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What is the matter?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And must I stab you worse than all your enemies have stabbed you?&rdquo; sighed
+      Rose, and tears of womanly pity now streamed down her cheeks.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Camille&rsquo;s mind began to misgive him. What was become of Josephine? she did
+      not appear. He faltered out, &ldquo;Your mother is well; all are well I hope.
+      Oh, where is she?&rdquo; and receiving no reply, began to tremble visibly with
+      the fear of some terrible calamity.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose, with a sister fainting close by, and this poor lover trembling
+      before her, lost all self-command, and began to wring her hands and cry
+      wildly. &ldquo;Camille,&rdquo; she almost screamed, &ldquo;there is but one thing for you to
+      do; leave Beaurepaire on the instant: fly from it; it is no place for
+      you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She is dead,&rdquo; said Camille, very quietly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      When he said that, with an unnatural and monotonous calm such as precedes
+      deliberate suicide, it flashed in one moment across Rose that it was much
+      best he should think so.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She did not reply; but she drooped her head and let him think it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She would have come to me ere this if she was alive,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;You are
+      all in white: they mourn in white for angels like her, that go to heaven,
+      virgins. Oh! I was blind. You might have told me at once; you see I can
+      bear it. What does it matter to one who loves as I love? It is only to
+      give her one more proof I lived only for her. I would have died a hundred
+      times but for my promise to her. Yes, I am coming, love; I am coming.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He fell on his knees and smiled, and whispered, &ldquo;I am coming, Josephine, I
+      am coming.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      A sob and a moan as of a creature dying in anguish answered him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose screamed with terror when she heard it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Camille rose to his feet, awestruck. &ldquo;That was her voice, behind this
+      tree,&rdquo; he whispered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, no,&rdquo; cried Rose; &ldquo;it was me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      But at that moment a rustle and a rush was heard of some one darting out
+      of the tree.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Camille darted furiously round it in the same direction. Rose tried to
+      stop him, but was too late. The next moment Raynal&rsquo;s wife was in his arms.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0010" id="link2HCH0010">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER X.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Josephine wrestled long and terribly with nature in that old oak-tree. But
+      who can so struggle forever? Anguish, remorse, horror, despair, and love
+      wrenched her to and fro; and O mysterious human heart! gleams of a mad
+      fitful joy shot through her, coming quick as lightning, going as quickly,
+      and leaving the despair darker. And then the fierce struggle of the soul
+      to make itself heard! More than once she had to close her mouth with her
+      hand: more than once she seized her throat not to cry out. But as the
+      struggle endured, she got weaker and weaker, and nature mightier and
+      mightier. And when the wounded hero fell on his knees so close to her;
+      when he who had resisted death so bravely for her, prepared to give up
+      life calmly for her, her bosom rose beyond all control: it seemed to fill
+      to choking, then to split wide open and give the struggling soul passage
+      in one gasping sob and heart-stricken cry. Could she have pent this in she
+      must have died.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It betrayed her. She felt it had: so then came the woman&rsquo;s instinct&mdash;flight:
+      the coward&rsquo;s impulse&mdash;flight: the chaste wife&rsquo;s inspiration&mdash;flight.
+      She rushed from her hiding-place and made wildly for the house.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But, unluckily, Camille was at that moment darting round the tree: she ran
+      right into the danger she meant to flee. He caught her in his arms. He
+      held her irresistibly. &ldquo;I have got her; I have got her,&rdquo; he shouted in
+      wild triumph. &ldquo;No! I will not let you go. None but God shall ever take you
+      from me, and he has spared you to me. You are not dead: you have kept
+      faith as I have: you have lived. See! look at me. I am alive, I am well, I
+      am happy. I told Rose that I suffered. If I had suffered I should remember
+      it. It is all gone at sight of you, my love! my love! Oh, my Josephine! my
+      love!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      His arm was firm round her waist. His glowing eyes poured love upon her.
+      She felt his beating heart.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      All that passed in her then, what mortal can say? She seemed two women:
+      that part of her which could not get away from his strong arm lost all
+      strength to resist, it yielded and thrilled under his embrace, her bosom
+      heaving madly: all that was free writhed away from him; her face was
+      averted with a glare of terror, and both her hands put up between his eyes
+      and it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You turn away your head. Rose, she turns away. Speak for me. Scold her;
+      for I don&rsquo;t know how to scold her. No answer from either; oh, what has
+      turned your hearts against me so?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Camille,&rdquo; cried Rose&mdash;the tears streaming down her cheeks&mdash;&ldquo;my
+      poor Camille! leave Beaurepaire. Oh, leave it at once.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Returned towards her with a look of inquiry.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At that Josephine, like some feeble but nimble wild creature on whom a
+      grasp has relaxed, writhed away from him and got free: &ldquo;Farewell!
+      Farewell!&rdquo; she cried, in despair&rsquo;s own voice, and made swiftly for the
+      house.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Camille stood aghast, and did not follow her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Now ere she had gone many steps who should meet her right in front but
+      Jacintha.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madame Raynal, the baroness&rsquo;s carriage is just in sight. I thought you&rsquo;d
+      like to know.&rdquo; Then she bawled proudly to Rose, &ldquo;I was the first to call
+      her madame;&rdquo; and off went Jacintha convinced she had done something very
+      clever.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      This blow turned those three to stone.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine had no longer the power or the wish to fly. &ldquo;Better so,&rdquo; she
+      thought, and she stood cowering.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The great passions that had spoken so loud were struck dumb, and a deep
+      silence fell upon the place. Madame Raynal&rsquo;s quivering eye turned slowly
+      and askant towards Camille, but stopped in terror ere it could see him.
+      For she knew by this fearful stillness that the truth was creeping on
+      Camille. And so did Rose.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At last Camille spoke one word in a low whisper.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madame?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Dead silence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;White? both in white?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose came between him and Josephine, and sobbed out, &ldquo;Camille, it was our
+      doing. We drove her to it. O sir, look how afraid of you she is. Do not
+      reproach her, if you are a man.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He waved her out of his way as if she had been some idle feather, and
+      almost staggered up to Josephine.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is for you to speak, my betrothed: are you married?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The poor creature, true to her nature, was thinking more of him than
+      herself. Even in her despair it flashed across her, &ldquo;If he knew all, he
+      too would be wretched for life. If I let him think ill of me he may be
+      happy one day.&rdquo; She cowered the picture of sorrow and tongue-tied guilt.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Are you a wife?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He winced and quivered as if a bullet had pierced him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This is how I came to be suspected; she I loved was false.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, Camille.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, no!&rdquo; cried Rose; &ldquo;don&rsquo;t believe HER: she never suspected you. We have
+      brought her to this, we alone.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Be silent, Rose! oh, be silent!&rdquo; gasped Josephine.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I lived for you: I would have died for you; you could not even wait for
+      me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      A low moan, but not a word of excuse.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What can I do for you now?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Forget me, Camille,&rdquo; said she despairingly, doggedly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Forget you? never, never! there is but one thing I can do to show you how
+      I loved you: I will forgive you, and begone. Whither shall I go? whither
+      shall I go now?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Camile, your words stab her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Let none speak but I,&rdquo; said Camille; &ldquo;none but I have the right to speak.
+      Poor weak angel that loved yet could not wait: I forgive you. Be happy, if
+      you can; I bid you be hap-py.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The quiet, despairing tones died away, and with them life seemed to end to
+      her, and hope to go out. He turned his back quickly on her. He cried
+      hoarsely, &ldquo;To the army! Back to the army, and a soldier&rsquo;s grave!&rdquo; Then
+      with a prodigious effort he drew himself haughtily up in marching
+      attitude. He took three strides, erect and fiery and bold.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At the next something seemed to snap asunder in the great heart, and the
+      worn body that heart had held up so long, rolled like a dead log upon the
+      ground with a tremendous fall.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0011" id="link2HCH0011">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XI.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      The baroness and Aubertin were just getting out of their carriage, when
+      suddenly they heard shrieks of terror in the Pleasaunce. They came with
+      quaking hearts as fast as their old limbs would carry them. They found
+      Rose and Josephine crouched over the body of a man, an officer.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose was just tearing open his collar and jacket. Dard and Jacintha had
+      run from the kitchen at the screams. Camille lay on his back, white and
+      motionless.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The doctor was the first to come up. &ldquo;Who! what is this? I seem to know
+      his face.&rdquo; Then shaking his head, &ldquo;Whoever it is, it is a bad case. Stand
+      away, ladies. Let me feel his pulse.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Whilst the old man was going stiffly down on one knee, Jacintha uttered a
+      cry of terror. &ldquo;See, see! his shirt! that red streak! Ah, ah! it is
+      getting bigger and bigger:&rdquo; and she turned faint in a moment, and would
+      have fallen but for Dard.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The doctor looked. &ldquo;All the better,&rdquo; said he firmly. &ldquo;I thought he was
+      dead. His blood flows; then I will save him. Don&rsquo;t clutch me so,
+      Josephine; don&rsquo;t cling to me like that. Now is the time to show your
+      breed: not turn sick at the sight of a little blood, like that foolish
+      creature, but help me save him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Take him in-doors,&rdquo; cried the baroness.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Into our house, mamma?&rdquo; gasped Rose; &ldquo;no, no.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What,&rdquo; said the baroness, &ldquo;a wounded soldier who has fought for France!
+      leave him to lie and die outside my door: what would my son say to that?
+      He is a soldier himself.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose cast a hasty look at Josephine. Josephine&rsquo;s eyes were bent on the
+      ground, and her hands clenched and trembling.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now, Jacintha, you be off,&rdquo; said the doctor. &ldquo;I can&rsquo;t have cowards about
+      him to make the others as bad. Go and stew down a piece of good beef for
+      him. Stew it in red wine and water.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That I will: poor thing!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, I know him,&rdquo; said the baroness suddenly; &ldquo;it is an old acquaintance,
+      young Dujardin: you remember, Josephine. I used to suspect him of a fancy
+      for you, poor fellow! Why, he must have come here to see us, poor soul.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No matter who it is; it is a man. Now, girls, have you courage, have you
+      humanity? Then come one on each side of him and take hands beneath his
+      back, while I lift his head and Dard his legs.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And handle him gently whatever you do,&rdquo; said Dard. &ldquo;I know what it is to
+      be wounded.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      These four carried the lifeless burden very slowly and gently across the
+      Pleasaunce to the house, then with more difficulty and caution up the
+      stairs.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      All the while the sisters&rsquo; hands griped one another tight beneath the
+      lifeless burden, and spoke to one another. And Josephine&rsquo;s arm upheld
+      tenderly but not weakly the hero she had struck down. She avoided Rose&rsquo;s
+      eye, her mother&rsquo;s, and even the doctor&rsquo;s: one gasping sob escaped her as
+      she walked with head half averted, and vacant, terror-stricken eyes, and
+      her victim on her sustaining arm.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The doctor selected the tapestried chamber for him as being most airy.
+      Then he ordered the women out, and with Dard&rsquo;s help undressed the still
+      insensible patient.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine sat down on the stairs in gloomy silence, her eyes on the
+      ground, like one waiting for her deathblow.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose, sick at heart, sat silent too at some distance. At last she said
+      faintly, &ldquo;Have we done well?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t know,&rdquo; said Josephine doggedly. Her eyes never left the ground.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We could not let him die for want of care.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He will not thank us. Better for him to die than live. Better for me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At this instant Dard came running down. &ldquo;Good news, mesdemoiselles, good
+      news! the wound runs all along; it is not deep, like mine was. He has
+      opened his eyes and shut them again. The dear good doctor stopped the
+      blood in a twinkle. The doctor says he&rsquo;ll be bound to save him. I must run
+      and tell Jacintha. She is taking on in the kitchen.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine, who had risen eagerly from her despairing posture, clasped her
+      hands together, then lifted up her voice and wept. &ldquo;He will live! he will
+      live!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      When she had wept a long while, she said to Rose, &ldquo;Come, sister, help your
+      poor Josephine.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, love, what shall we do?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My duty,&rdquo; faltered Josephine. &ldquo;An hour ago it seemed so sweet,&rdquo; and she
+      fell to weeping patiently again. They went to Josephine&rsquo;s room. She crept
+      slowly to a wardrobe, and took out a gray silk dress.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, never mind for to-day,&rdquo; cried Rose.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Help me, Rose. It is for myself as well; to remind me every moment I am
+      Madame Raynal.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They put the gray gown on her, both weeping patiently. It will be known at
+      the last day, all that honest women have suffered weeping silently in this
+      noisy world.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Camille soon recovered his senses and a portion of his strength: then the
+      irritation of his wound brought on fever. This in turn retired before the
+      doctor&rsquo;s remedies and a sound constitution, but it left behind it a great
+      weakness and general prostration. And in this state the fate of the body
+      depends greatly on the mind.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness and the doctor went constantly to see him, and soothe him: he
+      smiled and thanked them, but his eager eyes watched the door for one who
+      came not.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      When he got well enough to leave his bed the largest couch was sent up to
+      him from the saloon; a kind hand lined the baron&rsquo;s silk dressing-gown for
+      him warm and soft and nice; and he would sit or lie on his couch, or take
+      two turns in the room leaning upon Rose&rsquo;s shoulder, and glad of the
+      support; and he looked piteously in her eyes when she came and when she
+      went. Rose looked down; she could do nothing, she could say nothing.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      With his strength, Camille lost a portion of his pride: he pined for a
+      sight of her he no longer respected; pined for her, as the thirsty pine
+      for water in Sahara.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At last one day he spoke out. &ldquo;How kind you are to me, Rose! how kind you
+      all are&mdash;but one.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He waited in hopes she would say something, but she held her tongue.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;At least tell me why it is. Is she ashamed? Is she afraid?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Neither.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She hates me: it is true, then, that we hate those whom we have wounded.
+      Cruel, cruel Josephine! Oh, heart of marble against which my heart has
+      wrecked itself forever!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, no! She is anything but cruel: but she is Madame Raynal.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah! I forgot. But have I no claim on her? Nearly four years she has been
+      my betrothed. What have I done? Was I ever false to her? I could forgive
+      her for what she has done to me, but she cannot forgive me. Does she mean
+      never to see me again?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ask yourself what good could come of it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Very well,&rdquo; said Camille, with a malicious smile. &ldquo;I am in her way. I see
+      what she wants; she shall have it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose carried these words to Josephine. They went through her like a sword.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose pitied her. Rose had a moment&rsquo;s weakness.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Let us go to him,&rdquo; she said; &ldquo;anything is better than this.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Rose, I dare not,&rdquo; was the wise reply.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But the next day early, Josephine took Rose to a door outside the house, a
+      door that had long been disused. Nettles grew before it. She produced a
+      key and with great difficulty opened this door. It led to the tapestried
+      chamber, and years ago they used to steal up it and peep into the room.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose scarcely needed to be told that she was to watch Camille, and report
+      to her. In truth, it was a mysterious, vague protection against a danger
+      equally mysterious. Yet it made Josephine easier. But so unflinching was
+      her prudence that she never once could be prevailed on to mount those
+      stairs, and peep at Camille herself. &ldquo;I must starve my heart, not feed
+      it,&rdquo; said she. And she grew paler and more hollow-eyed day by day.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Yet this was the same woman who showed such feebleness and irresolution
+      when Raynal pressed her to marry him. But then dwarfs feebly drew her this
+      way and that. Now giants fought for her. Between a feeble inclination and
+      a feeble disinclination her dead heart had drifted to and fro. Now honor,
+      duty, gratitude,&mdash;which last with her was a passion,&mdash;dragged
+      her one way: love, pity, and remorse another.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Not one of these giants would relax his grasp, and nothing yielded except
+      her vital powers. Yes; her temper, one of the loveliest Heaven ever gave a
+      human creature, was soured at times.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Was it a wonder? There lay the man she loved pining for her; cursing her
+      for her cruelty, and alternately praying Heaven to forgive him and to
+      bless her: sighing, at intervals, all the day long, so loud, so deep, so
+      piteously, as if his heart broke with each sigh; and sometimes, for he
+      little knew, poor soul, that any human eye was upon him, casting aside his
+      manhood in his despair, and flinging himself on the very floor, and
+      muffling his head, and sobbing; he a hero.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And here was she pining in secret for him who pined for her? &ldquo;I am not a
+      woman at all,&rdquo; said she, who was all woman. &ldquo;I am crueller to him than a
+      tiger or any savage creature is to the victim she tears. I must cure him
+      of his love for me; and then die; for what shall I have to live for? He
+      weeps, he sighs, he cries for Josephine.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Her enforced cruelty was more contrary to this woman&rsquo;s nature than black
+      is to white, or heat to cold, and the heart rebelled furiously at times.
+      As when a rock tries to stem a current, the water fights its way on more
+      sides than one, so insulted nature dealt with Josephine. Not only did her
+      body pine, but her nerves were exasperated. Sudden twitches came over her,
+      that almost made her scream. Her permanent state was utter despondency,
+      but across it came fitful flashes of irritation; and then she was scarce
+      mistress of herself.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Wherefore you, who find some holy woman cross and bitter, stop a moment
+      before you sum her up vixen and her religion naught: inquire the history
+      of her heart: perhaps beneath the smooth cold surface of duties well
+      discharged, her life has been, or even is, a battle against some
+      self-indulgence the insignificant saint&rsquo;s very blood cries out for: and so
+      the poor thing is cross, not because she is bad, but because she is better
+      than the rest of us; yet only human.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Now though Josephine was more on her guard with the baroness than with
+      Rose, or the doctor, or Jacintha, her state could not altogether escape
+      the vigilance of a mother&rsquo;s eye.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But the baroness had not the clew we have; and what a difference that
+      makes! How small an understanding, put by accident or instruction on the
+      right track, shall run the game down! How great a sagacity shall wander if
+      it gets on a false scent!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Doctor,&rdquo; said the baroness one day, &ldquo;you are so taken up with your
+      patient you neglect the rest of us. Do look at Josephine! She is ill, or
+      going to be ill. She is so pale, and so fretful, so peevish, which is not
+      in her nature. Would you believe it, doctor, she snaps?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Our Josephine snap? This is new.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And snarls.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then look for the end of the world.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The other day I heard her snap Rose: and this morning she half snarled at
+      me, just because I pressed her to go and console our patient. Hush! here
+      she is. My child, I am accusing you to the doctor. I tell him you neglect
+      his patient: never go near him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I will visit him one of these days,&rdquo; said Josephine, coldly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;One of these days,&rdquo; said the baroness, shocked. &ldquo;You used not to be so
+      hard-hearted. A soldier, an old comrade of your husband&rsquo;s, wounded and
+      sick, and you alone never go to him, to console him with a word of
+      sympathy or encouragement.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine looked at her mother with a sort of incredulous stare. Then,
+      after a struggle, she replied with a tone and manner so spiteful and icy
+      that it would have deceived even us who know her had we heard it. &ldquo;He has
+      plenty of nurses without me.&rdquo; She added, almost violently, &ldquo;My husband, if
+      he were wounded, would not have so many, perhaps not have one.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      With this she rose and went out, leaving them aghast. She sat down in the
+      passage on a window-seat, and laughed hysterically. Rose heard her and ran
+      to her. Josephine told her what her mother had said to her. Rose soothed
+      her. &ldquo;Never mind, you have your sister who understands you: don&rsquo;t you go
+      back till they have got some other topic.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose out of curiosity went in, and found a discussion going on. The doctor
+      was fathoming Josephine, for the benefit of his companion.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is a female jealousy, and of a mighty innocent kind. We are so taken
+      up with this poor fellow, she thinks her soldier is forgotten.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Surely, doctor, our Josephine would not be so unreasonable, so unjust,&rdquo;
+       suggested her mother.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She belongs to a sex, be it said without offending you, madame, among
+      whose numberless virtues justice does not fill a prominent place.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness shook her head. &ldquo;That is not it. It is a piece of prudery.
+      This young gentleman was a sort of admirer of hers, though she did not
+      admire him much, as far as I remember. But it was four years ago; and she
+      is married to a man she loves, or is going to love.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, but, mamma, a trifling excess of delicacy is surely excusable.&rdquo;
+       This from Rose.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, no; it is not delicacy; it is prudery. And when people are sick and
+      suffering, an honest woman should take up her charity and lay down her
+      prudery, or her coquetry: two things that I suspect are the same thing in
+      different shapes.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Here Jacintha came in. &ldquo;Mademoiselle, here is the colonel&rsquo;s broth; Madame
+      Raynal has flavored it for him, and you are to take it up to him, and keep
+      him company while he eats it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come,&rdquo; cried the baroness, &ldquo;my lecture has not been lost.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose followed Jacintha up-stairs.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose was heart and head on Raynal&rsquo;s side.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She had deceived him about Josephine&rsquo;s attachment, and felt all the more
+      desirous to guard him against any ill consequences of it. Then he had been
+      so generous to her: he had left her her sister, who would have gone to
+      Egypt, and escaped this misery, but for her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But on the other hand,
+    </p>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+                                         &mdash;Gentle pity
+     Tugged at her heartstrings with complaining cries.
+</pre>
+    <p>
+      This watching of Camille saddened even her. When she was with him his
+      pride bore him up: but when he was alone as he thought, his anguish and
+      despair were terrible, and broke out in so many ways that often Rose
+      shrank in terror from her peep hole.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She dared not tell Josephine the half of what she saw: what she did tell
+      her agitated her so terribly: and often Rose had it on the tip of her
+      tongue to say, &ldquo;Do pray go and see if you can say nothing that will do him
+      good;&rdquo; but she fought the impulse down. This battle of feeling, though
+      less severe than her sister&rsquo;s, was constant; it destroyed her gayety. She,
+      whose merry laugh used to ring like chimes through the house, never
+      laughed now, seldom smiled, and often sighed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Dr. Aubertin was the last to succumb to the deep depression, but his time
+      came: and he had been for a day or two as grave and as sad as the rest,
+      when one day that Rose was absent, spying on Camille, he took the baroness
+      and Josephine into his confidence; and condescended finally to ask their
+      advice.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is humiliating,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;after all my experience, to be obliged to
+      consult unprofessional persons. Forty years ago I should have been TOO
+      WISE to do so. But since then I have often seen science baffled and
+      untrained intelligences throw light upon hard questions: and your sex in
+      particular has luminous instincts and reads things by flashes that we men
+      miss with a microscope. Our dear Madame Raynal suspected that plausible
+      notary, and to this day I believe she could not tell us why.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine admitted as much very frankly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There you see,&rdquo; said the doctor. &ldquo;Well, then, you must help me in this
+      case. And this time I promise to treat your art with more respect.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And pray who is it she is to read now?&rdquo; asked the baroness.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Who should it be but my poor patient? He puzzles me. I never knew a
+      patient so faint-hearted.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A soldier faint-hearted!&rdquo; exclaimed the baroness. &ldquo;To be sure these men
+      that storm cities, and fire cannon, and cut and hack one another with so
+      much spirit, are poor creatures compared with us when they have to lie
+      quiet and suffer.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The doctor walked the room in great excitement. &ldquo;It is not his wound that
+      is killing him, there&rsquo;s something on his mind. You, Josephine, with your
+      instincts do help me: do pray, for pity&rsquo;s sake, throw off that sublime
+      indifference you have manifested all along to this man&rsquo;s fate.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She has not,&rdquo; cried the baroness, firing up. &ldquo;Did I not see her lining
+      his dressing-gown for him? and she inspects everything that he eats: do
+      you not?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, mother.&rdquo; She then suggested in a faltering voice that time would
+      cure the patient, and time alone.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Time! you speak as if time was a quality: time is only a measure of
+      events, favorable or unfavorable; it kills as many as it cures.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, you surely would not imply his life is in any danger?&rdquo; This was the
+      baroness.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madame, if the case was not grave, should I take this unusual step? I
+      tell you if some change does not take place soon, he will be a dead man in
+      another fortnight. That is all TIME will do for him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness uttered an exclamation of pity and distress. Josephine put
+      her hand to her bosom, and a creeping horror came over her, and then a
+      faintness. She sat working mechanically, and turning like ice within.
+      After a few minutes of this, she rose with every appearance of external
+      composure and left the room. In the passage she met Rose coming hastily
+      towards the salon laughing: the first time she had laughed this many a
+      day. Oh, what a contrast between the two faces that met there&mdash;the
+      one pale and horror stricken, the other rosy and laughing!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, dear, at last I am paid for all my trouble, and yours, by a
+      discovery; he never drinks a drop of his medicine; he pours it into the
+      ashes under the grate; I caught him in the fact.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then this is too much: I can resist no longer. Come with me,&rdquo; said
+      Josephine doggedly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Where?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0012" id="link2HCH0012">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XII.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Josephine paused on the landing, and laid her hand on Rose&rsquo;s shoulder. It
+      was so cold it made Rose shudder, and exacted a promise from her not to
+      contradict a word she should say to Camille. &ldquo;I do not go to him for my
+      pleasure, but for his life,&rdquo; she said; &ldquo;I must deceive him and save him;
+      and then let me lie down and die.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, that the wretch had never been born!&rdquo; cried Rose, in despair. But she
+      gave the required promise, and offered to go and tell Camille Josephine
+      was coming to visit him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But Josephine declined this. &ldquo;No,&rdquo; said she; &ldquo;give me every advantage; I
+      must think beforehand every word I shall say; but take him by surprise,
+      coward and doubleface that I am.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose knocked at the door. A faint voice said, &ldquo;Come in.&rdquo; The sisters
+      entered the room very softly. Camille sat on the sofa, his head bowed over
+      his hands. A glance showed Josephine that he was doggedly and resolutely
+      thrusting himself into the grave. Thinking it was only Rose&mdash;for he
+      had now lost all hope of seeing Josephine come in at the door&mdash;he
+      never moved. Some one glided gently but rapidly up to him. He looked up.
+      Josephine was kneeling to him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He lifted his head with a start, and trembled all over.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She whispered, &ldquo;I am come to you to beg your pity; to appeal to your
+      generosity; to ask a favor; I who deserve so little of you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have waited a long time,&rdquo; said Camille, agitated greatly; &ldquo;and so
+      have I.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Camille, you are torturing one who loved you once, and who has been very
+      weak and faithless, but not so wicked as she appears.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How am I torturing you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;With remorse; do I not suffer enough? Would you make me a murderess?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why have you never been near me?&rdquo; retorted Camille. &ldquo;I could forgive your
+      weakness, but not your heartlessness.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is my duty. I have no right to seek your society. If you really want
+      mine, you have only to get well, and so join us down-stairs a week or two
+      before you leave us.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How am I to get well? My heart is broken.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Camille, be a man. Do not fling away a soldier&rsquo;s life because a fickle,
+      worthless woman could not wait for you. Forgive me like a man, or else
+      revenge yourself like a man. If you cannot forgive me, kill me. See, I
+      kneel at your feet. I will not resist you. Kill me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I wish I could. Oh! if I could kill you with a look and myself with a
+      wish! No man should ever take you from me, then. We would be together in
+      the grave at this hour. Do not tempt me, I say;&rdquo; and he cast a terrible
+      look of love, and hatred, and despair upon her. Her purple eye never
+      winced; it poured back tenderness and affection in return. He saw and
+      turned away with a groan, and held out his hand to her. She seized it and
+      kissed it. &ldquo;You are great, you are generous; you will not strike me as a
+      woman strikes; you will not die to drive me to despair.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I see,&rdquo; said he, more gently, &ldquo;love is gone, but pity remains. I thought
+      that was gone, too.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, Camille,&rdquo; said Josephine, in a whisper, &ldquo;pity remains, and remorse
+      and terror at what I have done to a man of whom I was never worthy.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, madame, as you have come at last to me, and even do me the honor to
+      ask me a favor&mdash;I shall try&mdash;if only out of courtesy&mdash;to&mdash;ah,
+      Josephine! Josephine! when did I ever refuse you anything?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At this Josephine sank into a chair, and burst out crying. Camille, at
+      this, began to cry too; and the two poor things sat a long way from one
+      another, and sobbed bitterly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The man, weakened as he was, recovered his quiet despair first.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t cry so,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;But tell me what is your will, and I shall obey
+      you as I used before any one came between us.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then, live, Camille. I implore you to live.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, Josephine, since you care about it, I will try and live. Why did
+      not you come before and ask me? I thought I was in your way. I thought you
+      wanted me dead.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine cast a look of wonder and anguish on Camille, but she said
+      nothing. She rang the bell, and, on Jacintha coming up, despatched her to
+      Dr. Aubertin for the patient&rsquo;s medicine.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tell the doctor,&rdquo; said she, &ldquo;Colonel Dujardin has let fall the glass.&rdquo;
+       While Jacintha was gone, she scolded Camille gently. &ldquo;How could you be so
+      unkind to the poor doctor who loves you so? Only think: to throw away his
+      medicines! Look at the ashes; they are wet. Camille, are you, too,
+      becoming disingenuous?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Jacintha came in with the tonic in a glass, and retired with an obeisance.
+      Josephine took it to Camille.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Drink with me, then,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;or I will not touch it.&rdquo; Josephine took
+      the glass. &ldquo;I drink to your health, Camille, and to your glory; laurels to
+      your brow, and some faithful woman to your heart, who will make you forget
+      this folly: it is for her I am saving you.&rdquo; She put the glass with
+      well-acted spirit to her lips; but in the very action a spasm seized her
+      throat and almost choked her; she lowered her head that he might not see
+      her face, and tried again; but the tears burst from her eyes and ran into
+      the liquid, and her lips trembled over the brim, and were paralyzed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, no! give it me!&rdquo; he cried; &ldquo;there is a tear of yours in it.&rdquo; He drank
+      off the bitter remedy now as if it had been nectar.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine blushed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If you wanted me to live, why did you not come here before?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I did not think you would be so foolish, so wicked, so cruel as to do
+      what you have been doing.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come and shine upon me every day, and you shall have no fresh cause of
+      complaint; things flourish in the sunshine that die in the dark: Rose, it
+      is as if the sun had come into my prison; you are pale, but you are
+      beautiful as ever&mdash;more beautiful; what a sweet dress! so quiet, so
+      modest, it sets off your beauty instead of vainly trying to vie with it.&rdquo;
+       With this he put out his hand and took her gray silk dress, and went to
+      kiss it as a devotee kisses the altar steps.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She snatched it away with a shudder.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, you are right,&rdquo; said she; &ldquo;thank you for noticing my dress; it is a
+      beautiful dress&mdash;ha! ha! A dress I take a pride in wearing, and
+      always shall, I hope. I mean to be buried in it. Come, Rose. Thank you,
+      Camille; you are very good, you have once more promised me to live. Get
+      well; come down-stairs; then you will see me every day, you know&mdash;there
+      is a temptation. Good-by, Camille!&mdash;are you coming, Rose? What are
+      you loitering for? God bless you, and comfort you, and help you to forget
+      what it is madness to remember!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      With these wild words she literally fled; and in one moment the room
+      seemed to darken to Camille.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Outside the door Josephine caught hold of Rose. &ldquo;Have I committed myself?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Over and over again. Do not look so terrified; I mean to me, but not to
+      him. How blind he is! and how much better you must know him than I do to
+      venture on such a transparent deceit. He believes whatever you tell him.
+      He is all ears and no eyes. Yes, love, I watched him keenly all the time.
+      He really thinks it is pity and remorse, nothing more. My poor sister, you
+      have a hard life to lead, a hard game to play; but so far you have
+      succeeded; yet could look poor Raynal in the face if he came home to-day.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then God be thanked!&rdquo; cried Josephine. &ldquo;I am as happy to-day as I can
+      ever hope to be. Now let us go through the farce of dressing&mdash;it is
+      near dinner-time&mdash;and then the farce of talking, and, hardest of all,
+      the farce of living.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      From that hour Camille began to get better very slowly, yet perceptibly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The doctor, afraid of being mistaken, said nothing for some days, but at
+      last he announced the good news at the dinner-table. &ldquo;He is to come
+      down-stairs in three days,&rdquo; added the doctor.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But I am sorry to say that as Camille&rsquo;s body strengthened some of the
+      worst passions in our nature attacked him. Fierce gusts of hate and love
+      combined overpowered this man&rsquo;s high sentiments of honor and justice, and
+      made him clench his teeth, and vow never to leave Beaurepaire without
+      Josephine. She had been his four years before she ever saw this
+      interloper, and she should be his forever. Her love would soon revive when
+      they should meet every day, and she would end by eloping with him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then conscience pricked him, and reminded him how and why Raynal had
+      married her: for Rose had told him all. Should he undermine an absent
+      soldier, whose whole conduct in this had been so pure, so generous, so
+      unselfish?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But this was not all. As I have already hinted, he was under a great
+      personal obligation to his quondam comrade Raynal. Whenever this was
+      vividly present to his mind, a great terror fell on him, and he would cry
+      out in anguish, &ldquo;Oh! that some angel would come to me and tear me by force
+      from this place!&rdquo; And the next moment passion swept over him like a flood,
+      and carried away all his virtuous resolves. His soul was in deep waters;
+      great waves drove it to and fro. Perilous condition, which seldom ends
+      well. Camille was a man of honor. In no other earthly circumstance could
+      he have hesitated an instant between right and wrong. But such natures,
+      proof against all other temptations, have often fallen, and will fall,
+      where sin takes the angel form of her they love. Yet, of all men, they
+      should pray for help to stand; for when they fall they still retain one
+      thing that divides them from mean sinners.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Remorse, the giant that rends the great hearts which mock at fear.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The day came in which the doctor had promised his patient he should come
+      down-stairs. First his comfortable sofa was taken down into the saloon for
+      his use: then the patient himself came down leaning on the doctor&rsquo;s arm,
+      and his heart palpitating at the thought of the meeting. He came into the
+      room; the baroness was alone. She greeted him kindly, and welcomed him.
+      Rose came in soon after and did the same. But no Josephine. Camille felt
+      sick at heart. At last dinner was announced; &ldquo;She will surely join us at
+      dinner,&rdquo; thought he. He cast his eyes anxiously on the table; the napkins
+      were laid for four only. The baroness carelessly explained this to him as
+      they sat down. &ldquo;Madame Raynal dines in her own room. I am sorry to say she
+      is indisposed.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Camille muttered polite regrets: the rage of disappointment drove its
+      fangs into him, and then came the heart-sickness of hope deferred. The
+      next day he saw her, but could not get a word with her alone. The baroness
+      tortured him another way. She was full of Raynal. She loved him. She
+      called him her son; was never weary of descanting on his virtues to
+      Camille. Not a day passed that she did not pester Camille to make a
+      calculation as to the probable period of his return, and he was obliged to
+      answer her. She related to him before Josephine and Rose, how this honest
+      soldier had come to them like a guardian angel and saved the whole family.
+      In vain he muttered that Rose had told him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Let me have the pleasure of telling it you my way,&rdquo; cried she, and told
+      it diffusely, and kept him writhing.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The next thing was, Josephine had received no letter from him this month;
+      the first month he had missed. In vain did Rose represent that he was only
+      a few days over his time. The baroness became anxious, communicated her
+      anxieties to Camille among the rest; and, by a torturing interrogatory,
+      compelled him to explain to her before Josephine and them all, that ships
+      do not always sail to a day, and are sometimes delayed. But oh! he winced
+      at the man&rsquo;s name; and Rose observed that he never mentioned it, nor
+      acknowledged the existence of such a person as Josephine&rsquo;s husband, except
+      when others compelled him. Yet they were acquainted; and Rose sometimes
+      wondered that he did not detract or sneer.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I should,&rdquo; said she; &ldquo;I feel I should.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He is too noble,&rdquo; said Josephine, &ldquo;and too wise. For, if he did, I should
+      respect him less, and my husband more than I do&mdash;if possible.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Certainly Camille was not the sort of nature that detracts, but the reason
+      he avoided Raynal&rsquo;s name was simply that his whole internal battle was to
+      forget such a man existed. From this dream he was rudely awakened every
+      hour since he joined the family, and the wound his self-deceiving heart
+      would fain have skinned over, was torn open. But worse than this was the
+      torture of being tantalized. He was in company with Josephine, but never
+      alone. Even if she left the room for an instant, Rose accompanied her and
+      returned with her. Camille at last began to comprehend that Josephine had
+      decided there should be no private interviews between her and him. Thus,
+      not only the shadow of the absent Raynal stood between them, but her
+      mother and sister in person, and worst of all, her own will. He called her
+      a cold-blooded fiend in his rage. Then the thought of all her tenderness
+      and goodness came to rebuke him. But even in rebuking it maddened him.
+      &ldquo;Yes, it is her very nature to love; but since she can make her heart turn
+      whichever way her honor bids, she will love her husband; she does not now;
+      but sooner or later she will. Then she will have children&mdash;(he
+      writhed with anguish and fury at this thought)&mdash;loving ties between
+      him and her. He has everything on his side. I, nothing but memories she
+      will efface from her heart. Will efface? She must have effaced them, or
+      she could not have married him.&rdquo; I know no more pitiable state of mind
+      than to love and hate the same creature. But when the two feelings are
+      both intense, and meet in an ardent bosom, such a man would do well to
+      spend a day or two upon his knees, praying for grace divine. For he who
+      with all his soul loves and hates one woman is next door to a maniac, and
+      is scarcely safe an hour together from suicide or even from homicide; this
+      truth the newspapers tell us, by examples, every month; but are
+      wonderfully little heeded, because newspapers do not, nor is it their
+      business to, analyze and dwell upon the internal feelings of the
+      despairing lover, whose mad and bloody act they record. With such a
+      tempest in his heart did Camille one day wander into the park. And soon an
+      irresistible attraction drew him to the side of the stream that flowed
+      along one side of it. He eyed it gloomily, and wherever the stagnant water
+      indicated a deeper pool than usual he stopped, and looked, and thought,
+      &ldquo;How calm and peaceful you are!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He sat down at last by the water-side, his eyes bent on a calm, green
+      pool.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It looked very peaceful; and it could give peace. He thought, oh! what a
+      blessing; to be quit of rage, jealousy, despair, and life, all in a
+      minute!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Yet that was a sordid death for a soldier to die, who had seen great
+      battles. Could he not die more nobly than that? With this he suddenly felt
+      in his pocket; and there sure enough fate had placed his pistols. He had
+      put them into this coat; and he had not worn this coat until to-day. He
+      had armed himself unconsciously. &ldquo;Ah!&rdquo; said he; &ldquo;it is to be; all these
+      things are preordained.&rdquo; (This notion of fate has strengthened many a
+      fatal resolution.) Then he had a cruel regret. To die without a word; a
+      parting word. Then he thought to himself, it was best so; for perhaps he
+      should have taken her with him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sir! colonel!&rdquo; uttered a solemn voice behind him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Absorbed and strung up to desperation as he was, this voice seemed
+      unnaturally loud, and discordant with Camille&rsquo;s mood; a sudden trumpet
+      from the world of small things.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was Picard, the notary.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Can you tell me where Madame Raynal is?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No. At the chateau, I suppose.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She is not there; I inquired of the servant. She was out. You have not
+      seen her, colonel?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not I; I never see her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then perhaps I had better go back to the chateau and wait for her: stay,
+      are you a friend of the family? Colonel, suppose I were to tell you, and
+      ask you to break it to Madame Raynal, or, better still, to the baroness,
+      or Mademoiselle Rose.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur,&rdquo; said Camille coldly, &ldquo;charge me with no messages, for I cannot
+      deliver them. I AM GOING ANOTHER WAY.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In that case, I will go to the chateau once more; for what I have to say
+      must be heard.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Picard returned to the chateau wondering at the colonel&rsquo;s strange manner.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Camille, for his part, wondered that any one could be so mad as to talk to
+      him about trifles; to him, a man standing on the brink of eternity. Poor
+      soul, it was he who was mad and unlucky. He should have heard what Picard
+      had to say. The very gentleness and solemnity of manner ought to have
+      excited his curiosity.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He watched Picard&rsquo;s retiring form. When he was out of sight, then he
+      turned round and resumed his thoughts as if Picard had been no more than a
+      fly that had buzzed and then gone.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, I should have taken her with me,&rdquo; he said. He sat gloomy and dogged
+      like a dangerous maniac in his cell; never moved, scarce thought for more
+      than half an hour; but his deadly purpose grew in him. Suddenly he
+      started. A lady was at the style, about a hundred yards distant. He
+      trembled. It was Josephine.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She came towards him slowly, her eyes bent on the ground in a deep
+      reverie. She stopped about a stone&rsquo;s throw from him, and looked at the
+      river long and thoughtfully; then casting her eye around, she caught sight
+      of Camille. He watched her grimly. He saw her give a little start, and
+      half turn round; but if this was an impulse to retreat, it was instantly
+      suppressed; for the next moment she pursued her way.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Camille stood gloomy and bitter, awaiting her in silence. He planted
+      himself in the middle of the path, and said not a word.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She looked him all over, and her color came and went.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Out so far as this,&rdquo; she said kindly; &ldquo;and without your cap.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He put his hand to his head, and discovered that he was bareheaded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You will catch your death of cold. Come, let us go in and get your cap.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She made as if she would pass him. He planted himself right before her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Camille!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why do you shun me as if I was a viper?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I do not shun you. I but avoid conferences that can lead to no good; it
+      is my duty.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are very wise; cold-hearted people can be wise.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Am I cold-hearted, Camille?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;As marble.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She looked him in the face; the water came into her eyes; after awhile she
+      whispered, sorrowfully, &ldquo;Well, Camille, I am.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But with all your wisdom and all your coldness,&rdquo; he went on to say, &ldquo;you
+      have made a mistake; you have driven me to madness and despair.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Heaven forbid!&rdquo; said she.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your prayer comes too late; you have done it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Camille, let me go to the oratory, and pray for you. You terrify me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is no use. Heaven has no mercy for me. Take my advice; stay where you
+      are; don&rsquo;t hurry; for what remains of your life you gave to pass with me,
+      do you understand that?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah!&rdquo; And she turned pale.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Can you read my riddle?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She looked him in the face. &ldquo;I can read your eyes, and I know you love me.
+      I think you mean to kill me. I have heard men kill the thing they love.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of course they do; sooner than another should have it, they kill it&mdash;they
+      kill it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;God has not made them patient like us women. Poor Camille!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Patience dies when hope dies. Come, Madame Raynal, say a prayer, for you
+      are going to die.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;God bless you, Camille!&rdquo; said the poor girl, putting her hands together
+      in her last prayer. At this sweet touch of affection, Camille hung his
+      head, and sobbed. Then suddenly lashing himself into fury, he cried,&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are my betrothed! you talk of duty; but you forget your duty to me.
+      Are you not my betrothed this four years? Answer me that.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, Camille, I was.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Did I not suffer death a hundred times for you, to keep faith with you,
+      you cold-blooded traitress with an angel&rsquo;s face?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, Camille! can you speak so bitterly to me? Have I denied your right to
+      kill me? You shall never dishonor me, but you shall kill me, if it is your
+      pleasure. I do not resist. Why, then, speak to me like that; must the last
+      words I hear from your mouth be words of anger, cruel Camille?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I was wrong. But it is so hard to kill her I love in cold blood. I want
+      anger as well as despair to keep me to it. Come, turn your head away from
+      me, and all our troubles shall end.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, Camille, let me look at you. Then you will be the last thing I shall
+      see on earth.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At this he hesitated a moment; then, with a fierce stamp at what he
+      thought was weakness, he levelled a pistol at her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She put up her hands with a piteous cry, &ldquo;Oh! not my face, Camille! pray
+      do not disfigure my face. Here&mdash;kill me here&mdash;in my bosom&mdash;my
+      heart that loved you well, when it was no sin to love you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I can&rsquo;t shoot you. I can&rsquo;t spill your blood. The river will end all, and
+      not disfigure your beauty, that has driven me mad, and cost you, poor
+      wretch, your life.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thank you, dear Camille. The water does not frighten me as a pistol does;
+      it will not hurt me; it will only kill me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, it is but a plunge, and you will be at peace forever; and so shall I.
+      Come, take my hand, Madame Raynal, Madame Raynal.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She gave him her hand with a look of infinite love. She only said, &ldquo;My
+      poor mother!&rdquo; That word did not fall to the ground. It flashed like
+      lightning at night across the demented lover, and lighted up his egotism
+      (suicide, like homicide, is generally a fit of maniacal egotism), even to
+      his eyes blinded by fury.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Wretch that I am,&rdquo; he shrieked. &ldquo;Fly, Josephine, fly! escape this moment,
+      that my better angel whispers to me. Do you hear? begone, while it is
+      time.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I will not leave you, Camille.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I say you shall. Go to your mother and Rose; go to those you love, and I
+      can pity; go to the chapel and thank Heaven for your escape.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, but not without you, Camille. I am afraid to leave you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have more to fear if you stay. Well, I can&rsquo;t wait any longer. Stay,
+      then, and live; and learn from me how to love Jean Raynal.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He levelled the pistol at himself.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine threw herself on him with a cry, and seized his arm. With the
+      strength excitement lent her she got the better, and all but overpowered
+      him. But, as usual, the man&rsquo;s strength lasted longer, and with a sustained
+      effort he threw her off; then, pale and panting, raised the pistol to take
+      his life. This time she moved neither hand nor foot; but she palsied his
+      rash hand with a word.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No; I LOVE YOU.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0013" id="link2HCH0013">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XIII.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      There lie the dead corpses of those words on paper; but my art is
+      powerless to tell you how they were uttered, those words, potent as a
+      king&rsquo;s, for they saved a life.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They were a cry of terror and a cry of reproach and a cry of love
+      unfathomable.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The weapon shook in his hand. He looked at her with growing astonishment
+      and joy; she at him fixedly and anxiously, her hands clasped in
+      supplication.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;As you used to love me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;More, far more. Give me the pistol. I love you, dearest. I love you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At these delicious words he lost all power of resistance, she saw; and her
+      soft and supple hand stole in and closed upon his, and gently withdrew the
+      weapon, and threw it into the water. &ldquo;Good Camille! now give me the
+      other.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How do you know there is another?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I know you are not the man to kill a woman and spare yourself. Come.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Josephine, have pity on me, do not deceive me; pray do not take this, my
+      only friend, from me, unless you really love me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I love you; I adore you,&rdquo; was her reply.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She leaned her head on his shoulder, but with her hand she sought his, and
+      even as she uttered those loving words she coaxed the weapon from his now
+      unresisting grasp.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There, it is gone; you are saved from death&mdash;saved from crime.&rdquo; And
+      with that, the danger was over, she trembled for the first time, and fell
+      to sobbing hysterically.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He threw himself at her knees, and embraced them again and again, and
+      begged her forgiveness in a transport of remorse and self-reproach.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She looked down with tender pity on him, and heard his cries of penitence
+      and shame.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Rise, Camille, and go home with me,&rdquo; said she faintly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, Josephine.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They went slowly and in silence. Camille was too ashamed and penitent to
+      speak; too full of terror too at the abyss of crime from which he had been
+      saved. The ancients feigned that a virgin could subdue a lion; perhaps
+      they meant that a pure gentle nature can subdue a nature fierce but
+      generous. Lion-like Camille walked by Josephine&rsquo;s side with his eyes bent
+      on the ground, the picture of humility and penitence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This is the last walk you and I shall take together,&rdquo; said Josephine
+      solemnly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I know it,&rdquo; said he humbly. &ldquo;I have forfeited all right to be by your
+      side.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My poor, lost love,&rdquo; sighed Josephine, &ldquo;will you never understand me? You
+      never stood higher in my esteem than at this moment. It is the avowal you
+      have forced from ME that parts us. The man to whom I have said &lsquo;I&rsquo;&mdash;must
+      not remain beneath my husband&rsquo;s roof. Does not your sense of honor agree
+      with mine?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It does,&rdquo; faltered he.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To-morrow you must leave the chateau.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I will obey you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What, you do not resist, you do not break my heart by complaints, by
+      reproaches?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, Josephine, all is changed. I thought you unfeeling: I thought you
+      were going to be HAPPY with him; that was what maddened me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I pray daily YOU may be happy, no matter how. But you and I are not
+      alike, dear as we are to one another. Well, do not fear: I shall never be
+      happy&mdash;will that soothe you, Camille?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, Josephine, all is changed; the words you have spoken have driven the
+      fiends out of my heart. I have nothing to do now but to obey, you to
+      command: it is your right. Since you love me a little still, dispose of
+      me. Bid me live: bid me die: bid me stay: bid me go. I shall never disobey
+      the angel who loves me, my only friend upon the earth.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      A single deep sob from Josephine was all the answer.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then he could not help asking her why she had not trusted him?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why did you not say to me long ago, &lsquo;I love you, but I am a wife; my
+      husband is an honest soldier, absent, and fighting for France: I am the
+      guardian of his honor and my own; be just, be generous, be self-denying;
+      depart and love me only as angels love&rsquo;? Perhaps this might have helped me
+      to show you that I too am a man of honor.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Perhaps I was wrong,&rdquo; sighed Josephine. &ldquo;I think I should have trusted
+      more to you. But then, who would have thought you could really doubt my
+      love? You were ill; I could not bear you to go till you were well, quite
+      well. I saw no other way to keep you but this, to treat you with feigned
+      coldness. You saw the coldness, but not what it cost me to maintain it.
+      Yes, I was unjust; and inconsiderate, for I had many furtive joys to
+      sustain me: I had you in my house under my care&mdash;that thought was
+      always sweet&mdash;I had a hand in everything that was for your good, for
+      your comfort. I helped Jacintha make your soup and your chocolate every
+      day. I had the delight of lining the dressing-gown you were to wear. I had
+      always some little thing or other to do for you. These kept me up: I
+      forgot in my selfishness that you had none of these supports, and that I
+      was driving you to despair. I am a foolish, disingenuous woman: I have
+      been very culpable. Forgive me!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Forgive you, angel of purity and goodness? I alone am to blame. What
+      right had I to doubt your heart? I knew the whole story of your marriage;
+      I saw your sweet pale face; but I was not pure enough to comprehend
+      angelic virtue and unselfishness. Well, I am brought to my senses. There
+      is but one thing for me to do&mdash;you bade me leave you to-morrow.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I was very cruel.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No! not cruel, wise. But I will be wiser. I shall go to-night.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To-night, Camille?&rdquo; said Josephine, turning pale.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay! for to-night I am strong; to-morrow I may be weak. To-night
+      everything thrusts me on the right path. To-morrow everything will draw me
+      from it. Do not cry, beloved one; you and I have a hard fight. We must be
+      true allies; whenever one is weak, then is the time for the other to be
+      strong. I have been weaker than you, to my shame be it said; but this is
+      my hour of strength. A light from heaven shows me my path. I am full of
+      passion, but like you I have honor. You are Raynal&rsquo;s wife, and&mdash;Raynal
+      saved my life.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah! is it possible? When? where? may Heaven bless him for it!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ask HIM; and say I told you of it&mdash;I have not strength to tell it
+      you, but I will go to-night.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Then Josephine, who had resisted till all her strength was gone, whispered
+      with a blush that it was too late to get a conveyance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I need none to carry my sword, my epaulets, and my love for you. I shall
+      go on foot.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine said nothing, but she began to walk slower and slower. And so
+      the unfortunate pair came along creeping slowly with drooping heads
+      towards the gate of the Pleasaunce. There their last walk in this world
+      must end. Many a man and woman have gone to the scaffold with hearts less
+      heavy and more hopeful than theirs.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dry your eyes, Josephine,&rdquo; said Camille with a deep sigh. &ldquo;They are all
+      out on the Pleasaunce.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, I will not dry my eyes,&rdquo; cried Josephine, almost violently. &ldquo;I care
+      for nothing now.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness, the doctor, and Rose, were all in the Pleasaunce: and as the
+      pair came in, lo! every eye was bent on Josephine.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She felt this, and her eyes sought the ground: benumbed as she was with
+      despondency, she began now to dread some fresh stroke or other.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Camille felt doubly guilty and confused. How they all look at us, he
+      thought. Do they know what a villain I have been? He determined to slip
+      away, and pack up, and begone. However, nobody took any notice of him. The
+      baroness drew Josephine apart. And Rose followed her mother and sister
+      with eyes bent on the ground.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      There was a strange solemnity about them all.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Aubertin remained behind. But even he took no notice of Camille, but
+      walked up and down with his hands behind him, and a sad and troubled face.
+      Camille felt his utter desolation. He was nothing to any of them. He
+      resolved to go at once, and charge Aubertin with his last adieus to the
+      family. It was a wise and manly resolve. He stopped Aubertin in the middle
+      of his walk, and said in a faint voice of the deepest dejection,&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Doctor, the time is come that I must once more thank you for all your
+      goodness to me, and bid you all farewell.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What, going before your strength is re-established?&rdquo; said the doctor
+      politely, but not warmly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am out of all danger, thanks to your skill.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Colonel, at another time I should insist upon your staying a day or two
+      longer; but now I think it would be unadvisable to press you to stay. Ah,
+      colonel, you came to a happy house, but you leave a sad one. Poor Madame
+      Raynal!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sir!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You saw the baroness draw her aside.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Y-yes.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;By this time she knows it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In Heaven&rsquo;s name what do you mean?&rdquo; asked Camille.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I forgot; you are not aware of the calamity that has fallen upon our
+      beloved Josephine; on the darling of the house.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Camille turned cold with vague apprehension. But he contrived to stammer
+      out, &ldquo;No; tell me! for Heaven&rsquo;s sake tell me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The doctor thus pressed revealed all in a very few words. &ldquo;My poor
+      friend,&rdquo; said he solemnly, &ldquo;her husband&mdash;is dead.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0014" id="link2HCH0014">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XIV.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      The baroness, as I have said, drew Josephine aside, and tried to break to
+      her the sad news: but her own grief overcame her, and bursting into tears
+      she bewailed the loss of her son. Josephine was greatly shocked. Death!&mdash;Raynal
+      dead&mdash;her true, kind friend dead&mdash;her benefactor dead. She clung
+      to her mother&rsquo;s neck, and sobbed with her. Presently she withdrew her face
+      and suddenly hid it in both her hands.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She rose and kissed her mother once more: and went to her own room: and
+      then, though there was none to see her, she hid her wet, but burning,
+      cheeks in her hands.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine confined herself for some days to her own room, leaving it only
+      to go to the chapel in the park, where she spent hours in prayers for the
+      dead and in self-humiliation. Her &ldquo;tender conscience&rdquo; accused herself
+      bitterly for not having loved this gallant spirit more than she had.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Camille realized nothing at first; he looked all confused in the doctor&rsquo;s
+      face, and was silent. Then after awhile he said, &ldquo;Dead? Raynal dead?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Killed in action.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      A red flush came to Camille&rsquo;s face, and his eyes went down to the ground
+      at his very feet, nor did he once raise them while the doctor told him how
+      the sad news had come. &ldquo;Picard the notary brought us the Moniteur, and
+      there was Commandant Raynal among the killed in a cavalry skirmish.&rdquo; With
+      this, he took the journal from his pocket, and Camille read it, with
+      awe-struck, and other feelings he would have been sorry to see analyzed.
+      He said not a word; and lowered his eyes to the ground.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And now,&rdquo; said Aubertin, &ldquo;you will excuse me. I must go to my poor friend
+      the baroness. She had a mother&rsquo;s love for him who is no more: well she
+      might.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Aubertin went away, and left Dujardin standing there like a statue, his
+      eyes still glued to the ground at his feet.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The doctor was no sooner out of sight, than Camille raised his eyes
+      furtively, like a guilty person, and looked irresolutely this way and
+      that: at last he turned and went back to the place where he had meditated
+      suicide and murder; looked down at it a long while, then looked up to
+      heaven&mdash;then fell suddenly on his knees: and so remained till
+      night-fall. Then he came back to the chateau.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He whispered to himself, &ldquo;And I am afraid it is too late to go away
+      to-night.&rdquo; He went softly into the saloon. Nobody was there but Rose and
+      Aubertin. At sight of him Rose got up and left the room. But I suppose she
+      went to Josephine; for she returned in a few minutes, and rang the bell,
+      and ordered some supper to be brought up for Colonel Dujardin.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have not dined, I hear,&rdquo; said she, very coldly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I was afraid you were gone altogether,&rdquo; said the doctor: then turning to
+      Rose, &ldquo;He told me he was going this evening. You had better stay quiet
+      another day or two,&rdquo; added he, kindly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you think so?&rdquo; said Camille, timidly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He stayed upon these terms. And now he began to examine himself. &ldquo;Did I
+      wish him dead? I hope I never formed such a thought! I don&rsquo;t remember ever
+      wishing him dead.&rdquo; And he went twice a day to that place by the stream,
+      and thought very solemnly what a terrible thing ungoverned passion is; and
+      repented&mdash;not eloquently, but silently, sincerely.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But soon his impatient spirit began to torment itself again. Why did
+      Josephine shun him now? Ah! she loved Raynal now that he was dead. Women
+      love the thing they have lost; so he had heard say. In that case, the very
+      sight of him would of course be odious to her: he could understand that.
+      The absolute, unreasoning faith he once had in her had been so rudely
+      shaken by her marriage with Raynal, that now he could only believe just so
+      much as he saw, and he saw that she shunned him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He became moody, sad, and disconsolate: and as Josephine shunned him, so
+      he avoided all the others, and wandered for hours by himself, perplexed
+      and miserable. After awhile, he became conscious that he was under a sort
+      of surveillance. Rose de Beaurepaire, who had been so kind to him when he
+      was confined to his own room, but had taken little notice of him since he
+      came down, now resumed her care of him, and evidently made it her business
+      to keep up his heart. She used to meet him out walking in a mysterious
+      way, and in short, be always falling in with him and trying to cheer him
+      up: with tolerable success.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Such was the state of affairs when the party was swelled and matters
+      complicated by the arrival of one we have lost sight of.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Edouard Riviere retarded his cure by an impatient spirit: but he got well
+      at last, and his uncle drove him in the cabriolet to his own quarters. The
+      news of the house had been told him by letter, but, of course, in so vague
+      and general a way that, thinking he knew all, in reality he knew nothing.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine had married Raynal. The marriage was sudden, but no doubt there
+      was an attachment: he had some reason to believe in sudden attachments.
+      Colonel Dujardin, an old acquaintance, had come back to France wounded,
+      and the good doctor had undertaken his cure: this incident appeared
+      neither strange nor any way important. What affected him most deeply was
+      the death of Raynal, his personal friend and patron. But when his tyrants,
+      as he called the surgeon and his uncle, gave him leave to go home, all
+      feelings were overpowered by his great joy at the prospect of seeing Rose.
+      He walked over to Beaurepaire, his arm in a sling, his heart beating. He
+      was coming to receive the reward of all he had done, and all he had
+      attempted. &ldquo;I will surprise them,&rdquo; thought he. &ldquo;I will see her face when I
+      come in at the door: oh, happy hour! this pays for all.&rdquo; He entered the
+      house without announcing himself; he went softly up to the saloon; to his
+      great disappointment he found no one but the baroness: she received him
+      kindly, but not with the warmth he expected. She was absorbed in her new
+      grief. He asked timidly after her daughters. &ldquo;Madame Raynal bears up, for
+      the sake of others. You will not, however, see her: she keeps her room. My
+      daughter Rose is taking a walk, I believe.&rdquo; After some polite inquiries,
+      and sympathy with his accident, the baroness retired to indulge her grief,
+      and Edouard thus liberated ran in search of his beloved.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He met her at the gate of the Pleasaunce, but not alone. She was walking
+      with an officer, a handsome, commanding, haughty, brilliant officer. She
+      was walking by his side, talking earnestly to him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      An arrow of ice shot through young Riviere; and then came a feeling of
+      death at his heart, a new symptom in his young life.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The next moment Rose caught sight of him. She flushed all over and uttered
+      a little exclamation, and she bounded towards him like a little antelope,
+      and put out both her hands at once. He could only give her one.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah!&rdquo; she cried with an accent of heavenly pity, and took his hand with
+      both hers.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      This was like the meridian sun coming suddenly on a cold place. He was all
+      happiness.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      When Josephine heard he was come her eye flashed, and she said quickly, &ldquo;I
+      will come down to welcome him&mdash;dear Edouard!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The sisters looked at one another. Josephine blushed. Rose smiled and
+      kissed her. She colored higher still, and said, &ldquo;No, she was ashamed to go
+      down.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Look at my face.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I see nothing wrong with it, except that it eclipses other people&rsquo;s, and
+      I have long forgiven you that.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, yes, dear Rose: look what a color it has, and a fortnight ago it was
+      pale as ashes.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Never mind; do you expect me to regret that?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Rose, I am a very bad woman.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Are you, dear? then hook this for me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, love. But I sometimes think you would forgive me if you knew how
+      hard I pray to be better. Rose, I do try so to be as unhappy as I ought;
+      but I can&rsquo;t, I can&rsquo;t. My cold heart seems as dead to unhappiness as once
+      it was to happiness. Am I a heartless woman after all?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not altogether,&rdquo; said Rose dryly. &ldquo;Fasten my collar, dear, and don&rsquo;t
+      torment yourself. You have suffered much and nobly. It was Heaven&rsquo;s will:
+      you bowed to it. It was not Heaven&rsquo;s will that you should be blighted
+      altogether. Bow in this, too, to Heaven&rsquo;s will: take things as they come,
+      and do cease to try and reconcile feelings that are too opposite to live
+      together.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah! these are such comfortable words, Rose; but mamma will see this
+      dreadful color in my cheek, and what can I say to her?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ten to one it will not be observed; and if it should, I will say it is
+      the excitement of seeing Edouard. Leave all to me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine greeted Edouard most affectionately, drew from him his whole
+      history, and petted him and sympathized with him deliciously, and made him
+      the hero of the evening. Camille, who was not naturally of a jealous
+      temper, bore this very well at first, but at last he looked so bitter at
+      her neglect of him, that Rose took him aside to soothe him. Edouard,
+      missing the auditor he most valued, and seeing her in secret conference
+      with the brilliant colonel, felt a return of the jealous pangs that had
+      seized him at first sight of the man; and so they played at cross
+      purposes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At another period of the evening the conversation became more general; and
+      Edouard took a dislike to Colonel Dujardin. A young man of twenty-eight
+      nearly always looks on a boy of twenty-one with the air of a superior, and
+      this assumption, not being an ill-natured one, is apt to be so easy and so
+      undefined that the younger hardly knows how to resent or to resist it. But
+      Edouard was a little vain as we know; and the Colonel jarred him terribly.
+      His quick haughty eye jarred him. His regimentals jarred him: they fitted
+      like a glove. His mustache and his manner jarred him, and, worst of all,
+      his cool familiarity with Rose, who seemed to court him rather than be
+      courted by him. He put this act of Rose&rsquo;s to the colonel&rsquo;s account,
+      according to the custom of lovers, and revenged himself in a small way by
+      telling Josephine in her ear &ldquo;that the colonel produced on his mind the
+      effect of an intolerable puppy.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine colored up and looked at him with a momentary surprise. She said
+      quietly, &ldquo;Military men do give themselves some airs, but he is very
+      amiable at bottom. You must make a better acquaintance with him, and then
+      he will reveal to you his nobler qualities.&rdquo;&mdash;&ldquo;Oh! I have no
+      particular desire,&rdquo; sneered unlucky Edouard. Sweet as Josephine was, this
+      was too much for her: she said nothing; but she quietly turned Edouard
+      over to Aubertin, and joined Rose, and under cover of her had a sweet
+      timid chat with her falsely accused.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      This occupied the two so entirely that Edouard was neglected. This hurt
+      his foible, and seemed to be so unkind on the very first day of his return
+      that he made his adieus to the baroness, and marched off in dudgeon
+      unobserved.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose missed him first, but said nothing.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      When Josephine saw he was gone, she uttered a little exclamation, and
+      looked at Rose. Rose put on a mien of haughty indifference, but the water
+      was in her eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine looked sorrowful.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      When they talked over everything together at night, she reproached
+      herself. &ldquo;We behaved ill to poor Edouard: we neglected him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He is a little cross, ill-tempered fellow,&rdquo; said Rose pettishly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, no! no!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And as vain as a peacock.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Has he not some right to be vain in this house?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes,&mdash;no. I am very angry with him. I won&rsquo;t hear a word in his
+      favor,&rdquo; said Rose pouting: then she gave his defender a kiss. &ldquo;Yes, dear,&rdquo;
+       said Josephine, answering the kiss, and ignoring the words, &ldquo;he is a dear;
+      and he is not cross, nor so very vain, poor boy! now don&rsquo;t you see what it
+      was?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, you do, you little cunning thing: you are too shrewd not to see
+      everything.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, indeed, Josephine; do tell me, don&rsquo;t keep me waiting: I can&rsquo;t bear
+      that.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, then&mdash;jealous! A little.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Jealous? Oh, what fun! Of Camille? Ha! ha! Little goose!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And,&rdquo; said Josephine very seriously, &ldquo;I almost think he would be jealous
+      of any one that occupied your attention. I watched him more or less all
+      the evening.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;All the better. I&rsquo;ll torment my lord.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Heaven forbid you should be so cruel.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh! I will not make him unhappy, but I&rsquo;ll tease him a little; it is not
+      in nature to abstain.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      This foible detected in her lover, Rose was very gay at the prospect of
+      amusement it afforded her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And I think I have many readers who at this moment are awaiting unmixed
+      enjoyment and hilarity from the same source.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      I wish them joy of their prospect.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Edouard called the next day: he wore a gloomy air. Rose met this with a
+      particularly cheerful one; on this, Edouard&rsquo;s face cleared up, and he was
+      himself again; agreeable as this was, Rose felt a little disappointed. &ldquo;I
+      am afraid he is not very jealous after all,&rdquo; thought she.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine left her room this day and mingled once more with the family.
+      The bare sight of her was enough for Camille at first, but after awhile he
+      wanted more. He wanted to be often alone with her; but several causes
+      co-operated to make her shy of giving him many such opportunities: first,
+      her natural delicacy, coupled with her habit of self-denial; then her fear
+      of shocking her mother, and lastly her fear of her own heart, and of
+      Camille, whose power over her she knew. For Camille, when he did get a
+      sweet word alone with her, seemed to forget everything except that she was
+      his betrothed, and that he had come back alive to marry her. He spoke to
+      her of his love with an ardor and an urgency that made her thrill with
+      happiness, but at the same time shrink with a certain fear and
+      self-reproach. Possessed with a feeling no stronger than hers, but single,
+      he did not comprehend the tumult, the trouble, the daily contest in her
+      heart. The wind seemed to him to be always changing, and hot and cold the
+      same hour. Since he did not even see that she was acting in hourly fear of
+      her mother&rsquo;s eye, he was little likely to penetrate her more hidden
+      sentiments; and then he had not touched her key-note,&mdash;self-denial.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Women are self-denying and uncandid. Men are self-indulgent and outspoken.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And this is the key to a thousand double misunderstandings; for believe
+      me, good women are just as stupid in misunderstanding men as honest men
+      are in misunderstanding women.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      To Camille, Josephine&rsquo;s fluctuations, joys, tremors, love, terror,
+      modesty, seemed one grand total, caprice. The component parts of it he saw
+      not; and her caprice tortured him almost to madness. Too penitent to give
+      way again to violent passion, he gently fretted. His health retrograded
+      and his temper began to sour. The eye of timid love that watched him with
+      maternal anxiety from under its long lashes saw this with dismay, and
+      Rose, who looked into her sister&rsquo;s bosom, devoted herself once more to
+      soothe him without compromising Josephine&rsquo;s delicacy. Matters were not so
+      bad but what a fine sprightly girl like Rose could cheer up a dejected but
+      manly colonel; and Rose was generally successful.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But then, unfortunately, this led to a fresh mystification. Riviere&rsquo;s
+      natural jealousy revived, and found constant food in the attention Rose
+      paid Camille, a brilliant colonel living in the house while he, poor
+      wretch, lived in lodgings. The false position of all the parties brought
+      about some singular turns. I give from their number one that forms a link,
+      though a small one, in my narrative.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      One day Edouard came to tell Rose she was making him unhappy; he had her
+      alone in the Pleasaunce; she received him with a radiant smile, and they
+      had a charming talk,&mdash;a talk all about HIM: what the family owed him,
+      etc.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      On this, his late jealousy and sense of injury seemed a thing of three
+      years ago, and never to return. So hard it is for the loving heart to
+      resist its sun.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Jacintha came with a message from the colonel: &ldquo;Would it be agreeable to
+      Mademoiselle Rose to walk with him at the usual hour?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Certainly,&rdquo; said Rose.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      As Jacintha was retiring Edouard called to her to stop a minute.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then, turning to Rose, he begged her very ceremoniously to reconsider that
+      determination.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What determination?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To sacrifice me to this Colonel Dujardin.&rdquo; Still politely, only a little
+      grimly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose opened her eyes. &ldquo;Are you mad?&rdquo; inquired she with quiet hauteur.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Neither mad nor a fool,&rdquo; was the reply. &ldquo;I love you too well to share
+      your regard with any one, upon any terms; least of all upon these, that
+      there is to be a man in the world at whose beck and call you are to be,
+      and at whose orders you are to break off an interview with me. Perdition!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dear Edouard, what folly! Can you suspect me of discourtesy, as well as
+      of&mdash;I know not what. Colonel Dujardin will join us, that is all, and
+      we shall take a little walk with him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not I. I decline the intrusion; you are engaged with me, and I have
+      things to say to you that are not fit for that puppy to hear. So choose
+      between me and him, and choose forever.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose colored. &ldquo;I should be very sorry to choose either of you forever; but
+      for this afternoon I choose you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, thank you&mdash;my whole life shall prove my gratitude for this
+      preference.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose beckoned Jacintha, and sent her with an excuse to Colonel Dujardin.
+      She then turned with an air of mock submission to Edouard. &ldquo;I am at
+      monsieur&rsquo;s ORDERS.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Then this unhappy novice, being naturally good-natured, thanked her again
+      and again for her condescension in setting his heart at rest. He proposed
+      a walk, since his interference had lost her one. She yielded a cold
+      assent. This vexed him, but he took it for granted it would wear off
+      before the end of the walk. Edouard&rsquo;s heart bounded, but he loved her too
+      sincerely to be happy unless he could see her happy too; the malicious
+      thing saw this, or perhaps knew it by instinct, and by means of this good
+      feeling of his she revenged herself for his tyranny. She tortured him as
+      only a woman can torture, and as even she can torture only a worthy man,
+      and one who loves her. In the course of that short walk this inexperienced
+      girl, strong in the instincts and inborn arts of her sex, drove pins and
+      needles, needles and pins, of all sorts and sizes, through her lover&rsquo;s
+      heart.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She was everything by turns, except kind, and nothing for long together.
+      She was peevish, she was ostentatiously patient and submissive, she was
+      inattentive to her companion and seemingly wrapped up in contemplation of
+      absent things and persons, the colonel to wit; she was dogged, repulsive,
+      and cold; and she never was herself a single moment. They returned to the
+      gate of the Pleasaunce. &ldquo;Well, mademoiselle,&rdquo; said Riviere very sadly,
+      &ldquo;that interloper might as well have been with us.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of course he might, and you would have lost nothing by permitting me to
+      be courteous to a guest and an invalid. If you had not played the tyrant,
+      and taken the matter into your own hands, I should have found means to
+      soothe your jeal&mdash;I mean your vanity; but you preferred to have your
+      own way. Well, you have had it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, mademoiselle, you have given me a lesson; you have shown me how idle
+      it is to attempt to force a young lady&rsquo;s inclinations in anything.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He bade her good-day, and went away sorrowful.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She cut Camille dead for the rest of the day.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Next morning, early, Edouard called expressly to see her. &ldquo;Mademoiselle
+      Rose,&rdquo; said he, humbly, &ldquo;I called to apologize for the ungentlemanly tone
+      of my remonstrances yesterday.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fiddle-dee,&rdquo; said Rose. &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t do it again; that is the best apology.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am not likely to offend so again,&rdquo; said he sadly. &ldquo;I am going away. I
+      am sorry to say I am promoted; my new post is ten leagues. HE WILL HAVE IT
+      ALL HIS OWN WAY NOW. But perhaps it is best. Were I to stay here, I
+      foresee you would soon lose whatever friendly feeling you have for me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Am I so changeable? I am not considered so,&rdquo; remonstrated Rose, gently.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Riviere explained; &ldquo;I am not vain,&rdquo; said he, with that self-knowledge
+      which is so general an attribute of human beings; &ldquo;no man less so, nor am
+      I jealous; but I respect myself, and I could never be content to share
+      your time and your regard with Colonel Dujardin, nor with a much better
+      man. See now; he has made me arrogant. Was I ever so before?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No! no! no! and I forgive you now, my poor Edouard.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He has made you cold as ice to me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No! that was my own wickedness and spitefulness.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Wickedness, spitefulness! they are not in your nature. It is all that
+      wretch&rsquo;s doing.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose sighed, but she said nothing; for she saw that to excuse Camille
+      would only make the jealous one more bitter against him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Will you deign to write to me at my new post? once a month? in answer to
+      my letters?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, dear. But you will ride over sometimes to see us.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, yes; but for some little time I shall not be able. The duties of a
+      new post.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Perhaps in a month&mdash;a fortnight?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sooner perhaps; the moment I hear that man is out of the house.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Edouard went away, dogged and sad; Rose shut herself up in her room and
+      had a good cry. In the afternoon Josephine came and remonstrated with her.
+      &ldquo;You have not walked with him at all to-day.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No; you must pet him yourself for once. I hate the sight of him; it has
+      made mischief between Edouard and me, my being so attentive to him.
+      Edouard is jealous, and I cannot wonder. After all, what right have I to
+      mystify him who honors me with his affection?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Then, being pressed with questions by Josephine, she related to her all
+      that had passed between Edouard and her, word for word.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Poor Camille!&rdquo; sighed Josephine the just.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, dear, yes! poor Camille! who has the power to make us all miserable,
+      and who does it, and will go on doing it until he is happy himself.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah! would to Heaven I could make him as happy as he deserves to be.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You could easily make him much happier than that. And why not do it?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;O Rose,&rdquo; said Josephine, shocked, &ldquo;how can you advise me so?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She then asked her if she thought it possible that Camille could be
+      ignorant of her heart.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Josephine,&rdquo; replied Rose, angrily, &ldquo;these men are absurd: they believe
+      only what they see. I have done what I can for you and Camille, but it is
+      useless. Would you have him believe you love him, you must yourself be
+      kind to him; and it would be a charitable action: you would make four
+      unhappy people happy, or, at least, put them on the road; NOW they are off
+      the road, and, by what I have seen to-day, I think, if we go on so much
+      longer, it will be too late to try to return. Come, Josephine, for my
+      sake! Let me go and tell him you will consent&mdash;to all our
+      happinesses. There, the crime is mine.&rdquo; And she ran off in spite of
+      Josephine&rsquo;s faint and hypocritical entreaties. She returns the next minute
+      looking all aghast. &ldquo;It is too late,&rdquo; said she. &ldquo;He is going away. I am
+      sure he is, for he is packing up his things to go. I spied through the old
+      place and saw him. He was sighing like a furnace as he strapped his
+      portmanteau. I hate him, of course, but I was sorry for him. I could not
+      help being. He sighed so all the time, piteously.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine turned pale, and lifted her hands in surprise and dismay.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Depend on it, Josephine, we are wrong,&rdquo; said Rose, firmly: &ldquo;these
+      wretches will not stand our nonsense above a certain time: they are not
+      such fools. We are mismanaging: one gone, the other going; both losing
+      faith in us.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine&rsquo;s color returned to her cheek, and then mounted high. Presently
+      she smiled, a smile full of conscious power and furtive complacency, and
+      said quietly, &ldquo;He will not go.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose was pleased, but not surprised, to hear her sister speak so
+      confidently, for she knew her power over Camille. &ldquo;That is right,&rdquo; said
+      she, &ldquo;go to him, and say two honest words: &lsquo;I bid you stay.&rsquo;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;O Rose! no!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Poltroon! You know he would go down on his knees, and stay directly.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No: I should blush all my life before you and him. I COULD not. I should
+      let him go sooner, almost. Oh, no! I will never ask a man to stay who
+      wishes to leave me. But just you go to him, and say Madame Raynal is going
+      to take a little walk: will he do her the honor to be her companion? Not a
+      word more, if you love me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll go. Hypocrite!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine received Camille with a bright smile. She seemed in unusually
+      good spirits, and overflowing with kindness and innocent affection. On
+      this his high gloomy brow relaxed, and all his prospects brightened as by
+      magic. Then she communicated to him a number of little plans for next week
+      and the week after. Among the rest he was to go with her and Rose to
+      Frejus. &ldquo;Such a sweet place: I want to show it you. You will come?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He hesitated a single moment: a moment of intense anxiety to the smiling
+      Josephine.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes! he would come: it was a great temptation, he saw so little of her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, you will see more of me now.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Shall I see you every day&mdash;alone, I mean?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, yes, if you wish it,&rdquo; replied Josephine, in an off-hand, indifferent
+      way.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He seized her hand and devoured it with kisses. &ldquo;Foolish thing!&rdquo; murmured
+      she, looking down on him with ineffable tenderness. &ldquo;Should I not be
+      always with you if I consulted my inclination?&mdash;let me go.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No! consult your inclination a little longer.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Must I?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes; that shall be your punishment.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;For what? What have I done?&rdquo; asked she with an air of great innocence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have made me happy, me who adore you,&rdquo; was the evasive reply.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine came in from her walk with a high color and beaming eyes, and
+      screamed, &ldquo;Run, Rose!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      On this concise, and to us not very clear instruction, Rose slipped up the
+      secret stair. She saw Camille come in and gravely unpack his little
+      portmanteau, and dispose his things in the drawers with soldier-like
+      neatness, and hum an agreeable march. She came and told Josephine.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah!&rdquo; said Josephine with a little sigh of pleasure, and a gentle triumph
+      in her eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She had not only got her desire, but had arrived at it her way,&mdash;woman&rsquo;s
+      way, round about.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      This adroit benevolence led to more than she bargained for. She and
+      Camille were now together every day: and their hearts, being under
+      restraint in public, melted together all the more in their stolen
+      interviews.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At the third delicious interview the modest Camille begged Josephine to be
+      his wife directly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Have you noticed those half tame deer that come up to you in a park so
+      lovingly, with great tender eyes, and, being now almost within reach, stop
+      short, and with bodies fixed like statues on pedestals, crane out their
+      graceful necks for sugar, or bread, or a chestnut, or a
+      pocket-handkerchief? Do but offer to put your hand upon them, away they
+      bound that moment twenty yards, and then stand quite still, and look at
+      your hand and you, with great inquiring, suspicious, tender eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      So Josephine started at Camille&rsquo;s audacious proposal. &ldquo;Never mention such
+      a thing to me again: or&mdash;or, I will not walk with you any more:&rdquo; then
+      she thrilled with pleasure at the obnoxious idea, &ldquo;she Camille&rsquo;s wife!&rdquo;
+       and colored all over&mdash;with rage, Camille thought. He promised
+      submissively not to renew the topic: no more he did till next day.
+      Josephine had spent nearly the whole interval in thinking of it; so she
+      was prepared to put him down by calm reasons. She proceeded to do so,
+      gently, but firmly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Lo and behold! what does he do, but meets her with just as many reasons,
+      and just as calm ones: and urges them gently, but firmly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Heaven had been very kind to them: why should they be unkind to
+      themselves? They had had a great escape: why not accept the happiness, as,
+      being persons of honor, they had accepted the misery? with many other
+      arguments, differing in other things, but agreeing in this, that they were
+      all sober, grave, and full of common-sense.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Finding him not defenceless on the score of reason, she shifted her ground
+      and appealed to his delicacy. On this he appealed to her love, and then
+      calm reason was jostled off the field, and passion and sentiment battled
+      in her place.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In these contests day by day renewed, Camille had many advantages.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose, though she did not like him, had now declared on his side. She
+      refused to show him the least attention. This threw him on Josephine: and
+      when Josephine begged her to help reduce Camille to reason, her answer
+      would be,&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hypocrite!&rdquo; with a kiss: or else she would say, with a half comic
+      petulance, &ldquo;No! no! I am on his side. Give him his own way, or he will
+      make us all four miserable.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Thus Josephine&rsquo;s ally went over to the enemy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And then this coy young lady&rsquo;s very power of resistance began to give way.
+      She had now battled for months against her own heart: first for her
+      mother; then, in a far more terrible conflict for Raynal, for honor and
+      purity; and of late she had been battling, still against her own heart,
+      for delicacy, for etiquette, things very dear to her, but not so great,
+      holy, and sustaining as honor and charity that were her very household
+      gods: and so, just when the motives of resistance were lowered, the length
+      of the resistance began to wear her out.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      For nothing is so hard to her sex as a long steady struggle. In matters
+      physical, this is the thing the muscles of the fair cannot stand; in
+      matters intellectual and moral, the long strain it is that beats them
+      dead.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Do not look for a Bacona, a Newtona, a Handella, a Victoria Huga.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Some American ladies tell us education has stopped the growth of these.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      No! mesdames. These are not in nature.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They can bubble letters in ten minutes that you could no more deliver to
+      order in ten days than a river can play like a fountain. They can sparkle
+      gems of stories: they can flash little diamonds of poems. The entire sex
+      has never produced one opera nor one epic that mankind could tolerate: and
+      why? these come by long, high-strung labor. But, weak as they are in the
+      long run of everything but the affections (and there giants), they are all
+      overpowering while their gallop lasts. Fragilla shall dance any two of you
+      flat on the floor before four o&rsquo;clock, and then dance on till the peep of
+      day.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Only you trundle off to your business as usual, and could dance again the
+      next night, and so on through countless ages.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She who danced you into nothing is in bed, a human jelly tipped with
+      headache.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      What did Josephine say to Rose one day? &ldquo;I am tired of saying &lsquo;No! no! no!
+      no! no!&rsquo; forever and ever to him I love.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      But this was not all. She was not free from self-reproach. Camille&rsquo;s faith
+      in her had stood firm. Hers in him had not. She had wronged him, first by
+      believing him false, then by marrying another. One day she asked his
+      pardon for this. He replied that he had forgiven that; but would she be
+      good enough to make him forget it?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I wish I could.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You can. Marry me: then your relation to that man will seem but a hideous
+      dream. I shall be able to say, looking at you, my wife, &lsquo;I was faithful: I
+      suffered something for her; I came home: she loved me still; the proof is,
+      she was my wife within three months of my return.&rsquo;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      When he said that to her in the Pleasaunce, if there had been a priest at
+      hand&mdash;. In a word, Josephine longed to show him her love, yet wished
+      not to shock her mother, nor offend her own sense of delicacy; but Camille
+      cared for nothing but his love. To sacrifice love and happiness, even for
+      a time, to etiquette, seemed to him to be trifling with the substance of
+      great things for the shadow of petty things; and he said so: sometimes
+      sadly, sometimes almost bitterly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      So Josephine was a beleagured fortress, attacked with one will, and
+      defended by troops, one-third of which were hot on the side of the
+      besiegers.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      When singleness attacks division, you know the result beforehand. Why then
+      should I spin words? I will not trace so ill-matched a contest step by
+      step, sentence by sentence: let me rather hasten to relate the one
+      peculiarity that arose out of this trite contest, where, under the names
+      of Camille and Josephine, the two great sexes may be seen acting the whole
+      world-wide distich,&mdash;
+    </p>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+     &ldquo;It&rsquo;s a man&rsquo;s part to try,
+     And a woman&rsquo;s to deny [for a while?].&rdquo;
+ </pre>
+    <p>
+      Finding her own resolutions oozing away, Josephine caught at another
+      person.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She said to Camille before Rose,&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Even if I could bring myself to snatch at happiness in this indelicate
+      way&mdash;scarce a month after, oh!&rdquo; And there ended the lady&rsquo;s sentence.
+      In the absence of a legitimate full stop, she put one hand before her
+      lovely face to hide it, and so no more. But some two minutes after she
+      delivered the rest in the form and with the tone of a distinct remark,
+      &ldquo;No: my mother would never consent.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, she would if you could be brought to implore her as earnestly as I
+      implore you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now would she?&rdquo; asked Josephine, turning quickly to her sister.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, never. Our mother would look with horror on such a proposal. A
+      daughter of hers to marry within a twelvemonth of her widowhood!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There, you see, Camille.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And, besides, she loved Raynal so; she has not forgotten him as we have,
+      almost.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ungrateful creature that I am!&rdquo; sighed Josephine!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She mourns for him every day. Often I see her eyes suddenly fill; that is
+      for him. Josephine&rsquo;s influence with mamma is very great: it is double
+      mine: but if we all went on our knees to her, the doctor and all, she
+      would never consent.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There you see, Camille: and I could not defy my mother, even for you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Camille sighed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I see everything is against me, even my love: for that love is too much
+      akin to veneration to propose to you a clandestine marriage.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, thank you! bless you for respecting as well as loving me, dear
+      Camille,&rdquo; said Josephine.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      These words, uttered with gentle warmth, were some consolation to Camille,
+      and confirmed him, as they were intended to do, in the above good
+      resolution. He smiled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Maladroit!&rdquo; muttered Rose.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why maladroit?&rdquo; asked Camille, opening his eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Let us talk of something else,&rdquo; replied Rose, coolly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Camille turned red. He understood that he had done something very stupid,
+      but he could not conceive what. He looked from one sister to the other
+      alternately. Rose was smiling ironically, Josephine had her eyes bent
+      demurely on a handkerchief she was embroidering.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      That evening Camille drew Rose aside, and asked for an explanation of her
+      &ldquo;maladroit.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So it was,&rdquo; replied Rose, sharply.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But as this did not make the matter quite clear, Camille begged a little
+      further explanation.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Was it your part to make difficulties?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, indeed.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Was it for you to tell her a secret marriage would not be delicate? Do
+      you think she will be behind you in delicacy? or that a love without
+      respect will satisfy her? yet you must go and tell her you respected her
+      too much to ask her to marry you secretly. In other words, situated as she
+      is, you asked her not to marry you at all: she consented to that directly;
+      what else could you expect?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Maladroit! indeed,&rdquo; said Camille, &ldquo;but I would not have said it, only I
+      thought&rdquo;&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You thought nothing would induce her to marry secretly, so you said to
+      yourself, &lsquo;I will assume a virtue: I will do a bit of cheap self-denial:
+      decline to the sound of trumpets what another will be sure to deny me if I
+      don&rsquo;t&mdash;ha! ha!&rsquo;&mdash;well, for your comfort, I am by no means so
+      sure she might not have been brought to do ANYTHING for you, except openly
+      defy mamma: but now of course&rdquo;&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And here this young lady&rsquo;s sentence ended: for the sisters, unlike in most
+      things, were one in grammar.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Camille was so disconcerted and sad at what he had done, that Rose began
+      to pity him: so she rallied him a little longer in spite of her pity: and
+      then all of a sudden gave him her hand, and said she would try and repair
+      the mischief.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He began to smother her hand with kisses.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh!&rdquo; said she, &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t deserve all that: I have a motive of my own; let
+      me alone, child, do. Your unlucky speech will be quoted to me a dozen
+      times. Never mind.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose went and bribed Josephine to consent.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come, mamma shall not know, and as for you, you shall scarcely move in
+      the matter; only do not oppose me very violently, and all will be well.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, Rose!&rdquo; said Josephine; &ldquo;it is delightful&mdash;terrible, I mean&mdash;to
+      have a little creature about one that reads one like this. What shall I
+      do? What shall I do?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, do the best you can under all the circumstances. His wound is
+      healed, you know; he must go back to the army; you have both suffered to
+      the limits of mortal endurance. Is he to go away unhappy, in any doubt of
+      your affection? and you to remain behind with the misery of self-reproach
+      added to the desolation of absence?&mdash;think.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is cruel. But to deceive my mother!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do not say deceive our mother; that is such a shocking phrase.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose then reminded Josephine that their confessor had told them a wise
+      reticence was not the same thing as a moral deceit. She reminded her, too,
+      how often they had acted on his advice and always with good effect; how
+      many anxieties and worries they had saved their mother by reticence.
+      Josephine assented warmly to this.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Was there not some reason to think they had saved their mother&rsquo;s very life
+      by these reticences? Josephine assented. &ldquo;And, Josephine, you are of age;
+      you are your own mistress; you have a right to marry whom you please: and,
+      sooner or later, you will certainly marry Camille. I doubt whether even
+      our mother could prevail on you to refuse him altogether. So it is but a
+      question of time, and of giving our mother pain, or sparing her pain. Dear
+      mamma is old; she is prejudiced. Why shock her prejudices? She could not
+      be brought to understand the case: these things never happened in her day.
+      Everything seems to have gone by rule then. Let us do nothing to worry her
+      for the short time she has to live. Let us take a course between pain to
+      her and cruelty to you and Camille.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      These arguments went far to convince Josephine: for her own heart
+      supported them. She went from her solid objections to untenable ones&mdash;a
+      great point gained. She urged the difficulty, the impossibility of a
+      secret marriage.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Camille burst in here: he undertook at once to overcome these imaginary
+      difficulties. &ldquo;They could be married at a distance.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You will find no priest who will consent to do such a wicked thing as
+      marry us without my mother&rsquo;s knowledge,&rdquo; objected Josephine.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh! as to that,&rdquo; said Rose, &ldquo;you know the mayor marries people nowadays.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I will not be married again without a priest,&rdquo; said Josephine, sharply.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nor I,&rdquo; said Camille. &ldquo;I know a mayor who will do the civil forms for me,
+      and a priest who will marry me in the sight of Heaven, and both will keep
+      it secret for love of me till it shall please Josephine to throw off this
+      disguise.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Who is the priest?&rdquo; inquired Josephine, keenly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;An old cure: he lives near Frejus: he was my tutor, and the mayor is the
+      mayor of Frejus, also an old friend of mine.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But what on earth will you say to them?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That is my affair: I must give them some reasons which compel me to keep
+      my marriage secret. Oh! I shall have to tell them some fibs, of course.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There, I thought so! I will not have you telling fibs; it lowers you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of course it does; but you can&rsquo;t have secrecy without a fib or two.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fibs that will injure no one,&rdquo; said Rose, majestically.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      From this day Camille began to act as well as to talk. He bought a light
+      caleche and a powerful horse, and elected factotum Dard his groom. Camille
+      rode over to Frejus and told a made-up story to the old cure and the
+      mayor, and these his old friends believed every word he said, and readily
+      promised their services and strict secrecy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He told the young ladies what he had done.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose approved. Josephine shook her head, and seeing matters going as her
+      heart desired and her conscience did not quite approve, she suddenly
+      affected to be next to nobody in the business&mdash;to be resigned,
+      passive, and disposed of to her surprise by Queen Rose and King Camille,
+      without herself taking any actual part in their proceedings.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At last the great day arrived on which Camille and Josephine were to be
+      married at Frejus.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The mayor awaited them at eleven o&rsquo;clock. The cure at twelve. The family
+      had been duly prepared for this excursion by several smaller ones.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose announced their intention over night; a part of it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mamma,&rdquo; said she, blushing a little, &ldquo;Colonel Dujardin is good enough to
+      take us to Frejus tomorrow. It is a long way, and we must breakfast early
+      or we shall not be back to dinner.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do so, my child. I hope you will have a fine day: and mind you take
+      plenty of wraps with you in case of a shower.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At seven o&rsquo;clock the next morning Camille and the two ladies took a hasty
+      cup of coffee together instead of breakfast, and then Dard brought the
+      caleche round.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The ladies got in, and Camille had just taken the reins in his hand, when
+      Jacintha screamed to him from the hall, &ldquo;Wait a moment, colonel, wait a
+      moment! The doctor! don&rsquo;t go without the doctor!&rdquo; And the next moment Dr.
+      Aubertin appeared with his cloak on his arm, and, saluting the ladies
+      politely, seated himself quietly in the vehicle before the party had
+      recovered their surprise.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The ladies managed to keep their countenances, but Dujardin&rsquo;s discomfiture
+      was evident.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He looked piteously at Josephine, and then asked Aubertin if they were to
+      set him down anywhere in particular.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, no; I am going with you to Frejus,&rdquo; was the quiet reply.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine quaked. Camille was devoured with secret rage: he lashed the
+      horse and away they went.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was a silent party. The doctor seemed in a reverie. The others did not
+      know what to think, much less to say. Aubertin sat by Camille&rsquo;s side; so
+      the latter could hold no secret communication with either lady.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Now it was not the doctor&rsquo;s habit to rise at this time of the morning: yet
+      there he was, going with them to Frejus uninvited.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine was in agony; had their intention transpired through some
+      imprudence of Camille?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Camille was terribly uneasy. He concluded the secret had transpired
+      through female indiscretion. Then they all tortured themselves as to the
+      old man&rsquo;s intention. But what seemed most likely was, that he was with
+      them to prevent a clandestine marriage by his bare presence, without
+      making a scene and shocking Josephine&rsquo;s pride: and if so, was he there by
+      his own impulse? No, it was rather to be feared that all this was done by
+      order of the baroness. There was a finesse about it that smacked of a
+      feminine origin, and the baroness was very capable of adopting such a
+      means as this, to spare her own pride and her favorite daughter&rsquo;s. &ldquo;The
+      clandestine&rdquo; is not all sugar. A more miserable party never went along,
+      even to a wedding.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      After waiting a long time for the doctor to declare himself, they turned
+      desperate, and began to chatter all manner of trifles. This had a good
+      effect: it roused Aubertin from his reverie, and presently he gave them
+      the following piece of information: &ldquo;I told you the other day that a
+      nephew of mine was just dead; a nephew I had not seen for many years.
+      Well, my friends, I received last night a hasty summons to his funeral.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;At Frejus?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, at Paris. The invitation was so pressing, that I was obliged to go.
+      The letter informed me, however, that a diligence passes through Frejus,
+      at eleven o&rsquo;clock, for Paris. I heard you say you were going to Frejus; so
+      I packed up a few changes of linen, and my MS., my work on entomology,
+      which at my last visit to the capital all the publishers were mad enough
+      to refuse: here it is. Apropos, has Jacintha put my bag into the
+      carriage?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      On this a fierce foot-search, and the bag was found. Meantime, Josephine
+      leaned back in her seat with a sigh of thankfulness. She was more intent
+      on not being found out than on being married. But Camille, who was more
+      intent on being married than on not being found out, was asking himself,
+      with fury, how on earth they should get rid of Aubertin in time.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Well, of course, under such circumstances as these the diligence did not
+      come to its time, nor till long after; and all the while, they were
+      waiting for it they were failing their rendezvous with the mayor, and
+      making their rendezvous with the curate impossible. But, above all, there
+      was the risk of one or other of those friends coming up and blurting all
+      out, taking for granted that the doctor must be in their confidence, or
+      why bring him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At last, at half-past eleven o&rsquo;clock, to their great relief, up came the
+      diligence. The doctor prepared to take his place in the interior, when the
+      conductor politely informed him that the vehicle stopped there a quarter
+      of an hour.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In that case I will not abandon my friends,&rdquo; said the doctor,
+      affectionately.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      One of his friends gnashed his teeth at this mark of affection. But
+      Josephine smiled sweetly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At last he was gone; but it wanted ten minutes only to twelve.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine inquired amiably, whether it would not be as well to postpone
+      matters to another day&mdash;meaning forever. &ldquo;My ARDOR is chilled,&rdquo; said
+      she, and showed symptoms of crying at what she had gone through.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Camille replied by half dragging them to the mayor. That worthy received
+      them with profound, though somewhat demure respect, and invited them to a
+      table sumptuously served. The ladies, out of politeness, were about to
+      assent, but Camille begged permission to postpone that part until after
+      the ceremony.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At last, to their astonishment, they were married. Then, with a promise to
+      return and dine with the mayor, they went to the cure. Lo and behold! he
+      was gone to visit a sick person. &ldquo;He had waited a long time for them,&rdquo;
+       said the servant.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine was much disconcerted, and showed a disposition to cry again.
+      The servant, a good-natured girl, nosed a wedding, and offered to run and
+      bring his reverence in a minute.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Presently there came an old silvery-haired man, who addressed them all as
+      his children. He took them to the church, and blessed their union; and for
+      the first time Josephine felt as if Heaven consented. They took a gentle
+      farewell of him, and went back to the mayor&rsquo;s to dine; and at this stage
+      of the business Rose and Josephine at last effected a downright
+      simultaneous cry, apropos of nothing that was then occurring.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      This refreshed them mightily, and they glowed at the mayor&rsquo;s table like
+      roses washed with dew.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But oh! how glad at heart they all were to find themselves in the carriage
+      once more going home to Beaurepaire.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose and Josephine sat intertwined on the back seat; Camille, the reins in
+      his right hand, nearly turned his back on the horse, and leaned back over
+      to them and purred to Rose and his wife with ineffable triumph and
+      tenderness.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The lovers were in Elysium, and Rose was not a little proud of her good
+      management in ending all their troubles. Their mother received them back
+      with great, and as they fancied, with singular, affection. She was
+      beginning to be anxious about them, she said. Then her kindness gave these
+      happy souls a pang it never gave them before.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Since the above events scarce a fortnight had elapsed; but such a change!
+      Camille sunburnt and healthy, and full of animation and confidence;
+      Josephine beaming with suppressed happiness, and more beautiful than Rose
+      could ever remember to have seen her. For a soft halo of love and
+      happiness shone around her head; a new and indefinable attraction bloomed
+      on her face. She was a wife. Her eye, that used to glance furtively on
+      Camille, now dwelt demurely on him; dwelt with a sort of gentle wonder and
+      admiration as well as affection, and, when he came or passed very near
+      her, a keen observer might have seen her thrill.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She kept a good deal out of her mother&rsquo;s way; for she felt within that her
+      face must be too happy. She feared to shock her mother&rsquo;s grief with her
+      radiance. She was ashamed of feeling unmixed heaven. But the flood of
+      secret bliss she floated in bore all misgivings away. The pair were
+      forever stealing away together for hours, and on these occasions Rose used
+      to keep out of her mother&rsquo;s sight, until they should return. So then the
+      new-married couple could wander hand in hand through the thick woods of
+      Beaurepaire, whose fresh green leaves were now just out, and hear the
+      distant cuckoo, and sit on mossy banks, and pour love into one another&rsquo;s
+      eyes, and plan ages of happiness, and murmur their deep passion and their
+      bliss almost more than mortal; could do all this and more, without
+      shocking propriety. These sweet duets passed for trios: for on their
+      return Rose would be out looking for them, or would go and meet them at
+      some distance, and all three would go up together to the baroness, as from
+      a joint excursion. And when they went up to their bedrooms, Josephine
+      would throw her arms round her sister&rsquo;s neck, and sigh, &ldquo;It is not
+      happiness, it is beatitude!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Meantime, the baroness mourned for Raynal. Her grief showed no decrease.
+      Rose even fancied at times she wore a gloomy and discontented look as
+      well; but on reflection she attributed that to her own fancy, or to the
+      contrast that had now sprung up in her sister&rsquo;s beaming complacency.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose, when she found herself left day after day alone for hours, was sad
+      and thought of Edouard. And this feeling gained on her day by day.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At last, one afternoon, she locked herself in her own room, and, after a
+      long contest with her pride, which, if not indomitable, was next door to
+      it, she sat down to write him a little letter. Now, in this letter, in the
+      place devoted by men to their after-thoughts, by women to their pretended
+      after-thoughts; i. e., to what they have been thinking of all through the
+      letter, she dropped a careless hint that all the party missed him very
+      much, &ldquo;even the obnoxious colonel, who, by-the-by, has transferred his
+      services elsewhere. I have forgiven him that, because he has said civil
+      things about you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose was reading her letter over again, to make sure that all the
+      principal expressions were indistinct, and that the composition generally,
+      except the postscript, resembled a Delphic oracle, when there was a hasty
+      footstep, and a tap at her door, and in came Jacintha, excited.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He is come, mademoiselle,&rdquo; cried she, and nodded her head like a
+      mandarin, only more knowingly; then she added, &ldquo;So you may burn that.&rdquo; For
+      her quick eye had glanced at the table.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Who is come?&rdquo; inquired Rose, eagerly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, your one?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My one?&rdquo; asked the young lady, reddening, &ldquo;my what?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The little one&mdash;Edouard&mdash;Monsieur Riviere.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, Monsieur Riviere,&rdquo; said Rose, acting nonchalance. &ldquo;Why could you not
+      say so? you use such phrases, who can conjecture what you mean? I will
+      come to Monsieur Riviere directly; mamma will be so glad.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Jacintha gone, Rose tore up the letter and locked up the pieces, then ran
+      to the glass. Etc.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Edouard had been so profoundly miserable he could stand it no longer; in
+      spite of his determination not to visit Beaurepaire while it contained a
+      rival, he rode over to see whether he had not tormented himself idly:
+      above all, to see the beloved face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Jacintha put him into the salle a manger. &ldquo;By that you will see her
+      alone,&rdquo; said the knowing Jacintha. He sat down, hat and whip in hand, and
+      wondered how he should be received&mdash;if at all.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In glides Rose all sprightliness and good-humor, and puts out her hand to
+      him; the which he kisses.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How could I keep away so long?&rdquo; asked he vaguely, and self-astonished.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How indeed, and we missing you so all the time!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Have YOU missed me?&rdquo; was the eager inquiry.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, no!&rdquo; was the cheerful reply; &ldquo;but all the rest have.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Presently the malicious thing gave a sudden start.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh! such a piece of news; you remember Colonel Dujardin, the obnoxious
+      colonel?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      No answer.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Transferred his attentions. Fancy!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Who to?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To Josephine and mamma. But such are the military. He only wanted to get
+      rid of you: this done (through your want of spirit), he scorns the rich
+      prize; so now I scorn HIM. Will you come for a walk?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, yes!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We will go and look for my deserter. I say, tell me now; cannot I write
+      to the commander-in-chief about this? a soldier has no right to be a
+      deserter, has he? tell me, you are a public man, and know everything
+      except my heart.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is it not too bad to tease me to-day?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes! but please! I have had few amusements of late. I find it so dull
+      without you to tease.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Formal permission to tease being conceded, she went that instant on the
+      opposite tack, and began to tell him how she had missed him, and how sorry
+      she had been anything should have occurred to vex their kind good friend.
+      In short, Edouard spent a delightful day, for Rose took him one way to
+      meet Josephine, who, she knew, was coming another. At night the last
+      embers of jealousy got quenched, for Josephine was a wife now, and had
+      already begun to tell Camille all her little innocent secrets; and she
+      told him all about Edouard and Rose, and gave him his orders; so he
+      treated Rose with great respect before Edouard; but paid her no marked
+      attention; also he was affable to Riviere, who, having ceased to suspect,
+      began to like him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In the course of the evening, the colonel also informed the baroness that
+      he expected every day an order to join the army of the Rhine.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Edouard pricked his ears.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness said no more than politeness dictated. She did not press him
+      to stay, but treated his departure as a matter of course. Riviere rode
+      home late in the evening in high spirits.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The next day Rose varied her late deportment; she sang snatches of melody,
+      going about the house; it was for all the world like a bird chirping. In
+      the middle of one chirp Jacintha interfered. &ldquo;Hush, mademoiselle, your
+      mamma! she is at the bottom of the corridor.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What was I thinking of?&rdquo; said Rose.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh! I dare say you know, mademoiselle,&rdquo; replied the privileged domestic.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A letter of good news came from Aubertin. That summons to his nephew&rsquo;s
+      funeral was an era in his harmless life.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The said nephew was a rich man and an oddity; one of those who love to
+      surprise folk. Moreover, he had no children, and detected his nephews and
+      nieces being unnaturally civil to him. &ldquo;Waiting to cut me up,&rdquo; was his
+      generous reading of them. So with this he made a will, and there defied,
+      as far as in him lay, the laws of nature; for he set his wealth a-flowing
+      backwards instead of forwards; he handed his property up to an ancestor,
+      instead of down to posterity.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      All this the doctor&rsquo;s pen set down with some humor, and in the calm spirit
+      with which a genuine philosopher receives prosperity as well as adversity.
+      Yet one natural regret escaped him; that all this wealth, since it was to
+      come, had not come a year or two sooner.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      All at Beaurepaire knew what their dear old friend meant.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      His other news to them was that they might expect him any moment.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      So here was another cause of rejoicing.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am so glad,&rdquo; said Josephine. &ldquo;Now, perhaps, he will be able to publish
+      his poor dear entomology, that the booksellers were all so unkind, so
+      unfeeling about.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      I linger on the brink of painful scenes to observe that a sweet and loving
+      friendship, such as this was between the good doctor and three persons of
+      another sex, is one of the best treasures of the human heart. Poverty had
+      strengthened it; yet now wealth could not weaken it. With no tie of blood
+      it yet was filial, sisterly, brotherly, national, chivalrous; happy,
+      unalloyed sentiment, free from ups and downs, from heats and chills, from
+      rivalry, from caprice; and, indeed, from all mortal accidents but one&mdash;and
+      why say one? methinks death itself does but suspend these gentle, rare,
+      unselfish amities a moment, then waft them upward to their abiding home.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0015" id="link2HCH0015">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XV.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      It was a fair morning in June: the sky was a bright, deep, lovely,
+      speckless blue: the flowers and bushes poured perfume, and sprinkled song
+      upon the balmy air. On such a day, so calm, so warm, so bright, so
+      scented, so tuneful, to live and to be young is to be happy. With gentle
+      hand it wipes all other days out of the memory; it smiles, it smells, it
+      sings, and clouds and rain and biting wind seem as far off and impossible
+      as grief and trouble.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Camille and Josephine had stolen out, and strolled lazily up and down
+      close under the house, drinking the sweet air, fragrant with perfume and
+      melody; the blue sky, and love.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose was in the house. She had missed them; but she thought they must be
+      near; for they seldom took long walks early in the day. Meeting Jacintha
+      on the landing of the great staircase, she asked her where her sister was.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madame Raynal is gone for a walk. She has taken the colonel with her. You
+      know she always takes the colonel out with her now.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That will do. You can finish your work.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Jacintha went into Camille&rsquo;s room.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose, who had looked as grave as a judge while Jacintha was present,
+      bubbled into laughter. She even repeated Jacintha&rsquo;s words aloud, and
+      chuckled over them. &ldquo;You know she always takes the colonel out with her
+      now&mdash;ha, ha, ha!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Rose!&rdquo; sighed a distant voice.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She looked round, and saw the baroness at some distance in the corridor,
+      coming slowly towards her, with eyes bent gloomily on the ground. Rose
+      composed her features into a settled gravity, and went to meet her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I wish to speak with you,&rdquo; said the baroness; &ldquo;let us sit down; it is
+      cool here.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose ran and brought a seat without a back, but well stuffed, and set it
+      against the wall. The old lady sat down and leaned back, and looked at
+      Rose in silence a good while; then she said,&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There is room for you; sit down, for I want to speak seriously to you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, mamma; what is it?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Turn a little round, and let me see your face.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose complied; and began to feel a little uneasy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Perhaps you can guess what I am going to say to you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have no idea.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, I am going to put a question to you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;With all my heart, dear mamma.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I invite you to explain to me the most singular, the most unaccountable
+      thing that ever fell under my notice. Will you do this for your mother?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;O mamma! of course I will do anything to please you that I can; but,
+      indeed, I don&rsquo;t know what you mean.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am going to tell you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The old lady paused. The young one, naturally enough, felt a chill of
+      vague anxiety strike across her frame.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Rose,&rdquo; said the old lady, speaking very gently but firmly, and leaning in
+      a peculiar way on her words, while her eye worked like an ice gimlet on
+      her daughter&rsquo;s face, &ldquo;a little while ago, when my poor Raynal&mdash;our
+      benefactor&mdash;was alive&mdash;and I was happy&mdash;you all chilled my
+      happiness by your gloom: the whole house seemed a house of mourning&mdash;tell
+      me now why was this.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mamma!&rdquo; said Rose, after a moment&rsquo;s hesitation, &ldquo;we could hardly be gay.
+      Sickness in the house! And if Colonel Raynal was alive, still he was
+      absent, and in danger.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh! then it was out of regard for him we were all dispirited?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, I suppose so,&rdquo; said Rose, stoutly; but then colored high at her own
+      want of candor. However, she congratulated herself that her mother&rsquo;s
+      suspicion was confined to past events.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Her self-congratulation on that score was short; for the baroness, after
+      eying her grimly for a second or two in silence, put her this awkward
+      question plump.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If so, tell me why is it that ever since that black day when the news of
+      his DEATH reached us, the whole house has gone into black, and has gone
+      out of mourning?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mamma,&rdquo; stammered Rose, &ldquo;what DO you mean?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Even poor Camille, who was so pale and wan, has recovered like magic.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;O mamma! is not that fancy?&rdquo; said Rose, piteously. &ldquo;Of what do you
+      suspect me? Can you think I am unfeeling&mdash;ungrateful? I should not be
+      YOUR daughter.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, no,&rdquo; said the baroness, &ldquo;to do you justice, you attempt sorrow; as
+      you put on black. But, my poor child, you do it with so little skill that
+      one sees a horrible gayety breaking through that thin disguise: you are no
+      true mourners: you are like the mutes or the undertakers at a funeral,
+      forced grief on the surface of your faces, and frightful complacency
+      below.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tra la! lal! la! la! Tra la! la! Tra la! la!&rdquo; carolled Jacintha, in the
+      colonel&rsquo;s room hard by.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The ladies looked at one another: Rose in great confusion.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tra la! la! la! Tra lal! lal! la! la! la!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Jacintha!&rdquo; screamed Rose angrily.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hush! not a word,&rdquo; said the baroness. &ldquo;Why remonstrate with HER? Servants
+      are but chameleons: they take the color of those they serve. Do not cry. I
+      wanted your confidence, not your tears, love. There, I will not twice in
+      one day ask you for your heart: it would be to lower the mother, and give
+      the daughter the pain of refusing it, and the regret, sure to come one
+      day, of having refused it. I will discover the meaning of it all by
+      myself.&rdquo; She went away with a gentle sigh; and Rose was cut to the heart
+      by her words; she resolved, whatever it might cost her and Josephine, to
+      make a clean breast this very day. As she was one of those who act
+      promptly, she went instantly in search of her sister, to gain her consent,
+      if possible.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Now, the said Josephine was in the garden walking with Camille, and
+      uttering a wife&rsquo;s tender solicitudes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And must you leave me? must you risk your life again so soon; the life on
+      which mine depends?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My dear, that letter I received from headquarters two days ago, that
+      inquiry whether my wound was cured. A hint, Josephine&mdash;a hint too
+      broad for any soldier not to take.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Camille, you are very proud,&rdquo; said Josephine, with an accent of reproach,
+      and a look of approval.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am obliged to be. I am the husband of the proudest woman in France.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hush! not so loud: there is Dard on the grass.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dard!&rdquo; muttered the soldier with a word of meaning. &ldquo;Josephine,&rdquo; said he
+      after a pause, and a little peevishly, &ldquo;how much longer are we to lower
+      our voices, and turn away our eyes from each other, and be ashamed of our
+      happiness?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Five months longer, is it not?&rdquo; answered Josephine quietly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Five months longer!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine was hurt at this, and for once was betrayed into a serious and
+      merited remonstrance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is this just?&rdquo; said she. &ldquo;Think of two months ago: yes, but two months
+      ago, you were dying. You doubted my love, because it could not overcome my
+      virtue and my gratitude: yet you might have seen it was destroying my
+      life. Poor Raynal, my husband, my benefactor, died. Then I could do more
+      for you, if not with delicacy, at least with honor; but no! words, and
+      looks, and tender offices of love were not enough, I must give stronger
+      proof. Dear Camille, I have been reared in a strict school: and perhaps
+      none of your sex can know what it cost me to go to Frejus that day with
+      him I love.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My own Josephine!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I made but one condition: that you would not rob me of my mother&rsquo;s
+      respect: to her our hasty marriage would appear monstrous, heartless. You
+      consented to be secretly happy for six months. One fortnight has passed,
+      and you are discontented again.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, no! do not think so. It is every word true. I am an ungrateful
+      villain.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How dare you say so? and to me! No! but you are a man.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So I have been told; but my conduct to you, sweet one, has not been that
+      of a man from first to last. Yet I could die for you, with a smile on my
+      lips. But when I think that once I lifted this sacrilegious hand against
+      your life&mdash;oh!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do not be silly, Camille. I love you all the better for loving me well
+      enough to kill me. What woman would not? I tell you, you foolish thing,
+      you are a man: monseigneur is one of the lordly sex, that is accustomed to
+      have everything its own way. My love, in a world that is full of misery,
+      here are two that are condemned to be secretly happy a few months longer:
+      a hard fate for one of your sex, it seems: but it is so much sweeter than
+      the usual lot of mine, that really I cannot share your misery,&rdquo; and she
+      smiled joyously.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then share my happiness, my dear wife.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I do; only mine is deep, not loud.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, Dard is gone, and we are out of doors; will the little birds betray
+      us?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The lower windows are open, and I saw Jacintha in one of the rooms.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Jacintha? we are in awe of the very servants. Well, if I must not say it
+      loud I will say it often,&rdquo; and putting his mouth to her ear, he poured a
+      burning whisper of love into it&mdash;&ldquo;My love! my angel! my wife! my
+      wife! my wife!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She turned her swimming eyes on him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My husband!&rdquo; she whispered in return.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose came out, and found them billing and cooing. &ldquo;You MUST not be so
+      happy, you two,&rdquo; said she authoritatively.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How can we help it?&rdquo; asked Camille.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You must and shall help it, somehow,&rdquo; retorted this little tyrant. &ldquo;Mamma
+      suspects. She has given me such a cross-examination, my blood runs cold.
+      No, on second thoughts, kiss her again, and you may both be as happy as
+      you like; for I am going to tell mamma all, and no power on earth shall
+      hinder me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Rose,&rdquo; said Camille, &ldquo;you are a sensible girl; and I always said so.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      But Josephine was horrified. &ldquo;What! tell my mother that within a month of
+      my husband&rsquo;s death?&rdquo;&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t say your husband,&rdquo; put in Camille wincing; &ldquo;the priest never
+      confirmed that union; words spoken before a magistrate do not make a
+      marriage in the sight of Heaven.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine cut him short. &ldquo;Amongst honorable men and women all oaths are
+      alike sacred: and Heaven&rsquo;s eye is in a magistrate&rsquo;s room as in a church. A
+      daughter of Beaurepaire gave her hand to him, and called herself his wife.
+      Therefore, she was his wife: and is his widow. She owes him everything;
+      the house you are all living in among the rest. She ought to be proud of
+      her brief connection with that pure, heroic spirit, and, when she is so
+      little noble as to disown him, then say that gratitude and justice have no
+      longer a place among mankind.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come into the chapel,&rdquo; said Camille, with a voice that showed he was
+      hurt.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They entered the chapel, and there they saw something that thoroughly
+      surprised them: a marble monument to the memory of Raynal. It leaned at
+      present against the wall below the place prepared to receive it. The
+      inscription, short, but emphatic, and full of feeling, told of the battles
+      he had fought in, including the last fatal skirmish, and his marriage with
+      the heiress of Beaurepaire; and, in a few soldier-like words, the
+      uprightness, simplicity, and generosity of his character.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They were so touched by this unexpected trait in Camille that they both
+      threw their arms round his neck by one impulse. &ldquo;Am I wrong to be proud of
+      him?&rdquo; said Josephine, triumphantly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, don&rsquo;t say too much to me,&rdquo; said Camille, looking down confused.
+      &ldquo;One tries to be good; but it is very hard&mdash;to some of us&mdash;not
+      to you, Josephine; and, after all, it is only the truth that we have
+      written on that stone. Poor Raynal! he was my old comrade; he saved me
+      from death, and not a soldier&rsquo;s death&mdash;drowning; and he was a better
+      man than I am, or ever shall be. Now he is dead, I can say these things.
+      If I had said them when he was alive, it would have been more to my
+      credit.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They all three went back towards the house; and on the way Rose told them
+      all that had passed between the baroness and her. When she came to the
+      actual details of that conversation, to the words, and looks, and tones,
+      Josephine&rsquo;s uneasiness rose to an overpowering height; she even admitted
+      that further concealment would be very difficult.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Better tell her than let her find out,&rdquo; said Rose. &ldquo;We must tell her some
+      day.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At last, after a long and agitated discussion, Josephine consented; but
+      Rose must be the one to tell. &ldquo;So then, you at least will make your peace
+      with mamma,&rdquo; argued Josephine, &ldquo;and let us go in and do this before our
+      courage fails; besides, it is going to rain, and it has turned cold. Where
+      have all these clouds come from? An hour ago there was not one in the
+      sky.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They went, with hesitating steps and guilty looks, to the saloon. Their
+      mother was not there. Here was a reprieve.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose had an idea. She would take her to the chapel, and show her the
+      monument, and that would please her with poor Camille. &ldquo;After that,&rdquo; said
+      Rose, &ldquo;I will begin by telling her all the misery you have both gone
+      through; and, when she pities you, then I will show her it was all my
+      fault your misery ended in a secret marriage.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The confederates sat there in a chilly state, waiting for the baroness. At
+      last, as she did not come, Rose got up to go to her. &ldquo;When the mind is
+      made up, it is no use being cowardly, and putting off,&rdquo; said she, firmly.
+      For all that, her cheek had but little color left in it, when she left her
+      chair with this resolve.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Now as Rose went down the long saloon to carry out their united resolve,
+      Jacintha looked in; and, after a hasty glance to see who was present, she
+      waited till Rose came up to her, and then whipped a letter from under her
+      apron and gave it her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;For my mistress,&rdquo; said she, with an air of mystery.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why not take it to her, then?&rdquo; inquired Rose.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I thought you might like to see it first, mademoiselle,&rdquo; said Jacintha,
+      with quiet meaning.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is it from the dear doctor?&rdquo; asked Josephine.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;La, no, mademoiselle, don&rsquo;t you know the doctor is come home? Why, he has
+      been in the house near an hour. He is with my lady.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The doctor proved Jacintha correct by entering the room in person soon
+      after; on this Rose threw down the letter, and she and the whole party
+      were instantly occupied in greeting him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      When the ladies had embraced him and Camille shaken hands with him, they
+      plied him with a thousand questions. Indeed, he had not half satisfied
+      their curiosity, when Rose happened to catch sight of the letter again,
+      and took it up to carry to the baroness. She now, for the first time, eyed
+      it attentively, and the consequence was she uttered an exclamation, and
+      took the first opportunity to beckon Aubertin.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He came to her; and she put the letter into his hand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He put up his glasses, and eyed it. &ldquo;Yes!&rdquo; whispered he, &ldquo;it is from HIM.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine and Camille saw something was going on; they joined the other
+      two, with curiosity in their faces.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose put her hand on a small table near her, and leaned a moment. She
+      turned half sick at a letter coming from the dead. Josephine now came
+      towards her with a face of concern, and asked what was the matter.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The reply came from Aubertin. &ldquo;My poor friends,&rdquo; said he, solemnly, &ldquo;this
+      is one of those fearful things that you have not seen in your short lives,
+      but it has been more than once my lot to witness it. The ships that carry
+      letters from distant countries vary greatly in speed, and are subject to
+      detaining accidents. Yes, this is the third time I have seen a letter come
+      written by a hand known to be cold. The baroness is a little excited
+      to-day, I don&rsquo;t know from what cause. With your approbation, Madame
+      Raynal, I will read this letter before I let her see it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Read it, if you please.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Shall I read it out?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Certainly. There may be some wish expressed in it; oh, I hope there is!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Camille, from delicacy, retired to some little distance, and the doctor
+      read the letter in a low and solemn voice.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;MY DEAR MOTHER,&mdash;I hope all are well at Beaurepaire, as I am, or I
+      hope soon to be. I received a wound in our last skirmish; not a very
+      severe one; but it put an end to my writing for some time.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Poor fellow! it was his death wound. Why, when was this written?&mdash;why,&rdquo;
+       and the doctor paused, and seemed stupefied: &ldquo;why, my dears, has my memory
+      gone, or&rdquo;&mdash;and again he looked eagerly at the letter&mdash;&ldquo;what was
+      the date of the battle in which he was killed? for this letter is dated
+      the 15th of May. Is it a dream? no! this was written since the date of his
+      death.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, doctor,&rdquo; said Rose, &ldquo;you deceive yourself.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, what was the date of the Moniteur, then?&rdquo; asked Aubertin, in great
+      agitation.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Considerably later than this,&rdquo; said Camille.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t think so; the journal! where is it?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My mother has it locked up. I&rsquo;ll run.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, Rose; no one but me. Now, Josephine, do not you go and give way to
+      hopes that may be delusive. I must see that journal directly. I will go to
+      the baroness. I shall excuse her less than you would.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He was scarcely gone when a cry of horror filled the room, a cry as of
+      madness falling like a thunderbolt on a human mind. It was Josephine, who
+      up to this had not uttered one word. But now she stood, white as a corpse,
+      in the middle of the room, and wrung her hands. &ldquo;What have I done? What
+      shall I do? It was the 3d of May. I see it before me in letters of fire;
+      the 3d of May! the 3d of May!&mdash;and he writes the 15th.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No! no!&rdquo; cried Camille wildly. &ldquo;It was long, long after time 3d.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It was the 3d of May,&rdquo; repeated Josephine in a hoarse voice that none
+      would have known for hers.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Camille ran to her with words of comfort and hope; he did not share her
+      fears. He remembered about when the Moniteur came, though not the very
+      day. He threw his arm lovingly round her as if to protect her against
+      these shadowy terrors. Her dilating eyes seemed fixed on something distant
+      in space or time, at some horrible thing coming slowly towards her. She
+      did not see Camille approach her, but the moment she felt him she turned
+      upon him swiftly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you love me?&rdquo; still in the hoarse voice that had so little in it of
+      Josephine. &ldquo;I mean, does one grain of respect or virtue mingle in your
+      love for me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What words are these, my wife?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then leave Raynal&rsquo;s house upon the instant. You wonder I can be so cruel?
+      I wonder too; and that I can see my duty so clear in one short moment. But
+      I have lived twenty years since that letter came. Oh! my brain has whirled
+      through a thousand agonies. And I have come back a thousand times to the
+      same thing; you and I must see each other&rsquo;s face no more.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh!&rdquo; cried Rose, &ldquo;is there no way but this?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Take care,&rdquo; she screamed, wildly, to her and Camille, &ldquo;I am on the verge
+      of madness; is it for you two to thrust me over the precipice? Come, now,
+      if you are a man of honor, if you have a spark of gratitude towards the
+      poor woman who has given you all except her fair name&mdash;that she will
+      take to the grave in spite of you all&mdash;promise that you will leave
+      Raynal&rsquo;s house this minute if he is alive, and let me die in honor as I
+      have lived.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, no!&rdquo; cried Camille, terror-stricken; &ldquo;it cannot be. Heaven is
+      merciful, and Heaven sees how happy we are. Be calm! these are idle fears;
+      be calm! I say. For if it is so I will obey you. I will stay; I will go; I
+      will die; I will live; I will obey you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Swear this to me by the thing you hold most sacred,&rdquo; she almost shrieked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I swear by my love for you,&rdquo; was his touching reply.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Ere they had recovered a miserable composure after this passionate
+      outburst, all the more terrible as coming from a creature so tender as
+      Josephine, agitated voices were heard at the door, and the baroness
+      tottered in, followed by the doctor, who was trying in vain to put some
+      bounds to her emotion and her hopes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, my children! my children!&rdquo; cried she, trembling violently. &ldquo;Here,
+      Rose, my hands shake so; take this key, open the cabinet, there is the
+      Moniteur. What is the date?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The journal was found, and rapidly examined. The date was the 20th of May.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There!&rdquo; cried Camille. &ldquo;I told you!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness uttered a feeble moan. Her hopes died as suddenly as they had
+      been born, and she sank drooping into a chair, with a bitter sigh.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Camille stole a joyful look at Josephine. She was in the same attitude
+      looking straight before her as at a coming horror. Presently Rose uttered
+      a faint cry, &ldquo;The battle was BEFORE.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To be sure,&rdquo; cried the doctor. &ldquo;You forget, it is not the date of the
+      paper we want, but of the battle it records. For Heaven&rsquo;s sake, when was
+      the battle?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The 3d of May,&rdquo; said Josephine, in a voice that seemed to come from the
+      tomb.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose&rsquo;s hands that held the journal fell like a dead weight upon her knees,
+      journal and all. She whispered, &ldquo;It was the 3d of May.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah!&rdquo; cried the baroness, starting up, &ldquo;he may yet be alive. He must be
+      alive. Heaven is merciful! Heaven would not take my son from me, a poor
+      old woman who has not long to live. There was a letter; where is the
+      letter?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Are we mad, not to read the letter?&rdquo; said the doctor. &ldquo;I had it; it has
+      dropped from my old fingers when I went for the journal.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      A short examination of the room showed the letter lying crumpled up near
+      the door. Camille gave it to the baroness. She tried to read it, but could
+      not.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am old,&rdquo; said she; &ldquo;my hand shakes and my eyes are troubled. This young
+      gentleman will read it to us. His eyes are not dim and troubled. Something
+      tells me that when I hear this letter, I shall find out whether my son
+      lives. Why do you not read it to me, Camille?&rdquo; cried she, almost fiercely.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Camille, thus pressed, obeyed mechanically, and began to read Raynal&rsquo;s
+      letter aloud, scarce knowing what he did, but urged and driven by the
+      baroness.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;MY DEAR MOTHER,&mdash;I hope all are well at Beaurepaire, as I am, or I
+      hope soon to be. I received a wound in our last skirmish; not a very
+      severe one, but it put an end to my writing for some time.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Go on, dear Camille! go on.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The page ends there, madame.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The paper was thin, and Camille, whose hand trembled, had some difficulty
+      in detaching the leaves from one another. He succeeded, however, at last,
+      and went on reading and writhing.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;By the way, you must address your next letter to me as Colonel Raynal. I
+      was promoted just before this last affair, but had not time to tell you;
+      and my wound stopped my writing till now.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There, there!&rdquo; cried the baroness. &ldquo;He was Colonel Raynal, and Colonel
+      Raynal was not killed.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The doctor implored her not to interrupt.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Go on, Camille. Why do you hesitate? what is the matter? Do for pity&rsquo;s
+      sake go on, sir.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Camille cast a look of agony around, and put his hand to his brow, on
+      which large drops of cold perspiration, like a death dew, were gathering;
+      but driven to the stake on all sides, he gasped on rather than read, for
+      his eye had gone down the page.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A namesake of mine, Commandant Raynal,&rdquo;&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;has not been&mdash;so fortunate. He&rdquo;&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Go on! go on!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The wretched man could now scarcely utter Raynal&rsquo;s words; they came from
+      him in a choking groan.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;he was killed, poor fellow! while heading a gallant charge upon the
+      enemy&rsquo;s flank.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He ground the letter convulsively in his hand, then it fell all crumpled
+      on the floor.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Bless you, Camille!&rdquo; cried the baroness, &ldquo;bless you! bless you! I have a
+      son still.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She stooped with difficulty, took up the letter, and, kissing it again and
+      again, fell on her knees, and thanked Heaven aloud before them all. Then
+      she rose and went hastily out, and her voice was heard crying very loud,
+      &ldquo;Jacintha! Jacintha!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The doctor followed in considerable anxiety for the effects of this
+      violent joy on so aged a person. Three remained behind, panting and pale
+      like those to whom dead Lazarus burst the tomb, and came forth in a
+      moment, at a word. Then Camille half kneeled, half fell, at Josephine&rsquo;s
+      feet, and, in a voice choked with sobs, bade her dispose of him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She turned her head away. &ldquo;Do not speak to me; do not look at me; if we
+      look at one another, we are lost. Go! die at your post, and I at mine.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He bowed his head, and kissed her dress, then rose calm as despair, and
+      white as death, and, with his knees knocking under him, tottered away like
+      a corpse set moving.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He disappeared from the house.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness soon came back, triumphant and gay.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have sent her to bid them ring the bells in the village. The poor shall
+      be feasted; all shall share our joy: my son was dead, and lives. Oh, joy!
+      joy! joy!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mother!&rdquo; shrieked Josephine.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mad woman that I am, I am too boisterous. Help me, Rose! she is going to
+      faint; her lips are white.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Dr. Aubertin and Rose brought a chair. They forced Josephine into it. She
+      was not the least faint; yet her body obeyed their hands just like a dead
+      body. The baroness melted into tears; tears streamed from Rose&rsquo;s eyes.
+      Josephine&rsquo;s were dry and stony, and fixed on coming horror. The baroness
+      looked at her with anxiety. &ldquo;Thoughtless old woman! It was too sudden; it
+      is too much for my dear child; too much for me,&rdquo; and she kneeled, and laid
+      her aged head on her daughter&rsquo;s bosom, saying feebly through her tears,
+      &ldquo;too much joy, too much joy!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine took no notice of her. She sat like one turned to stone looking
+      far away over her mother&rsquo;s head with rigid eyes fixed on the air and on
+      coming horrors.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose felt her arm seized. It was Aubertin. He too was pale now, though not
+      before. He spoke in a terrible whisper to Rose, his eye fixed on the woman
+      of stone that sat there.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;IS THIS JOY?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose, by a mighty effort, raised her eyes and confronted his full. &ldquo;What
+      else should it be?&rdquo; said she.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And with these words this Spartan girl was her sister&rsquo;s champion once more
+      against all comers, friend or foe.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0016" id="link2HCH0016">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XVI.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Dr. Aubertin received one day a note from a publishing bookseller, to
+      inquire whether he still thought of giving the world his valuable work on
+      insects. The doctor was amazed. &ldquo;My valuable work! Why, Rose, they all
+      refused it, and this person in particular recoiled from it as if my
+      insects could sting on paper.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The above led to a correspondence, in which the convert to insects
+      explained that the work must be published at the author&rsquo;s expense, the
+      publisher contenting himself with the profits. The author, thirsting for
+      the public, consented. Then the publisher wrote again to say that the
+      immortal treatise must be spiced; a little politics flung in: &ldquo;Nothing
+      goes down, else.&rdquo; The author answered in some heat that he would not
+      dilute things everlasting with the fleeting topics of the day, nor defile
+      science with politics. On this his Mentor smoothed him down, despising him
+      secretly for not seeing that a book is a matter of trade and nothing else.
+      It ended in Aubertin going to Paris to hatch his Phoenix. He had not been
+      there a week, when a small deputation called on him, and informed him he
+      had been elected honorary member of a certain scientific society. The
+      compliment was followed by others, till at last certain ladies, with the
+      pliancy of their sex, find out they had always secretly cared for
+      butterflies. Then the naturalist smelt a rat, or, in other words, began to
+      scent that entomology, a form of idiocy in a poor man, is a graceful
+      decoration of the intellect in a rich one.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Philosopher without bile, he saw through this, and let it amuse, not shock
+      him. His own species, a singularly interesting one in my opinion, had
+      another trait in reserve for him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He took a world of trouble to find out the circumstances of his nephew&rsquo;s
+      nephews and nieces: then he made arrangements for distributing a large
+      part of his legacy among them. His intentions and the proportions of his
+      generosity transpired.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Hitherto they had been silent, but now they all fell-to and abused him:
+      each looking only to the amount of his individual share, not at the sum
+      total the doctor was giving way to an ungrateful lot.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The donor was greatly amused, and noted down the incident and some of the
+      remarks in his commonplace book, under the general head of &ldquo;Bestiarium;&rdquo;
+       and the particular head of &ldquo;Homo.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Paris with its seductions netted the good doctor, and held him two or
+      three months; would have detained him longer, but for alarming accounts
+      the baroness sent of Josephine&rsquo;s health. These determined him to return to
+      Beaurepaire; and, must I own it, the announcement was no longer hailed at
+      Beaurepaire with universal joy as heretofore.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine Raynal, late Dujardin, is by this time no stranger to my
+      intelligent reader. I wish him to bring his knowledge of her character and
+      her sensibility to my aid. Imagine, as the weary hours and days and weeks
+      roll over her head, what this loving woman feels for her lover whom she
+      has dismissed; what this grateful wife feels for the benefactor she has
+      unwittingly wronged; but will never wrong with her eyes open; what this
+      lady pure as snow, and proud as fire, feels at the seeming frailty into
+      which a cruel combination of circumstances has entrapped her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Put down the book a moment: shut your eyes: and imagine this strange and
+      complicated form of human suffering.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Her mental sufferings were terrible; and for some time Rose feared for her
+      reason. At last her agonies subsided into a listlessness and apathy little
+      less alarming. She seemed a creature descending inch by inch into the
+      tomb. Indeed, I fully believe she would have died of despair: but one of
+      nature&rsquo;s greatest forces stepped into the arena and fought on the side of
+      life. She was affected with certain bilious symptoms that added to Rose&rsquo;s
+      uneasiness, but Jacintha assured her it was nothing, and would retire and
+      leave the sufferer better. Jacintha, indeed, seemed now to take a
+      particular interest in Josephine, and was always about her with looks of
+      pity and interest.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Good creature!&rdquo; thought Rose, &ldquo;she sees my sister is unhappy: and that
+      makes her more attentive and devoted to her than ever.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      One day these three were together in Josephine&rsquo;s room. Josephine was
+      mechanically combing her long hair, when all of a sudden she stretched out
+      her hand and cried, &ldquo;Rose!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose ran to her, and coming behind her saw in the glass that her lips were
+      colorless. She screamed to Jacintha, and between them they supported
+      Josephine to the bed. She had hardly touched it when she fainted dead
+      away. &ldquo;Mamma! mamma!&rdquo; cried Rose in her terror.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hush!&rdquo; cried Jacintha roughly, &ldquo;hold your tongue: it is only a faint.
+      Help me loosen her: don&rsquo;t make any noise, whatever.&rdquo; They loosened her
+      stays, and applied the usual remedies, but it was some time before she
+      came-to. At last the color came back to her lips, then to her cheek, and
+      the light to her eye. She smiled feebly on Jacintha and Rose, and asked if
+      she had not been insensible.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, love, and frightened us&mdash;a little&mdash;not much&mdash;oh,
+      dear! oh, dear!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t be alarmed, sweet one, I am better. And I will never do it again,
+      since it frightens you.&rdquo; Then Josephine said to her sister in a low voice,
+      and in the Italian language, &ldquo;I hoped it was death, my sister; but he
+      comes not to the wretched.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If you hoped that,&rdquo; replied Rose in the same language, &ldquo;you do not love
+      your poor sister who so loves you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      While the Italian was going on, Jacintha&rsquo;s dark eyes glanced suspiciously
+      on each speaker in turn. But her suspicions were all wide of the mark.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now may I go and tell mamma?&rdquo; asked Rose.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, mademoiselle, you shall not,&rdquo; said Jacintha. &ldquo;Madame Raynal, do take
+      my side, and forbid her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, what is it to you?&rdquo; said Rose, haughtily.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If it was not something to me, should I thwart my dear young lady?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No. And you shall have your own way, if you will but condescend to give
+      me a reason.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      This to some of us might appear reasonable, but not to Jacintha: it even
+      hurt her feelings.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mademoiselle Rose,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;when you were little and used to ask me
+      for anything, did I ever say to you, &lsquo;Give me a REASON first&rsquo;?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There! she is right,&rdquo; said Josephine. &ldquo;We should not make terms with
+      tried friends. Come, we will pay her devotion this compliment. It is such
+      a small favor. For my part I feel obliged to her for asking it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine&rsquo;s health improved steadily from that day. Her hollow cheeks
+      recovered their plump smoothness, and her beauty its bloom, and her person
+      grew more noble and statue-like than ever, and within she felt a sense of
+      indomitable vitality. Her appetite had for some time been excessively
+      feeble and uncertain, and her food tasteless; but of late, by what she
+      conceived to be a reaction such as is common after youth has shaken off a
+      long sickness, her appetite had been not only healthy but eager. The
+      baroness observed this, and it relieved her of a large portion of her
+      anxiety. One day at dinner her maternal heart was so pleased with
+      Josephine&rsquo;s performance that she took it as a personal favor, &ldquo;Well done,
+      Josephine,&rdquo; said she; &ldquo;that gives your mother pleasure to see you eat
+      again. Soup and bouillon: and now twice you have been to Rose for some of
+      that pate, which does you so much credit, Jacintha.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine colored high at this compliment.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is true,&rdquo; said she, &ldquo;I eat like a pig;&rdquo; and, with a furtive glance at
+      the said pate, she laid down her knife and fork, and ate no more of
+      anything. The baroness had now a droll misgiving.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The doctor will be angry with me,&rdquo; said she: &ldquo;he will find her as well as
+      ever.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madame,&rdquo; said Jacintha hastily, &ldquo;when does the doctor come, if I may make
+      so bold, that I may get his room ready, you know?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well thought of, Jacintha. He comes the day after to-morrow, in the
+      afternoon.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At night when the young ladies went up to bed, what did they find but a
+      little cloth laid on a little table in Josephine&rsquo;s room, and the remains
+      of the pate she had liked. Rose burst out laughing. &ldquo;Look at that dear
+      duck of a goose, Jacintha! Our mother&rsquo;s flattery sank deep: she thinks we
+      can eat her pates at all hours of the day and night. Shall I send it
+      away?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; said Josephine, &ldquo;that would hurt her culinary pride, and perhaps her
+      affection: only cover it up, dear, for just now I am not in the humor: it
+      rather turns me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      It was covered up. The sisters retired to rest. In the morning Rose lifted
+      the cover and found the plate cleared, polished. She was astounded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The large tapestried chamber, once occupied by Camille Dujardin, was now
+      turned into a sitting-room, and it was a favorite on account of the
+      beautiful view from the windows.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      One day Josephine sat there alone with some work in her hand; but the
+      needle often stopped, and the fair head drooped. She heaved a deep sigh.
+      To her surprise it was echoed by a sigh that, like her own, seemed to come
+      from a heart full of sighs.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She turned hastily round and saw Jacintha.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Now Josephine had all a woman&rsquo;s eye for reading faces, and she was
+      instantly struck by a certain gravity in Jacintha&rsquo;s gaze, and a flutter
+      which the young woman was suppressing with tolerable but not complete
+      success.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Disguising the uneasiness this discovery gave her, she looked her visitor
+      full in the face, and said mildly, but a little coldly, &ldquo;Well, Jacintha?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Jacintha lowered her eyes and muttered slowly,&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The doctor&mdash;comes&mdash;to-day,&rdquo; then raised her eyes all in a
+      moment to take Josephine off her guard; but the calm face was
+      impenetrable. So then Jacintha added, &ldquo;to our misfortune,&rdquo; throwing in
+      still more meaning.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To our misfortune? A dear old friend&mdash;like him?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Jacintha explained. &ldquo;That old man makes me shake. You are never safe with
+      him. So long as his head is in the clouds, you might take his shoes off,
+      and on he&rsquo;d walk and never know it; but every now and then he comes out of
+      the clouds all in one moment, without a word of warning, and when he does
+      his eye is on everything, like a bird&rsquo;s. Then he is so old: he has seen a
+      heap. Take my word for it, the old are more knowing than the young, let
+      them be as sharp as you like: the old have seen everything. WE have only
+      heard talk of the most part, with here and there a glimpse. To know life
+      to the bottom you must live it out, from the soup to the dessert; and that
+      is what the doctor has done, and now he is coming here. And Mademoiselle
+      Rose will go telling him everything; and if she tells him half what she
+      has seen, your secret will be no secret to that old man.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My secret!&rdquo; gasped Josephine, turning pale.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t look so, madame: don&rsquo;t be frightened at poor Jacintha. Sooner or
+      later you MUST trust somebody besides Mademoiselle Rose.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine looked at her with inquiring, frightened eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Jacintha drew nearer to her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mademoiselle,&mdash;I beg pardon, madame,&mdash;I carried you in my arms
+      when I was a child. When I was a girl you toddled at my side, and held my
+      gown, and lisped my name, and used to put your little arms round my neck,
+      and kissed me, you would; and if ever I had the least pain or sickness
+      your dear little face would turn as sorrowful, and all the pretty color
+      leave it for Jacintha; and now you are in trouble, in sore trouble, yet
+      you turn away from me, you dare not trust me, that would be cut in pieces
+      ere I would betray you. Ah, mademoiselle, you are wrong. The poor can
+      feel: they have all seen trouble, and a servant is the best of friends
+      where she has the heart to love her mistress; and do not I love you? Pray
+      do not turn from her who has carried you in her arms, and laid you to
+      sleep upon her bosom, many&rsquo;s and many&rsquo;s the time.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine panted audibly. She held out her hand eloquently to Jacintha,
+      but she turned her head away and trembled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Jacintha cast a hasty glance round the room. Then she trembled too at what
+      she was going to say, and the effect it might have on the young lady. As
+      for Josephine, terrible as the conversation had become, she made no
+      attempt to evade it: she remained perfectly passive. It was the best way
+      to learn how far Jacintha had penetrated her secret, if at all.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Jacintha looked fearfully round and whispered in Josephine&rsquo;s ear, &ldquo;When
+      the news of Colonel Raynal&rsquo;s death came, you wept, but the color came back
+      to your cheek. When the news of his life came, you turned to stone. Ah! my
+      poor young lady, there has been more between you and THAT MAN than should
+      be. Ever since one day you all went to Frejus together, you were a changed
+      woman. I have seen you look at him as&mdash;as a wife looks at her man. I
+      have seen HIM&rdquo;&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hush, Jacintha! Do not tell me what you have seen: oh! do not remind me
+      of joys I pray God to help me forget. He was my husband, then!&mdash;oh,
+      cruel Jacintha, to remind me of what I have been, of what I am! Ah me! ah
+      me! ah me!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your husband!&rdquo; cried Jacintha in utter amazement.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then Josephine drooped her head on this faithful creature&rsquo;s shoulder, and
+      told her with many sobs the story I have told you. She told it very
+      briefly, for it was to a woman who, though little educated, was full of
+      feeling and shrewdness, and needed but the bare facts: she could add the
+      rest from her own heart and experience: could tell the storm of feelings
+      through which these two unhappy lovers must have passed. Her frequent
+      sighs of pity and sympathy drew Josephine on to pour out all her griefs.
+      When the tale was ended she gave a sigh of relief.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It might have been worse: I thought it was worse the more fool I. I
+      deserve to have my head cut off.&rdquo; This was Jacintha&rsquo;s only comment at that
+      time.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was Josephine&rsquo;s turn to be amazed. &ldquo;It could have been worse?&rdquo; said
+      she. &ldquo;How? tell me,&rdquo; added she bitterly. &ldquo;It would be a consolation to me,
+      could I see that.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Jacintha colored and evaded this question, and begged her to go on, to
+      keep nothing back from her. Josephine assured her she had revealed all.
+      Jacintha looked at her a moment in silence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is then as I half suspected. You do not know all that is before you.
+      You do not see why I am afraid of that old man.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, not of him in particular.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nor why I want to keep Mademoiselle Rose from prattling to him?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No. I assure you Rose is to be trusted; she is wise&mdash;wiser than I
+      am.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are neither of you wise. You neither of you know anything. My poor
+      young mistress, you are but a child still. You have a deep water to wade
+      through,&rdquo; said Jacintha, so solemnly that Josephine trembled. &ldquo;A deep
+      water, and do not see it even. You have told me what is past, now I must
+      tell you what is coming. Heaven help me! But is it possible you have no
+      misgiving? Tell the truth, now.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Alas! I am full of them; at your words, at your manner, they fly around
+      me in crowds.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Have you no ONE?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then turn your head from me a bit, my sweet young lady; I am an honest
+      woman, though I am not so innocent as you, and I am forced against my will
+      to speak my mind plainer than I am used to.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Then followed a conversation, to detail which might anticipate our story;
+      suffice it to say, that Rose, coming into the room rather suddenly, found
+      her sister weeping on Jacintha&rsquo;s bosom, and Jacintha crying and sobbing
+      over her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She stood and stared in utter amazement.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Dr. Aubertin, on his arrival, was agreeably surprised at Madame Raynal&rsquo;s
+      appearance. He inquired after her appetite.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, as to her appetite,&rdquo; cried the baroness, &ldquo;that is immense.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Indeed!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It was,&rdquo; explained Josephine, &ldquo;just when I began to get better, but now
+      it is as much as usual.&rdquo; This answer had been arranged beforehand by
+      Jacintha. She added, &ldquo;The fact is, we wanted to see you, doctor, and my
+      ridiculous ailments were a good excuse for tearing you from Paris.&rdquo;&mdash;&ldquo;And
+      now we have succeeded,&rdquo; said Rose, &ldquo;let us throw off the mask, and talk of
+      other things; above all, of Paris, and your eclat.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;For all that,&rdquo; persisted the baroness, &ldquo;she was ill, when I first wrote,
+      and very ill too.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madame Raynal,&rdquo; said the doctor solemnly, &ldquo;your conduct has been
+      irregular; once ill, and your illness announced to your medical adviser,
+      etiquette forbade you to get well but by his prescriptions. Since, then,
+      you have shown yourself unfit to conduct a malady, it becomes my painful
+      duty to forbid you henceforth ever to be ill at all, without my permission
+      first obtained in writing.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      This badinage was greatly relished by Rose, but not at all by the
+      baroness, who was as humorless as a swan.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He stayed a month at Beaurepaire, then off to Paris again: and being now a
+      rich man, and not too old to enjoy innocent pleasures, he got a habit of
+      running backwards and forwards between the two places, spending a month or
+      so at each alternately. So the days rolled on. Josephine fell into a state
+      that almost defies description; her heart was full of deadly wounds, yet
+      it seemed, by some mysterious, half-healing balm, to throb and ache, but
+      bleed no more. Beams of strange, unreasonable complacency would shoot
+      across her; the next moment reflection would come, she would droop her
+      head, and sigh piteously. Then all would merge in a wild terror of
+      detection. She seemed on the borders of a river of bliss, new, divine, and
+      inexhaustible: and on the other bank mocking malignant fiends dared her to
+      enter that heavenly stream. The past to her was full of regrets; the
+      future full of terrors, and empty of hope. Yet she did not, could not
+      succumb. Instead of the listlessness and languor of a few months back, she
+      had now more energy than ever; at times it mounted to irritation. An
+      activity possessed her: it broke out in many feminine ways. Among the rest
+      she was seized with what we men call a cacoethes of the needle: &ldquo;a raging
+      desire&rdquo; for work. Her fingers itched for work. She was at it all day. As
+      devotees retire to pray, so she to stitch. On a wet day she would often
+      slip into the kitchen, and ply the needle beside Jacintha: on a dry day
+      she would hide in the old oak-tree, and sit like a mouse, and ply the
+      tools of her craft, and make things of no mortal use to man or woman; and
+      she tried little fringes of muslin upon her white hand, and held it up in
+      front of her, and smiled, and then moaned. It was winter, and Rose used
+      sometimes to bring her out a thick shawl, as she sat in the old oak-tree
+      stitching, but Josephine nearly always declined it. SHE WAS NEARLY
+      IMPERVIOUS TO COLD.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then, her purse being better filled than formerly, she visited the poor
+      more than ever, and above all the young couples; and took a warm interest
+      in their household matters, and gave them muslin articles of her own
+      making, and sometimes sniffed the soup in a young housewife&rsquo;s pot, and
+      took a fancy to it, and, if invited to taste it, paid her the compliment
+      of eating a good plateful of it, and said it was much better soup than the
+      chateau produced, and, what is stranger, thought so: and, whenever some
+      peevish little brat set up a yell in its cradle and the father naturally
+      enough shook his fist at the destroyer of his peace, Madame Raynal&rsquo;s
+      lovely face filled with concern not for the sufferer but the pest, and she
+      flew to it and rocked it and coaxed it and consoled it, till the young
+      housewife smiled and stopped its mouth by other means. And, besides the
+      five-franc pieces she gave the infants to hold, these visits of Madame
+      Raynal were always followed by one from Jacintha with a basket of
+      provisions on her stalwart arm, and honest Sir John Burgoyne peeping out
+      at the corner. Kind and beneficent as she was, her temper deteriorated
+      considerably, for it came down from angelic to human. Rose and Jacintha
+      were struck with the change, assented to everything she said, and
+      encouraged her in everything it pleased her caprice to do. Meantime the
+      baroness lived on her son Raynal&rsquo;s letters (they came regularly twice a
+      month). Rose too had a correspondence, a constant source of delight to
+      her. Edouard Riviere was posted at a distance, and could not visit her;
+      but their love advanced rapidly. Every day he wrote down for his Rose the
+      acts of the day, and twice a week sent the budget to his sweetheart, and
+      told her at the same time every feeling of his heart. She was less
+      fortunate than he; she had to carry a heavy secret; but still she found
+      plenty to tell him, and tender feelings too to vent on him in her own
+      arch, shy, fitful way. Letters can enchain hearts; it was by letters that
+      these two found themselves imperceptibly betrothed. Their union was looked
+      forward to as certain, and not very distant. Rose was fairly in love.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      One day, Dr. Aubertin, coming back from Paris to Beaurepaire rather
+      suddenly, found nobody at home but the baroness. Josephine and Rose were
+      gone to Frejus; had been there more than a week. She was ailing again; so
+      as Frejus had agreed with her once, Rose thought it might again. &ldquo;She
+      would send for them back directly.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; said the doctor, &ldquo;why do that? I will go over there and see them.&rdquo;
+       Accordingly, a day or two after this, he hired a carriage, and went off
+      early in the morning to Frejus. In so small a place he expected to find
+      the young ladies at once; but, to his surprise, no one knew them nor had
+      heard of them. He was at a nonplus, and just about to return home and
+      laugh at himself and the baroness for this wild-goose chase, when he fell
+      in with a face he knew, one Mivart, a surgeon, a young man of some talent,
+      who had made his acquaintance in Paris. Mivart accosted him with great
+      respect; and, after the first compliments, informed him that he had been
+      settled some months in this little town, and was doing a fair stroke of
+      business.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Killing some, and letting nature cure others, eh?&rdquo; said the doctor; then,
+      having had his joke, he told Mivart what had brought him to Frejus.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Are they pretty women, your friends? I think I know all the pretty women
+      about,&rdquo; said Mivart with levity. &ldquo;They are not pretty,&rdquo; replied Aubertin.
+      Mivart&rsquo;s interest in them faded visibly out of his countenance. &ldquo;But they
+      are beautiful. The elder might pass for Venus, and the younger for Hebe.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I know them then!&rdquo; cried he; &ldquo;they are patients of mine.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The doctor colored. &ldquo;Ah, indeed!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In the absence of your greater skill,&rdquo; said Mivart, politely; &ldquo;it is
+      Madame Aubertin and her sister you are looking for, is it not?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Aubertin groaned. &ldquo;I am rather too old to be looking for a Madame
+      Aubertin,&rdquo; said he; &ldquo;no; it is Madame Raynal, and Mademoiselle de
+      Beaurepaire.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Mivart became confidential. &ldquo;Madame Aubertin and her sister,&rdquo; said he,
+      &ldquo;are so lovely they make me ill to look at them: the deepest blue eyes you
+      ever saw, both of them; high foreheads; teeth like ivory mixed with pearl;
+      such aristocratic feet and hands; and their arms&mdash;oh!&rdquo; and by way of
+      general summary the young surgeon kissed the tips of his fingers, and was
+      silent; language succumbed under the theme. The doctor smiled coldly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Mivart added, &ldquo;If you had come an hour sooner, you might have seen
+      Mademoiselle Rose; she was in the town.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mademoiselle Rose? who is that?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, Madame Aubertin&rsquo;s sister.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At this Dr. Aubertin looked first very puzzled, then very grave.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hum!&rdquo; said he, after a little reflection, &ldquo;where do these paragons live?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;They lodge at a small farm; it belongs to a widow; her name is Roth.&rdquo;
+       They parted. Dr. Aubertin walked slowly towards his carriage, his hands
+      behind him, his eyes on the ground. He bade the driver inquire where the
+      Widow Roth lived, and learned it was about half a league out of the town.
+      He drove to the farmhouse; when the carriage drove up, a young lady looked
+      out of the window on the first floor. It was Rose de Beaurepaire. She
+      caught the doctor&rsquo;s eye, and he hers. She came down and welcomed him with
+      a great appearance of cordiality, and asked him, with a smile, how he
+      found them out.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;From your medical attendant,&rdquo; said the doctor, dryly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose looked keenly in his face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He said he was in attendance on two paragons of beauty, blue eyes, white
+      teeth and arms.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And you found us out by that?&rdquo; inquired Rose, looking still more keenly
+      at him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hardly; but it was my last chance of finding you, so I came. Where is
+      Madame Raynal?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come into this room, dear friend. I will go and find her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Full twenty minutes was the doctor kept waiting, and then in came Rose,
+      gayly crying, &ldquo;I have hunted her high and low, and where do you think my
+      lady was? sitting out in the garden&mdash;come.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Sure enough, they found Josephine in the garden, seated on a low chair.
+      She smiled when the doctor came up to her, and asked after her mother.
+      There was an air of languor about her; her color was clear, delicate, and
+      beautiful.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have been unwell, my child.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A little, dear friend; you know me; always ailing, and tormenting those I
+      love.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well! but, Josephine, you know this place and this sweet air always set
+      you up. Look at her now, doctor; did you ever see her look better? See
+      what a color. I never saw her look more lovely.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I never saw her look SO lovely; but I have seen her look better. Your
+      pulse. A little languid?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, I am a little.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you stay at Beaurepaire?&rdquo; inquired Rose; &ldquo;if so, we will come home.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;On the contrary, you will stay here another fortnight,&rdquo; said the doctor,
+      authoritatively.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Prescribe some of your nice tonics for me, doctor,&rdquo; said Josephine,
+      coaxingly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No! I can&rsquo;t do that; you are in the hands of another practitioner.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What does that matter? You were at Paris.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is not the etiquette in our profession to interfere with another man&rsquo;s
+      patients.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, dear! I am so sorry,&rdquo; began Josephine.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I see nothing here that my good friend Mivart is not competent to deal
+      with,&rdquo; said the doctor, coldly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then followed some general conversation, at the end of which the doctor
+      once more laid his commands on them to stay another fortnight where they
+      were, and bade them good-by.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He was no sooner gone than Rose went to the door of the kitchen, and
+      called out, &ldquo;Madame Jouvenel! Madame Jouvenel! you may come into the
+      garden again.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The doctor drove away; but, instead of going straight to Beaurepaire, he
+      ordered the driver to return to the town. He then walked to Mivart&rsquo;s
+      house.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In about a quarter of an hour he came out of it, looking singularly grave,
+      sad, and stern.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0017" id="link2HCH0017">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XVII.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Edouard Riviere contrived one Saturday to work off all arrears of
+      business, and start for Beaurepaire. He had received a very kind letter
+      from Rose, and his longing to see her overpowered him. On the road his
+      eyes often glittered, and his cheek flushed with expectation. At last he
+      got there. His heart beat: for four months he had not seen her. He ran up
+      into the drawing-room, and there found the baroness alone; she welcomed
+      him cordially, but soon let him know Rose and her sister were at Frejus.
+      His heart sank. Frejus was a long way off. But this was not all. Rose&rsquo;s
+      last letter was dated from Beaurepaire, yet it must have been written at
+      Frejus. He went to Jacintha, and demanded an explanation of this. The
+      ready Jacintha said it looked as if she meant to be home directly; and
+      added, with cool cunning, &ldquo;That is a hint for me to get their rooms
+      ready.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This letter must have come here enclosed in another,&rdquo; said Edouard,
+      sternly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Like enough,&rdquo; replied Jacintha, with an appearance of sovereign
+      indifference.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Edouard looked at her, and said, grimly, &ldquo;I will go to Frejus.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So I would,&rdquo; said Jacintha, faltering a little, but not perceptibly; &ldquo;you
+      might meet them on the road, if so be they come the same road; there are
+      two roads, you know.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Edouard hesitated; but he ended by sending Dard to the town on his own
+      horse, with orders to leave him at the inn, and borrow a fresh horse. &ldquo;I
+      shall just have time,&rdquo; said he. He rode to Frejus, and inquired at the
+      inns and post-office for Mademoiselle de Beaurepaire. They did not know
+      her; then he inquired for Madame Raynal. No such name known. He rode by
+      the seaside upon the chance of their seeing him. He paraded on horseback
+      throughout the place, in hopes every moment that a window would open, and
+      a fair face shine at it, and call him. At last his time was up, and he was
+      obliged to ride back, sick at heart, to Beaurepaire. He told the baroness,
+      with some natural irritation, what had happened. She was as much surprised
+      as he was.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I write to Madame Raynal at the post-office, Frejus,&rdquo; said she.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And Madame Raynal gets your letters?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of course she does, since she answers them; you cannot have inquired at
+      the post.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, it was the first place I inquired at, and neither Mademoiselle de
+      Beaurepaire nor Madame Raynal were known there.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Jacintha, who could have given the clew, seemed so puzzled herself, that
+      they did not even apply to her. Edouard took a sorrowful leave of the
+      baroness, and set out on his journey home.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Oh! how sad and weary that ride seemed now by what it had been coming. His
+      disappointment was deep and irritating; and ere he had ridden half way a
+      torturer fastened on his heart. That torture is suspicion; a vague and
+      shadowy, but gigantic phantom that oppresses and rends the mind more
+      terribly than certainty. In this state of vague, sickening suspicion, he
+      remained some days: then came an affectionate letter from Rose, who had
+      actually returned home. In this she expressed her regret and
+      disappointment at having missed him; blamed herself for misleading him,
+      but explained that their stay at Frejus had been prolonged from day to day
+      far beyond her expectation. &ldquo;The stupidity of the post-office was more
+      than she could account for,&rdquo; said she. But, what went farthest to console
+      Edouard, was, that after this contretemps she never ceased to invite him
+      to come to Beaurepaire. Now, before this, though she said many kind and
+      pretty things in her letters, she had never invited him to visit the
+      chateau; he had noticed this. &ldquo;Sweet soul,&rdquo; thought he, &ldquo;she really is
+      vexed. I must be a brute to think any more about it. Still&rdquo;&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      So this wound was skinned over.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At last, what he called his lucky star ordained that he should be
+      transferred to the very post his Commandant Raynal had once occupied. He
+      sought and obtained permission to fix his quarters in the little village
+      near Beaurepaire, and though this plan could not be carried out for three
+      months, yet the prospect of it was joyful all that time&mdash;joyful to
+      both lovers. Rose needed this consolation, for she was very unhappy: her
+      beloved sister, since their return from Frejus, had gone back. The flush
+      of health was faded, and so was her late energy. She fell into deep
+      depression and languor, broken occasionally by fits of nervous irritation.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She would sit for hours together at one window languishing and fretting.
+      Can the female reader guess which way that window looked?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Now, Edouard was a favorite of Josephine&rsquo;s; so Rose hoped he would help to
+      distract her attention from those sorrows which a lapse of years alone
+      could cure.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      On every account, then, his visit was looked forward to with hope and joy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He came. He was received with open arms. He took up his quarters at his
+      old lodgings, but spent his evenings and every leisure hour at the
+      chateau.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He was very much in love, and showed it. He adhered to Rose like a leech,
+      and followed her about like a little dog.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      This would have made her very happy if there had been nothing great to
+      distract her attention and her heart; but she had Josephine, whose deep
+      depression and fits of irritation and terror filled her with anxiety; and
+      so Edouard was in the way now and then. On these occasions he was too vain
+      to see what she was too polite to show him offensively.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But on this she became vexed at his obtuseness.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Does he think I can be always at his beck and call?&rdquo; thought she.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She is always after her sister,&rdquo; said he.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He was just beginning to be jealous of Josephine when the following
+      incident occurred:&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose and the doctor were discussing Josephine. Edouard pretended to be
+      reading a book, but he listened to every word.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Dr. Aubertin gave it as his opinion that Madame Raynal did not make enough
+      blood.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh! if I thought that!&rdquo; cried Rose.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, then, it is so, I assure you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Doctor,&rdquo; said Rose, &ldquo;do you remember, one day you said healthy blood
+      could be drawn from robust veins and poured into a sick person&rsquo;s?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is a well-known fact,&rdquo; said Aubertin.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t believe it,&rdquo; said Rose, dryly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then you place a very narrow limit to science,&rdquo; said the doctor, coldly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Did you ever see it done?&rdquo; asked Rose, slyly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have not only seen it done, but have done it myself.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then do it for us. There&rsquo;s my arm; take blood from that for dear
+      Josephine!&rdquo; and she thrust a white arm out under his eye with such a bold
+      movement and such a look of fire and love as never beamed from common
+      eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A keen, cold pang shot through the human heart of Edouard Riviere.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The doctor started and gazed at her with admiration: then he hung his
+      head. &ldquo;I could not do it. I love you both too well to drain either of
+      life&rsquo;s current.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose veiled her fire, and began to coax. &ldquo;Once a week; just once a week,
+      dear, dear doctor; you know I should never miss it. I am so full of that
+      health, which Heaven denies to her I love.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Let us try milder measures first,&rdquo; said the doctor. &ldquo;I have most faith in
+      time.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What if I were to take her to Frejus? hitherto, the sea has always done
+      wonders for her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Frejus, by all means,&rdquo; said Edouard, mingling suddenly in the
+      conversation; &ldquo;and this time I will go with you, and then I shall find out
+      where you lodged before, and how the boobies came to say they did not know
+      you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose bit her lip. She could not help seeing then how much dear Edouard was
+      in her way and Josephine&rsquo;s. Their best friends are in the way of all who
+      have secrets. Presently the doctor went to his study. Then Edouard let
+      fall a mock soliloquy. &ldquo;I wonder,&rdquo; said he, dropping out his words one by
+      one, &ldquo;whether any one will ever love me well enough to give a drop of
+      their blood for me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If you were in sickness and sorrow, who knows?&rdquo; said Rose, coloring up.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I would soon be in sickness and sorrow if I thought that.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t jest with such matters, monsieur.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am serious. I wish I was as ill as Madame Raynal is, to be loved as she
+      is.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You must resemble her in some other things to be loved as she is.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have often made me feel that of late, dear Rose.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      This touched her. But she fought down the kindly feeling. &ldquo;I am glad of
+      it,&rdquo; said she, out of perverseness. She added after a while, &ldquo;Edouard, you
+      are naturally jealous.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not the least in the world, Rose, I assure you. I have many faults, but
+      jealous I am not.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, yes, you are, and suspicious, too; there is something in your
+      character that alarms me for our happiness.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, if you come to that, there are things in YOUR conduct I could wish
+      explained.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There! I said so. You have not confidence in me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pray don&rsquo;t say that, dear Rose. I have every confidence in you; only
+      please don&rsquo;t ask me to divest myself of my senses and my reason.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t ask you to do that or anything else for me; good-by, for the
+      present.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Where are you going now? tic! tic! I never can get a word in peace with
+      you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am not going to commit murder. I&rsquo;m only going up-stairs to my sister.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Poor Madame Raynal, she makes it very hard for me not to dislike her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dislike my Josephine?&rdquo; and Rose bristled visibly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She is an angel, but I should hate an angel if it came forever between
+      you and me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Excuse me, she was here long before you. It is you that came between her
+      and me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I came because I was told I should be welcome,&rdquo; said Edouard bitterly,
+      and equivocating a little; he added, &ldquo;and I dare say I shall go when I am
+      told I am one too many.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Bad heart! who says you are one too many in the house? But you are too
+      exigent, monsieur; you assume the husband, and you tease me. It is
+      selfish; can you not see I am anxious and worried? you ought to be kind to
+      me, and soothe me; that is what I look for from you, and, instead of that,
+      I declare you are getting to be quite a worry.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I should not be if you loved me as I love you. I give YOU no rival. Shall
+      I tell you the cause of all this? you have secrets.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What secrets?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is it me you ask? am I trusted with them? Secrets are a bond that not
+      even love can overcome. It is to talk secrets you run away from me to
+      Madame Raynal. Where did you lodge at Frejus, Mademoiselle the Reticent?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In a grotto, dry at low water, Monsieur the Inquisitive.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That is enough: since you will not tell me, I will find it out before I
+      am a week older.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      This alarmed Rose terribly, and drove her to extremities. She decided to
+      quarrel.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sir,&rdquo; said she, &ldquo;I thank you for playing the tyrant a little prematurely;
+      it has put me on my guard. Let us part; you and I are not suited to each
+      other, Edouard Riviere.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He took this more humbly than she expected. &ldquo;Part!&rdquo; said he, in
+      consternation; &ldquo;that is a terrible word to pass between you and me.
+      Forgive me! I suppose I am jealous.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are; you are actually jealous of my sister. Well, I tell you plainly
+      I love you, but I love my sister better. I never could love any man as I
+      do her; it is ridiculous to expect such a thing.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And do you think I could bear to play second fiddle to her all my life?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t ask you. Go and play first trumpet to some other lady.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You speak your wishes so plainly now, I have nothing to do but to obey.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He kissed her hand and went away disconsolately.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose, instead of going to Josephine, her determination to do which had
+      mainly caused the quarrel, sat sadly down, and leaned her head on her
+      hand. &ldquo;I am cruel. I am ungrateful. He has gone away broken-hearted. And
+      what shall I do without him?&mdash;little fool! I love him better than he
+      loves me. He will never forgive me. I have wounded his vanity; and they
+      are vainer than we are. If we meet at dinner I will be so kind to him, he
+      will forget it all. No! Edouard will not come to dinner. He is not a
+      spaniel that you can beat, and then whistle back again. Something tells me
+      I have lost him, and if I have, what shall I do? I will write him a note.
+      I will ask him to forgive me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She sat down at the table, and took a sheet of notepaper and began to
+      write a few conciliatory words. She was so occupied in making these kind
+      enough, and not too kind, that a light step approached her unobserved. She
+      looked up and there was Edouard. She whipped the paper off the table.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A look of suspicion and misery crossed Edouard&rsquo;s face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose caught it, and said, &ldquo;Well, am I to be affronted any more?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, Rose. I came back to beg you to forget what passed just now,&rdquo; said
+      he.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose&rsquo;s eye flashed; his return showed her her power. She abused it
+      directly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How can I forget it if you come reminding me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dear Rose, now don&rsquo;t be so unkind, so cruel&mdash;I have not come back to
+      tease you, sweet one. I come to know what I can do to please you; to make
+      you love me again?&rdquo; and he was about to kneel graciously on one knee.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll tell you. Don&rsquo;t come near me for a month.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Edouard started up, white as ashes with mortification and wounded love.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This is how you treat me for humbling myself, when it is you that ought
+      to ask forgiveness.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why should I ask what I don&rsquo;t care about?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What DO you care about?&mdash;except that sister of yours? You have no
+      heart. And on this cold-blooded creature I have wasted a love an empress
+      might have been proud of inspiring. I pray Heaven some man may sport with
+      your affections, you heartless creature, as you have played with mine, and
+      make you suffer what I suffer now!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And with a burst of inarticulate grief and rage he flung out of the room.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose sank trembling on the sofa a little while: then with a mighty effort
+      rose and went to comfort her sister.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Edouard came no more to Beaurepaire.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      There is an old French proverb, and a wise one, &ldquo;Rien n&rsquo;est certain que
+      l&rsquo;imprevu;&rdquo; it means you can make sure of nothing but this, that matters
+      will not turn as you feel sure they will. And, even for this reason, you,
+      who are thinking of suicide because trade is declining, speculation
+      failing, bankruptcy impending, or your life going to be blighted forever
+      by unrequited love&mdash;DON&rsquo;T DO IT. Whether you are English, American,
+      French, or German, listen to a man that knows what is what, and DON&rsquo;T DO
+      IT. I tell you none of those horrors, when they really come, will affect
+      you as you fancy they will. The joys we expect are not a quarter so
+      bright, nor the troubles half so dark as we think they will be. Bankruptcy
+      coming is one thing, come is quite another: and no heart or life was ever
+      really blighted at twenty years of age. The love-sick girls that are
+      picked out of the canal alive, all, without exception, marry another man,
+      have brats, and get to screech with laughter when they think of sweetheart
+      No. 1, generally a blockhead, or else a blackguard, whom they were fools
+      enough to wet their clothes for, let alone kill their souls. This happens
+      INVARIABLY. The love-sick girls that are picked out of the canal dead have
+      fled from a year&rsquo;s misery to eternal pain, from grief that time never
+      failed to cure, to anguish incurable. In this world &ldquo;Rien n&rsquo;est certain
+      que l&rsquo;imprevu.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Edouard and Rose were tender lovers, at a distance. How much happier and
+      more loving they thought they should be beneath the same roof. They came
+      together: their prominent faults of character rubbed: the secret that was
+      in the house did its work: and altogether, they quarrelled. L&rsquo;imprevu.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Dard had been saying to Jacintha for ever so long, &ldquo;When granny dies, I
+      will marry you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Granny died. Dard took possession of her little property. Up came a
+      glittering official, and turned him out; he was not her heir. Perrin, the
+      notary, was. He had bought the inheritance of her two sons, long since
+      dead.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Dard had not only looked on the cottage and cow, as his, but had spoken of
+      them as such for years. The disappointment and the irony of comrades ate
+      into him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I will leave this cursed place,&rdquo; said he.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine instantly sent for him to Beaurepaire. He came, and was factotum
+      with the novelty of a fixed salary. Jacintha accommodated him with a new
+      little odd job or two. She set him to dance on the oak floors with a brush
+      fastened to his right foot; and, after a rehearsal or two, she made him
+      wait at table. Didn&rsquo;t he bang the things about: and when he brought a lady
+      a dish, and she did not instantly attend, he gave her elbow a poke to
+      attract attention: then she squeaked; and he grinned at her double
+      absurdity in minding a touch, and not minding the real business of the
+      table.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But his wrongs rankled in him. He vented antique phrases such as, &ldquo;I want
+      a change;&rdquo; &ldquo;This village is the last place the Almighty made,&rdquo; etc.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then he was attacked with a moral disease: affected the company of
+      soldiers. He spent his weekly salary carousing with the military, a class
+      of men so brilliant that they are not expected to pay for their share of
+      the drink; they contribute the anecdotes and the familiar appeals to
+      Heaven: and is not that enough?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Present at many recitals, the heroes of which lost nothing by being their
+      own historians, Dard imbibed a taste for military adventure. His very
+      talk, which used to be so homely, began now to be tinselled with big
+      swelling words of vanity imported from the army. I need hardly say these
+      bombastical phrases did not elevate his general dialect: they lay
+      fearfully distinct upon the surface, &ldquo;like lumps of marl upon a barren
+      soil, encumbering the ground they could not fertilize.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Jacintha took leave to remind him of an incident connected with warfare&mdash;wounds.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you remember how you were down upon your luck when you did but cut
+      your foot? Why, that is nothing in the army. They never go out to fight
+      but some come back with arms off, and some with legs off and some with
+      heads; and the rest don&rsquo;t come back at all: and how would you like that?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      This intrusion of statistics into warfare at first cooled Dard&rsquo;s
+      impatience for the field. But presently the fighting half of his heart
+      received an ally in one Sergeant La Croix (not a bad name for a military
+      aspirant). This sergeant was at the village waiting to march with the new
+      recruits to the Rhine. Sergeant La Croix was a man who, by force of
+      eloquence, could make soldiering appear the most delightful as well as
+      glorious of human pursuits. His tongue fired the inexperienced soul with a
+      love of arms, as do the drums and trumpets and tramp of soldiers, and
+      their bayonets glittering in the sun. He would have been worth his weight
+      in fustian here, where we recruit by that and jargon; he was superfluous
+      in France, where they recruited by force: but he was ornamental: and he
+      set Dard and one or two more on fire. Indeed, so absorbing was his sense
+      of military glory, that there was no room left in him for that mere verbal
+      honor civilians call veracity.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      To speak plainly, the sergeant was a fluent, fertile, interesting,
+      sonorous, prompt, audacious liar: and such was his success, that Dard and
+      one or two more became mere human fiction pipes&mdash;of comparatively
+      small diameter&mdash;irrigating a rural district with false views of
+      military life, derived from that inexhaustible reservoir, La Croix.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At last the long-threatened conscription was levied: every person fit to
+      bear arms, and not coming under the allowed exceptions, drew a number: and
+      at a certain hour the numbers corresponding to these were deposited in an
+      urn, and one-third of them were drawn in presence of the authorities.
+      Those men whose numbers were drawn had to go for soldiers. Jacintha
+      awaited the result in great anxiety. She could not sit at home for it; so
+      she went down the road to meet Dard, who had promised to come and tell her
+      the result as soon as known. At last she saw him approaching in a
+      disconsolate way. &ldquo;O Dard! speak! are we undone? are you a dead man?&rdquo;
+       cried she. &ldquo;Have they made a soldier of you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No such luck: I shall die a man of all work,&rdquo; grunted Dard.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And you are sorry? you unnatural little monster! you have no feeling for
+      me, then.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, yes, I have; but glory is No. 1 with me now.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How loud the bantams crow! You leave glory to fools that be six feet
+      high.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;General Bonaparte isn&rsquo;t much higher than I am, and glory sits upon his
+      brow. Why shouldn&rsquo;t glory sit upon my brow?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Because it would weigh you down, and smother you, you little fool.&rdquo; She
+      added, &ldquo;And think of me, that couldn&rsquo;t bear you to be killed at any price,
+      glory or no glory.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Then, to appease her fears, Dard showed her his number, 99; and assured
+      her he had seen the last number in the functionary&rsquo;s hand before he came
+      away, and it was sixty something.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      This ocular demonstration satisfied Jacintha; and she ordered Dard to help
+      her draw the water.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;All right,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;there is no immortal glory to be picked up to-day,
+      so I&rsquo;ll go in for odd jobs.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      While they were at this job a voice was heard hallooing. Dard looked up,
+      and there was a rigid military figure, with a tremendous mustache, peering
+      about. Dard was overjoyed. It was his friend, his boon-companion. &ldquo;Come
+      here, old fellow,&rdquo; cried he, &ldquo;ain&rsquo;t I glad to see you, that is all?&rdquo; La
+      Croix marched towards the pair. &ldquo;What are you skulking here for, recruit
+      ninety-nine?&rdquo; said he, sternly, dropping the boon-companion in the
+      sergeant; &ldquo;the rest are on the road.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The rest, old fellow! what do you mean? why, I was not drawn.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, you were.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, I wasn&rsquo;t.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thunder of war, but I say you were. Yours was the last number.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That is an unlucky guess of yours, for I saw the last number. Look here,&rdquo;
+       and he fumbled in his pocket, and produced his number.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      La Croix instantly fished out a corresponding number.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, and here you are; this was the last number drawn.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Dard burst out laughing.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You goose!&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;that is sixty-six&mdash;look at it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sixty-six!&rdquo; roared the sergeant; &ldquo;no more than yours is&mdash;they are
+      both sixty-sixes when you play tricks with them, and turn them up like
+      that; but they are both ninety-nines when you look at them fair.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Dard scratched his head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come,&rdquo; said the corporal, briskly, &ldquo;make up his bundle, girl, and let us
+      be off; we have got our marching orders; going to the Rhine.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And do you think that I will let him go?&rdquo; screamed Jacintha. &ldquo;No! I will
+      say one word to Madame Raynal, and she will buy him a substitute
+      directly.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Dard stopped her sullenly. &ldquo;No! I have told all in the village that I
+      would go the first chance: it is come, and I&rsquo;ll go. I won&rsquo;t stay to be
+      laughed at about this too. If I was sure to be cut in pieces, I&rsquo;d go. Give
+      over blubbering, girl, and get us a bottle of the best wine, and while we
+      are drinking it, the sergeant and I, you make up my bundle. I shall never
+      do any good here.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Jacintha knew the obstinate toad. She did as she was bid, and soon the
+      little bundle was ready, and the two men faced the wine; La Croix, radiant
+      and bellicose; Dard, crestfallen but dogged (for there was a little bit of
+      good stuff at the bottom of the creature); and Jacintha rocking herself,
+      with her apron over her head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll give you a toast,&rdquo; said La Croix. &ldquo;Here&rsquo;s gunpowder.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Jacintha promptly honored the toast with a flood of tears.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Drop that, Jacintha,&rdquo; said Dard, angrily; &ldquo;do you think that is
+      encouraging? Sergeant, I told this poor girl all about glory before you
+      came, but she was not ripe for it: say something to cheer her up, for I
+      can&rsquo;t.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I can,&rdquo; cried this trumpet of battle, emptying its glass. &ldquo;Attention,
+      young woman.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, dear! oh, dear! yes, sir.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A French soldier is a man who carries France in his heart&rdquo;&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But if the cruel foreign soldiers kill him? Oh!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, in that case, he does not care a straw. Every man must die; horses
+      likewise, and dogs, and donkeys, when they come to the end of their
+      troubles; but dogs and donkeys and chaps in blouses can&rsquo;t die gloriously;
+      as Dard may, if he has any luck at all: so, from this hour, if there was
+      twice as little of him, be proud of him, for from this time he is a part
+      of France and her renown. Come, recruit ninety-nine, shoulder your traps
+      at duty&rsquo;s call, and let us go forth in form. Attention! Quick&mdash;march!
+      Halt! is that the way I showed you to march? Didn&rsquo;t I tell you to start
+      from the left? Now try again. QUICK&mdash;march! left&mdash;right&mdash;left&mdash;right&mdash;left&mdash;right&mdash;NOW
+      you&rsquo;ve&mdash;GOT it&mdash;DRAT ye,&mdash;KEEP it&mdash;left&mdash;right&mdash;left&mdash;right&mdash;left&mdash;right.&rdquo;
+       And with no more ado the sergeant marched the little odd-job man to the
+      wars.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      VIVE LA FRANCE! <a name="link2HCH0018" id="link2HCH0018">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XVIII.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Edouard, the moment his temper cooled, became very sad. He longed to be
+      friends again with Rose, but did not know how. His own pride held him
+      back, and so did his fear that he had gone too far, and that his offended
+      mistress would not listen to an offer of reconciliation from him. He sat
+      down alone now to all his little meals. No sweet, mellow voices in his ear
+      after the fatigues of the day. It was a dismal change in his life.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At last, one day, he received three lines from Josephine, requesting him
+      to come and speak to her. He went over directly, full of vague hopes. He
+      found her seated pale and languid in a small room on the ground floor.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What has she been doing to you, dear?&rdquo; began she kindly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Has she not told you, Madame Raynal?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No; she is refractory. She will tell me nothing, and that makes me fear
+      she is the one in fault.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh! if she does not accuse me, I am sure I will not accuse her. I dare
+      say I am to blame; it is not her fault that I cannot make her love me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But you can. She does.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes; but she loves others better, and she holds me out no hope it will
+      ever be otherwise. On this one point how can I hope for your sympathy;
+      unfortunately for me you are one of my rivals. She told me plainly she
+      never could love me as she loves you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And you believed her?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I had good reason to believe her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine smiled sadly. &ldquo;Dear Edouard,&rdquo; said she, &ldquo;you must not attach so
+      much importance to every word we say. Does Rose at her age know
+      everything? Is she a prophet? Perhaps she really fancies she will always
+      love her sister as she does now; but you are a man of sense; you ought to
+      smile and let her talk. When you marry her you will take her to your own
+      house; she will only see me now and then; she will have you and your
+      affection always present. Each day some new tie between you and her. You
+      two will share every joy, every sorrow. Your children playing at your
+      feet, and reflecting the features of both parents, will make you one. Your
+      hearts will melt together in that blessed union which raises earth so near
+      to heaven; and then you will wonder you could ever be jealous of poor
+      Josephine, who must never hope&mdash;ah, me!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Edouard, wrapped up in himself, mistook Josephine&rsquo;s emotion at the picture
+      she had drawn of conjugal love. He soothed her, and vowed upon his honor
+      he never would separate Rose from her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madame Raynal,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;you are an angel, and I am a fiend. Jealousy
+      must be the meanest of all sentiments. I never will be jealous again,
+      above all, of you, sweet angel. Why, you are my sister as well as hers,
+      and she has a right to love you, for I love you myself.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You make me very happy when you talk so,&rdquo; sighed Josephine. &ldquo;Peace is
+      made?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Never again to be broken. I will go and ask her pardon. What is the
+      matter now?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      For Jacintha was cackling very loud, and dismissing with ignominy two
+      beggars, male and female.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She was industry personified, and had no sympathy with mendicity. In vain
+      the couple protested, Heaven knows with what truth, that they were not
+      beggars, but mechanics out of work. &ldquo;March! tramp!&rdquo; was Jacintha&rsquo;s least
+      word. She added, giving the rein to her imagination, &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll loose the dog.&rdquo;
+       The man moved away, the woman turned appealingly to Edouard. He and
+      Josephine came towards the group. She had got a sort of large hood, and in
+      that hood she carried an infant on her shoulders. Josephine inspected it.
+      &ldquo;It looks sickly, poor little thing,&rdquo; said she.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What can you expect, young lady?&rdquo; said the woman. &ldquo;Its mother had to rise
+      and go about when she ought to have been in her bed, and now she has not
+      enough to give it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, dear!&rdquo; cried Josephine. &ldquo;Jacintha, give them some food and a nice
+      bottle of wine.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That I will,&rdquo; cried Jacintha, changing her tone with courtier-like
+      alacrity. &ldquo;I did not see she was nursing.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine put a franc into the infant&rsquo;s hand; the little fingers closed on
+      it with that instinct of appropriation, which is our first and often our
+      last sentiment. Josephine smiled lovingly on the child, and the child
+      seeing that gave a small crow.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Bless it,&rdquo; said Josephine, and thereupon her lovely head reared itself
+      like a snake&rsquo;s, and then darted down on the child; and the young noble
+      kissed the beggar&rsquo;s brat as if she would eat it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      This won the mother&rsquo;s heart more than even the gifts.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Blessings on you, my lady!&rdquo; she cried. &ldquo;I pray the Lord not to forget
+      this when a woman&rsquo;s trouble comes on you in your turn! It is a small
+      child, mademoiselle, but it is not an unhealthy one. See.&rdquo; Inspection was
+      offered, and eagerly accepted.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Edouard stood looking on at some distance in amazement, mingled with
+      disgust.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ugh!&rdquo; said he, when she rejoined him, &ldquo;how could you kiss that nasty
+      little brat?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dear Edouard, don&rsquo;t speak so of a poor little innocent. Who would pity
+      them if we women did not? It had lovely eyes.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Like saucers.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is no compliment when you are affectionate to anybody; you overflow
+      with benevolence on all creation, like the rose which sheds its perfume on
+      the first-comer.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If he is not going to be jealous of me next,&rdquo; whined Josephine.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She took him to Rose, and she said, &ldquo;There, whenever good friends quarrel,
+      it is understood they were both in the wrong. Bygones are to be bygones;
+      and when your time comes round to quarrel again, please consult me first,
+      since it is me you will afflict.&rdquo; She left them together, and went and
+      tapped timidly at the doctor&rsquo;s study.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Aubertin received her with none of that reserve she had seen in him. He
+      appeared both surprised and pleased at her visit to his little sanctum. He
+      even showed an emotion Josephine was at a loss to account for. But that
+      wore off during the conversation, and, indeed, gave place to a sort of
+      coldness.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dear friend,&rdquo; said she, &ldquo;I come to consult you about Rose and Edouard.&rdquo;
+       She then told him what had happened, and hinted at Edouard&rsquo;s one fault.
+      The doctor smiled. &ldquo;It is curious. You have come to draw my attention to a
+      point on which it has been fixed for some days past. I am preparing a cure
+      for the two young fools; a severe remedy, but in their case a sure one.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He then showed her a deed, wherein he had settled sixty thousand francs on
+      Rose and her children. &ldquo;Edouard,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;has a good place. He is active
+      and rising, and with my sixty thousand francs, and a little purse of ten
+      thousand more for furniture and nonsense, they can marry next week, if
+      they like. Yes, marriage is a sovereign medicine for both of these
+      patients. She does not love him quite enough. Cure: marriage. He loves her
+      a little too much. Cure: marriage.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;O doctor!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Can&rsquo;t help it. I did not make men and women. We must take human nature as
+      we find it, and thank God for it on the whole. Have you nothing else to
+      confide to me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, doctor.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Are you sure?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, dear friend. But this is very near my heart,&rdquo; faltered Josephine.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The doctor sighed; then said gently, &ldquo;They shall be happy: as happy as you
+      wish them.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Meantime, in another room, a reconciliation scene was taking place, and
+      the mutual concessions of two impetuous but generous spirits.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness noticed the change in Josephine&rsquo;s appearance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She asked Rose what could be the matter.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Some passing ailment,&rdquo; was the reply.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Passing? She has been so, on and off, a long time. She makes me very
+      anxious.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose made light of it to her mother, but in her own heart she grew more
+      and more anxious day by day. She held secret conferences with Jacintha;
+      that sagacious personage had a plan to wake Josephine from her deathly
+      languor, and even soothe her nerves, and check those pitiable fits of
+      nervous irritation to which she had become subject. Unfortunately,
+      Jacintha&rsquo;s plan was so difficult and so dangerous, that at first even the
+      courageous Rose recoiled from it; but there are dangers that seem to
+      diminish when you look them long in the face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The whole party was seated in the tapestried room: Jacintha was there,
+      sewing a pair of sheets, at a respectful distance from the gentlefolks,
+      absorbed in her work; but with both ears on full cock.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The doctor, holding his glasses to his eye, had just begun to read out the
+      Moniteur.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness sat close to him, Edouard opposite; and the young ladies each
+      in her corner of a large luxurious sofa, at some little distance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;&lsquo;The Austrians left seventy cannon, eight thousand men, and three colors
+      upon the field. Army of the North: General Menard defeated the enemy after
+      a severe engagement, taking thirteen field-pieces and a quantity of
+      ammunition.&rsquo;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness made a narrow-minded renmark. &ldquo;That is always the way with
+      these journals,&rdquo; said she. &ldquo;Austrians! Prussians! when it&rsquo;s Egypt one
+      wants to hear about.&rdquo;&mdash;&ldquo;No, not a word about Egypt,&rdquo; said the doctor;
+      &ldquo;but there is a whole column about the Rhine, where Colonel Dujardin is&mdash;and
+      Dard. If I was dictator, the first nuisance I would put down is small
+      type.&rdquo; He then spelled out a sanguinary engagement: &ldquo;eight thousand of the
+      enemy killed. We have some losses to lament. Colonel Dujardin&rdquo;&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Only wounded, I hope,&rdquo; said the baroness.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The doctor went coolly on. &ldquo;At the head of the 24th brigade made a
+      brilliant charge on the enemy&rsquo;s flank, that is described in the general
+      order as having decided the fate of the battle.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How badly you do read,&rdquo; said the old lady, sharply. &ldquo;I thought he was
+      gone; instead of that he has covered himself with glory; but it is all our
+      doing, is it not, young ladies? We saved his life.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We saved it amongst us, madame.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What is the matter, Rose?&rdquo; said Edouard.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nothing: give me the salts, quick.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She only passed them, as it were, under her own nostrils; then held them
+      to Josephine, who was now observed to be trembling all over. Rose
+      contrived to make it appear that this was mere sympathy on Josephine&rsquo;s
+      part.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t be silly, girls,&rdquo; cried the baroness, cheerfully; &ldquo;there is nobody
+      killed that we care about.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Dr. Aubertin read the rest to himself.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Edouard fell into a gloomy silence and tortured himself about Camille, and
+      Rose&rsquo;s anxiety and agitation.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      By and by the new servant brought in a letter. It was the long-expected
+      one from Egypt.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Here is something better than salts for you. A long letter, Josephine,
+      and all in his own hand; so he is safe, thank Heaven! I was beginning to
+      be uneasy again. You frightened me for that poor Camille: but this is
+      worth a dozen Camilles; this is my son; I would give my old life for him.&rdquo;&mdash;&ldquo;My
+      dear Mother&mdash;(&lsquo;Bless him!&rsquo;), my dear wife, and my dear sister&mdash;(&lsquo;Well!
+      you sit there like two rocks!&rsquo;)&mdash;We have just gained a battle&mdash;fifty
+      colors. (&lsquo;What do you think of that?&rsquo;) All the enemy&rsquo;s baggage and
+      ammunition are in our hands. (&lsquo;This is something like a battle, this
+      one.&rsquo;) Also the Pasha of Natolie. (&lsquo;Ah! the Pasha of Natolie; an important
+      personage, no doubt, though I never had the honor of hearing of him. Do
+      you hear?&mdash;you on the sofa. My son has captured the Pasha of Natolie.
+      He is as brave as Caesar.&rsquo;) But this success is not one of those that lead
+      to important results (&lsquo;Never mind, a victory is a victory&rsquo;), and I should
+      not wonder if Bonaparte was to dash home any day. If so, I shall go with
+      him, and perhaps spend a whole day with you, on my way to the Rhine.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At this prospect a ghastly look passed quick as lightning between Rose and
+      Josephine.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness beckoned Josephine to come close to her, and read her what
+      followed in a lower tone of voice.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tell my wife I love her more and more every day. I don&rsquo;t expect as much
+      from her, but she will make me very happy if she can make shift to like me
+      as well as her family do.&rdquo;&mdash;&ldquo;No danger! What husband deserves to be
+      loved as he does? I long for his return, that his wife, his mother, and
+      his sister may all combine to teach this poor soldier what happiness
+      means. We owe him everything, Josephine, and if we did not love him, and
+      make him happy, we should be monsters; now should we not?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine stammered an assent.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;NOW you may read his letter: Jacintha and all,&rdquo; said the baroness
+      graciously.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The letter circulated. Meantime, the baroness conversed with Aubertin in
+      quite an undertone.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My friend, look at Josephine. That girl is ill, or else she is going to
+      be ill.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Neither the one nor the other, madame,&rdquo; said Aubertin, looking her coolly
+      in the face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But I say she is. Is a doctor&rsquo;s eye keener than a mother&rsquo;s?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Considerably,&rdquo; replied the doctor with cool and enviable effrontery.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness rose. &ldquo;Now, children, for our evening walk. We shall enjoy it
+      now.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I trust you may: but for all that I must forbid the evening air to one of
+      the party&mdash;to Madame Raynal.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness came to him and whispered, &ldquo;That is right. Thank you. See
+      what is the matter with her, and tell me.&rdquo; And she carried off the rest of
+      the party.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At the same time Jacintha asked permission to pass the rest of the evening
+      with her relations in the village. But why that swift, quivering glance of
+      intelligence between Jacintha and Rose de Beaurepaire when the baroness
+      said, &ldquo;Yes, certainly&rdquo;?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Time will show.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine and the doctor were left alone. Now Josephine had noticed the
+      old people whisper and her mother glance her way, and the whole woman was
+      on her guard. She assumed a languid complacency, and by way of shield, if
+      necessary, took some work, and bent her eyes and apparently her attention
+      on it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The doctor was silent and ill at ease.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She saw he had something weighty on his mind. &ldquo;The air would have done me
+      no harm,&rdquo; said she.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Neither will a few words with me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, no, dear friend. Only I think I should have liked a little walk this
+      evening.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Josephine,&rdquo; said the doctor quietly, &ldquo;when you were a child I saved your
+      life.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have often heard my mother speak of it. I was choked by the croup, and
+      you had the courage to lance my windpipe.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Had I?&rdquo; said the doctor, with a smile. He added gravely, &ldquo;It seems then
+      that to be cruel is sometimes kindness. It is the nature of men to love
+      those whose life they save.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And they love you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, our affection is not perfect. I don&rsquo;t know which is most to blame,
+      but after all these years I have failed to inspire you with confidence.&rdquo;
+       The doctor&rsquo;s voice was sad, and Josephine&rsquo;s bosom panted.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pray do not say so,&rdquo; she cried. &ldquo;I would trust you with my life.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But not with your secret.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My secret! What secret? I have no secrets.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Josephine, you have now for full twelve months suffered in body and mind,
+      yet you have never come to me for counsel, for comfort, for an old man&rsquo;s
+      experience and advice, nor even for medical aid.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But, dear friend, I assure you&rdquo;&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We DO NOT deceive our friend. We CANNOT deceive our doctor.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine trembled, but defended herself after the manner of her sex.
+      &ldquo;Dear doctor,&rdquo; said she, &ldquo;I love you all the better for this. Your regard
+      for me has for once blinded your science. I am not so robust as you have
+      known me, but there is nothing serious the matter with me. Let us talk of
+      something else. Besides, it is not interesting to talk about one&rsquo;s self.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Very well; since there is nothing serious or interesting in your case, we
+      will talk about something that is both serious and interesting.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;With all my heart;&rdquo; and she smiled with a sense of relief.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But the doctor leaned over the table to her, and said in a cautious and
+      most emphatic whisper, &ldquo;We will talk about YOUR CHILD.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The work dropped from Josephine&rsquo;s hands: she turned her face wildly on
+      Aubertin, and faltered out, &ldquo;M&mdash;my child?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My words are plain,&rdquo; replied he gravely. &ldquo;YOUR CHILD.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      When the doctor repeated these words, when Josephine looking in his face
+      saw he spoke from knowledge, however acquired, and not from guess, she
+      glided down slowly off the sofa and clasped his knees as he stood before
+      her, and hid her face in an agony of shame and terror on his knees.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Forgive me,&rdquo; she sobbed. &ldquo;Pray do not expose me! Do not destroy me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Unhappy young lady,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;did you think you had deceived me, or that
+      you are fit to deceive any but the blind? Your face, your anguish after
+      Colonel Dujardin&rsquo;s departure, your languor, and then your sudden
+      robustness, your appetite, your caprices, your strange sojourn at Frejus,
+      your changed looks and loss of health on your return! Josephine, your old
+      friend has passed many an hour thinking of you, divining your folly,
+      following your trouble step by step. Yet you never invited him to aid
+      you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine faltered out a lame excuse. If she had revered him less she
+      could have borne to confess to him. She added it would be a relief to her
+      to confide in him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then tell me all,&rdquo; said he.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She consented almost eagerly, and told him&mdash;nearly all. The old man
+      was deeply affected. He murmured in a broken voice, &ldquo;Your story is the
+      story of your sex, self-sacrifice, first to your mother, then to Camille,
+      now to your husband.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And he is well worthy of any sacrifice I can make,&rdquo; said Josephine. &ldquo;But
+      oh, how hard it is to live!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I hope to make it less hard to you ere long,&rdquo; said the doctor quietly. He
+      then congratulated himself on having forced Josephine to confide in him.
+      &ldquo;For,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;you never needed an experienced friend more than at this
+      moment. Your mother will not always be so blind as of late. Edouard is
+      suspicious. Jacintha is a shrewd young woman, and very inquisitive.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine was not at the end of her concealments: she was ashamed to let
+      him know she had made a confidant of Jacintha and not of him. She held her
+      peace.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then,&rdquo; continued Aubertin, &ldquo;there is the terrible chance of Raynal&rsquo;s
+      return. But ere I take on me to advise you, what are your own plans?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t know,&rdquo; said Josephine helplessly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You&mdash;don&rsquo;t&mdash;know!&rdquo; cried the doctor, looking at her in utter
+      amazement.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is the answer of a mad woman, is it not? Doctor, I am little better.
+      My foot has slipped on the edge of a precipice. I close my eyes, and let
+      myself glide down it. What will become of me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;All shall be well,&rdquo; said Aubertin, &ldquo;provided you do not still love that
+      man.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine did not immediately reply: her thoughts turned inwards. The good
+      doctor was proceeding to congratulate her on being cured of a fatal
+      passion, when she stopped him with wonder in her face. &ldquo;Not love him! How
+      can I help loving him? I was his betrothed. I wronged him in my thoughts.
+      War, prison, anguish, could not kill him; he loved me so. He struggled
+      bleeding to my feet; and could I let him die, after all? Could I be
+      crueller than prison, and torture, and despair?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The doctor sighed deeply; but, arming himself with the necessary
+      resolution, he sternly replied, &ldquo;A woman of your name cannot vacillate
+      between love and honor; such vacillations have but one end. I will not let
+      you drift a moral wreck between passion and virtue; and that is what it
+      will come to if you hesitate now.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hesitate! Who can say I have hesitated where my honor was concerned? You
+      can read our bodies then, but not our hearts. What! you see me so pale,
+      forlorn, and dead, and that does not tell you I have bid Camille farewell
+      forever? That we might be safer still I have not even told him he is a
+      father: was ever woman so cruel as I am? I have written him but one
+      letter, and in that I must deceive him. I told him I thought I might one
+      day be happy, if I could hear that he did not give way to despair. I told
+      him we must never meet again in this world. So now come what will: show me
+      my duty and I will do it. This endless deceit burns my heart. Shall I tell
+      my husband? It will be but one pang more, one blush more for me. But my
+      mother!&rdquo; and, thus appealed to, Dr. Aubertin felt, for the first time, all
+      the difficulty of the situation he had undertaken to cure. He hesitated,
+      he was embarrassed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah,&rdquo; said Josephine, &ldquo;you see.&rdquo; Then, after a short silence, she said
+      despairingly, &ldquo;This is my only hope: that poor Raynal will be long absent,
+      and that ere he returns mamma will lie safe from sorrow and shame in the
+      little chapel. Doctor, when a woman of my age forms such wishes as these,
+      I think you might pity her, and forgive her ill-treatment of you, for she
+      cannot be very happy. Ah me! ah me! ah me!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Courage, poor soul! All is now in my hands, and I will save you,&rdquo; said
+      the doctor, his voice trembling in spite of him. &ldquo;Guilt lies in the
+      intention. A more innocent woman than you does not breathe. Two courses
+      lay open to you: to leave this house with Camille Dujardin, or to dismiss
+      him, and live for your hard duty till it shall please Heaven to make that
+      duty easy (no middle course was tenable for a day); of these two paths you
+      chose the right one, and, having chosen, I really think you are not called
+      on to reveal your misfortune, and make those unhappy to whose happiness
+      you have sacrificed your own for years to come.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Forever,&rdquo; said Josephine quietly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The young use that word lightly. The old have almost ceased to use it.
+      They have seen how few earthly things can conquer time.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He resumed, &ldquo;You think only of others, Josephine, but I shall think of you
+      as well. I shall not allow your life to be wasted in a needless struggle
+      against nature.&rdquo; Then turning to Rose, who had glided into the room, and
+      stood amazed, &ldquo;Her griefs were as many before her child was born, yet her
+      health stood firm. Why? because nature was on her side. Now she is sinking
+      into the grave. Why? because she is defying nature. Nature intended her to
+      be pressing her child to her bosom day and night; instead of that, a
+      peasant woman at Frejus nurses the child, and the mother pines at
+      Beaurepaire.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At this, Josephine leaned her face on her hands on the doctor&rsquo;s shoulder.
+      In this attitude she murmured to him, &ldquo;I have never seen him since I left
+      Frejus.&rdquo; Dr. Aubertin sighed for her. Emboldened by this, she announced
+      her intention of going to Frejus the very next day to see her little
+      Henri. But to this Dr. Aubertin demurred. &ldquo;What, another journey to
+      Frejus?&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;when the first has already roused Edouard&rsquo;s suspicions;
+      I can never consent to that.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Then Josephine surprised them both. She dropped her coaxing voice and
+      pecked the doctor like an irritated pigeon. &ldquo;Take care,&rdquo; said she, &ldquo;don&rsquo;t
+      be too cruel to me. You see I am obedient, resigned. I have given up all I
+      lived for: but if I am never to have my little boy&rsquo;s arms round me to
+      console me, then&mdash;why torment me any longer? Why not say to me,
+      &lsquo;Josephine, you have offended Heaven; pray for pardon, and die&rsquo;?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Then the doctor was angry in his turn. &ldquo;Oh, go then,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;go to
+      Frejus; you will have Edouard Riviere for a companion this time. Your
+      first visit roused his suspicions. So before you go tell your mother all;
+      for since she is sure to find it out, she had better hear it from you than
+      from another.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Doctor, have pity on me,&rdquo; said Josephine.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have no heart,&rdquo; said Rose. &ldquo;She shall see him though, in spite of
+      you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, yes! he has a heart,&rdquo; said Josephine: &ldquo;he is my best friend. He will
+      let me see my boy.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      All this, and the tearful eyes and coaxing yet trembling voice, was hard
+      to resist. But Aubertin saw clearly, and stood firm. He put his
+      handkerchief to his eyes a moment: then took the pining young mother&rsquo;s
+      hand. &ldquo;And, do you think,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;I do not pity you and love your boy?
+      Ah! he will never want a father whilst I live; and from this moment he is
+      under my care. I will go to see him; I will bring you news, and all in
+      good time; I will place him where you shall visit him without imprudence;
+      but, for the present, trust a wiser head than yours or Rose&rsquo;s; and give me
+      your sacred promise not to go to Frejus.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Weighed down by his good-sense and kindness, Josephine resisted no longer
+      in words. She just lifted her hands in despair and began to cry. It was so
+      piteous, Aubertin was ready to yield in turn, and consent to any
+      imprudence, when he met with an unexpected ally.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Promise,&rdquo; said Rose, doggedly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine looked at her calmly through her tears.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Promise, dear,&rdquo; repeated Rose, and this time with an intonation so fine
+      that it attracted Josephine&rsquo;s notice, but not the doctor&rsquo;s. It was
+      followed by a glance equally subtle.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I promise,&rdquo; said Josephine, with her eye fixed inquiringly on her sister.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      For once she could not make the telegraph out: but she could see it was
+      playing, and that was enough. She did what Rose bid her; she promised not
+      to go to Frejus without leave.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Finding her so submissive all of a sudden, he went on to suggest that she
+      must not go kissing every child she saw. &ldquo;Edouard tells me he saw you
+      kissing a beggar&rsquo;s brat. The young rogue was going to quiz you about it at
+      the dinner-table; luckily, he told me his intention, and I would not let
+      him. I said the baroness would be annoyed with you for descending from
+      your dignity&mdash;and exposing a noble family to fleas&mdash;hush! here
+      he is.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tiresome!&rdquo; muttered Rose, &ldquo;just when&rdquo;&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Edouard came forward with a half-vexed face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      However, he turned it off into play. &ldquo;What have you been saying to her,
+      monsieur, to interest her so? Give me a leaf out of your book. I need it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The doctor was taken aback for a moment, but at last he said slyly, &ldquo;I
+      have been proposing to her to name the day. She says she must consult you
+      before she decides that.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, you wicked doctor!&mdash;and consult HIM of all people!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So be off, both of you, and don&rsquo;t reappear before me till it is settled.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Edouard&rsquo;s eyes sparkled. Rose went out with a face as red as fire.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was a balmy evening. Edouard was to leave them for a week the next day.
+      They were alone: Rose was determined he should go away quite happy.
+      Everything was in Edouard&rsquo;s favor: he pleaded his cause warmly: she
+      listened tenderly: this happy evening her piquancy and archness seemed to
+      dissolve into tenderness as she and Edouard walked hand in hand under the
+      moon: a tenderness all the more heavenly to her devoted lover, that she
+      was not one of those angels who cloy a man by invariable sweetness.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      For a little while she forgot everything but her companion. In that soft
+      hour he won her to name the day, after her fashion.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Josephine goes to Paris with the doctor in about three weeks,&rdquo; murmured
+      she.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And you will stay behind, all alone?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Alone? that shall depend on you, monsieur.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      On this Edouard caught her for the first time in his arms.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She made a faint resistance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Seal me that promise, sweet one!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No! no!&mdash;there!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He pressed a delicious first kiss upon two velvet lips that in their
+      innocence scarcely shunned the sweet attack.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      For all that, the bond was no sooner sealed after this fashion, than the
+      lady&rsquo;s cheek began to burn.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Suppose we go in NOW?&rdquo; said she, dryly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, not yet.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is late, dear Edouard.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And with these words something returned to her mind with its full force:
+      something that Edouard had actually made her forget. She wanted to get rid
+      of him now.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Edouard,&rdquo; said she, &ldquo;can you get up early in the morning? If you can,
+      meet me here to-morrow before any of them are up; then we can talk without
+      interruption.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Edouard was delighted.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Eight o&rsquo;clock?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sooner if you like. Mamma bade me come and read to her in her room
+      to-night. She will be waiting for me. Is it not tiresome?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, it is.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, we must not mind that, dear; in three weeks&rsquo; time we are to have
+      too much of one another, you know, instead of too little.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Too much! I shall never have enough of you. I shall hate the night which
+      will rob me of the sight of you for so many hours in the twenty-four.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If you can&rsquo;t see me, perhaps you may hear me; my tongue runs by night as
+      well as by day.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, that is a comfort,&rdquo; said Edouard, gravely. &ldquo;Yes, little quizzer, I
+      would rather hear you scold than an angel sing. Judge, then, what music it
+      is when you say you love me!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I love you, Edouard.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Edouard kissed her hand warmly, and then looked irresolutely at her face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, no!&rdquo; said she, laughing and blushing. &ldquo;How rude you are. Next time we
+      meet.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That is a bargain. But I won&rsquo;t go till you say you love me again.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Edouard, don&rsquo;t be silly. I am ashamed of saying the same thing so often&mdash;I
+      won&rsquo;t say it any more. What is the use? You know I love you. There, I HAVE
+      said it: how stupid!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Adieu, then, my wife that is to be.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Adieu! dear Edouard.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My hus&mdash;go on&mdash;my hus&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My huswife that shall be.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Then they walked very slowly towards the house, and once more Rose left
+      quizzing, and was all tenderness.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Will you not come in, and bid them &lsquo;good-night&rsquo;?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, my own; I am in heaven. Common faces&mdash;common voices would bring
+      me down to earth. Let me be alone;&mdash;your sweet words ringing in my
+      ear. I will dilute you with nothing meaner than the stars. See how bright
+      they shine in heaven; but not so bright as you shine in my heart.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dear Edouard, you flatter me, you spoil me. Alas! why am I not more
+      worthy of your love?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;More worthy! How can that be?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose sighed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But I will atone for all. I will make you a better&mdash;(here she
+      substituted a full stop for a substantive)&mdash;than you expect. You will
+      see else.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She lingered at the door: a proof that if Edouard, at that particular
+      moment, had seized another kiss, there would have been no very violent
+      opposition or offence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But he was not so impudent as some. He had been told to wait till the next
+      meeting for that. He prayed Heaven to bless her, and so the affianced
+      lovers parted for the night.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was about nine o&rsquo;clock. Edouard, instead of returning to his lodgings,
+      started down towards the town, to conclude a bargain with the innkeeper
+      for an English mare he was in treaty for. He wanted her for to-morrow&rsquo;s
+      work; so that decided him to make the purchase. In purchases, as in other
+      matters, a feather turns the balanced scale. He sauntered leisurely down.
+      It was a very clear night; the full moon and the stars shining silvery and
+      vivid. Edouard&rsquo;s heart swelled with joy. He was loved after all, deeply
+      loved; and in three short weeks he was actually to be Rose&rsquo;s husband: her
+      lord and master. How like a heavenly dream it all seemed&mdash;the first
+      hopeless courtship, and now the wedding fixed! But it was no dream; he
+      felt her soft words still murmur music at his heart, and the shadow of her
+      velvet lips slept upon his own.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He had strolled about a league when he heard the ring of a horse&rsquo;s hoofs
+      coming towards him, accompanied by a clanking noise; it came nearer and
+      nearer, till it reached a hill that lay a little ahead of Edouard; then
+      the sounds ceased; the cavalier was walking his horse up the hill.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Presently, as if they had started from the earth, up popped between
+      Edouard and the sky, first a cocked hat that seemed in that light to be
+      cut with a razor out of flint; then the wearer, phosphorescent here and
+      there; so brightly the keen moonlight played on his epaulets and steel
+      scabbard. A step or two nearer, and Edouard gave a great shout; it was
+      Colonel Raynal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      After the first warm greeting, and questions and answers, Raynal told him
+      he was on his way to the Rhine with despatches.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To the Rhine?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am allowed six days to get there. I made a calculation, and found I
+      could give Beaurepaire half a day. I shall have to make up for it by hard
+      riding. You know me; always in a hurry. It is Bonaparte&rsquo;s fault this time.
+      He is always in a hurry too.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, colonel,&rdquo; said Edouard, &ldquo;let us make haste then. Mind they go early
+      to rest at the chateau.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But you are not coming my way, youngster?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not coming your way? Yes, but I am. Yours is a face I don&rsquo;t see every
+      day, colonel; besides I would not miss THEIR faces, especially the
+      baroness&rsquo;s and Madame Raynal&rsquo;s, at sight of you; and, besides,&rdquo;&mdash;and
+      the young gentleman chuckled to himself, and thought of Rose&rsquo;s words, &ldquo;the
+      next time we meet;&rdquo; well, this will be the next time. &ldquo;May I jump up
+      behind?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Colonel Raynal nodded assent. Edouard took a run, and lighted like a
+      monkey on the horse&rsquo;s crupper. He pranced and kicked at this unexpected
+      addition; but the spur being promptly applied to his flanks, he bounded
+      off with a snort that betrayed more astonishment than satisfaction, and
+      away they cantered to Beaurepaire, without drawing rein.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There,&rdquo; said Edouard, &ldquo;I was afraid they would be gone to bed; and they
+      are. The very house seems asleep&mdash;fancy&mdash;at half-past ten.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That is a pity,&rdquo; said Raynal, &ldquo;for this chateau is the stronghold of
+      etiquette. They will be two hours dressing before they will come out and
+      shake hands. I must put my horse into the stable. Go you and give the
+      alarm.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I will, colonel. Stop, first let me see whether none of them are up,
+      after all.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And Edouard walked round the chateau, and soon discovered a light at one
+      window, the window of the tapestried room. Running round the other way he
+      came slap upon another light: this one was nearer the ground. A narrow but
+      massive door, which he had always seen not only locked but screwed up, was
+      wide open; and through the aperture the light of a candle streamed out and
+      met the moonlight streaming in.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hallo!&rdquo; cried Edouard.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He stopped, turned, and looked in.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hallo!&rdquo; he cried again much louder.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A young woman was sleeping with her feet in the silvery moonlight, and her
+      head in the orange-colored blaze of a flat candle, which rested on the
+      next step above of a fine stone staircase, whose existence was now first
+      revealed to the inquisitive Edouard.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Coming plump upon all this so unexpectedly, he quite started.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, Jacintha!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He touched her on the shoulder to wake her. No. Jacintha was sleeping as
+      only tired domestics can sleep. He might have taken the candle and burnt
+      her gown off her back. She had found a step that fitted into the small of
+      her back, and another that supported her head, and there she was fast as a
+      door.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At this moment Raynal&rsquo;s voice was heard calling him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There is a light in that bedroom.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is not a bedroom, colonel; it is our sitting-room now. We shall find
+      them all there, or at least the young ladies; and perhaps the doctor. The
+      baroness goes to bed early. Meantime I can show you one of our dramatis
+      personae, and an important one too. She rules the roost.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He took him mysteriously and showed him Jacintha.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Moonlight by itself seems white, and candlelight by itself seems yellow;
+      but when the two come into close contrast at night, candle turns a reddish
+      flame, and moonlight a bluish gleam.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      So Jacintha, with her shoes in this celestial sheen, and her face in that
+      demoniacal glare, was enough to knock the gazer&rsquo;s eye out.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Make a good sentinel&mdash;this one,&rdquo; said Raynal&mdash;&ldquo;an outlying
+      picket for instance, on rough ground, in front of the enemy&rsquo;s riflemen.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ha! ha! colonel! Let us see where this staircase leads. I have an idea it
+      will prove a short cut.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Where to?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To the saloon, or somewhere, or else to some of Jacintha&rsquo;s haunts. Serve
+      her right for going to sleep at the mouth of her den.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Forward then&mdash;no, halt! Suppose it leads to the bedrooms? Mind this
+      is a thundering place for ceremony. We shall get drummed out of the
+      barracks if we don&rsquo;t mind our etiquette.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At this they hesitated; and Edouard himself thought, on the whole, it
+      would be better to go and hammer at the front door.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Now while they hesitated, a soft delicious harmony of female voices
+      suddenly rose, and seemed to come and run round the walls. The men looked
+      at one another in astonishment; for the effect was magical. The staircase
+      being enclosed on all sides with stone walls and floored with stone, they
+      were like flies inside a violoncello; the voices rang above, below, and on
+      every side of the vibrating walls. In some epochs spirits as hardy as
+      Raynal&rsquo;s, and wits as quick as Riviere&rsquo;s, would have fled then and there
+      to the nearest public, and told over cups how they had heard the dames of
+      Beaurepaire, long since dead, holding their revel, and the conscious old
+      devil&rsquo;s nest of a chateau quivering to the ghostly strains.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But this was an incredulous age. They listened, and listened, and decided
+      the sounds came from up-stairs.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Let us mount, and surprise these singing witches,&rdquo; said Edouard.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Surprise them! what for? It is not the enemy&mdash;for once. What is the
+      good of surprising our friends?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Storming parties and surprises were no novelty and therefore no treat to
+      Raynal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It will be so delightful to see their faces at first sight of you. O
+      colonel, for my sake! Don&rsquo;t spoil it by going tamely in at the front door,
+      after coming at night from Egypt for half an hour.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Raynal grumbled something about its being a childish trick; but to please
+      Edouard consented at last; only stipulated for a light: &ldquo;or else,&rdquo; said
+      he, &ldquo;we shall surprise ourselves instead with a broken neck, going over
+      ground we don&rsquo;t know to surprise the natives&mdash;our skirmishers got
+      nicked that way now and then in Egypt.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, colonel, I will go first with Jacintha&rsquo;s candle.&rdquo; Edouard mounted
+      the stairs on tiptoe. Raynal followed. The solid stone steps did not
+      prate. The men had mounted a considerable way, when puff a blast of wind
+      came through a hole, and out went Edouard&rsquo;s candle. He turned sharply
+      round to Raynal. &ldquo;Peste!&rdquo; said he in a vicious whisper. But the other laid
+      his hand on his shoulder and whispered, &ldquo;Look to the front.&rdquo; He looked,
+      and, his own candle being out, saw a glimmer on ahead. He crept towards
+      it. It was a taper shooting a feeble light across a small aperture. They
+      caught a glimpse of what seemed to be a small apartment. Yet Edouard
+      recognized the carpet of the tapestried room&mdash;which was a very large
+      room. Creeping a yard nearer, he discovered that it was the tapestried
+      room, and that what had seemed the further wall was only the screen,
+      behind which were lights, and two women singing a duet.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He whispered to Raynal, &ldquo;It is the tapestried room.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is it a sitting-room?&rdquo; whispered Raynal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes! yes! Mind and not knock your foot against the wood.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And Raynal went softly up and put his foot quietly through the aperture,
+      which he now saw was made by a panel drawn back close to the ground; and
+      stood in the tapestried chamber. The carpet was thick; the voices favored
+      the stealthy advance; the floor of the old house was like a rock; and
+      Edouard put his face through the aperture, glowing all over with
+      anticipation of the little scream of joy that would welcome his friend
+      dropping in so nice and suddenly from Egypt.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The feeling was rendered still more piquant by a sharp curiosity that had
+      been growing on him for some minutes past. For why was this passage opened
+      to-night?&mdash;he had never seen it opened before. And why was Jacintha
+      lying sentinel at the foot of the stairs?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But this was not all. Now that they were in the room both men became
+      conscious of another sound besides the ladies&rsquo; voices&mdash;a very
+      peculiar sound. It also came from behind the screen. They both heard it,
+      and showed, by the puzzled looks they cast at one another, that neither
+      could make out what on earth it was. It consisted of a succession of
+      little rustles, followed by little thumps on the floor.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But what was curious, too, this rustle, thump&mdash;rustle, thump&mdash;fell
+      exactly into the time of the music; so that, clearly, either the rustle
+      thump was being played to the tune, or the tune sung to the rustle thump.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      This last touch of mystery inflamed Edouard&rsquo;s impatience beyond bearing:
+      he pointed eagerly and merrily to the corner of the screen. Raynal obeyed,
+      and stepped very slowly and cautiously towards it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rustle, thump! rustle, thump! rustle, thump! with the rhythm of harmonious
+      voices.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Edouard got his head and foot into the room without taking his eye off
+      Raynal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rustle, thump! rustle, thump! rustle, thump!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Raynal was now at the screen, and quietly put his head round it, and his
+      hand upon it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Edouard was bursting with expectation.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      No result. What is this? Don&rsquo;t they see him? Why does he not speak to
+      them? He seems transfixed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rustle, thump! rustle, thump; accompanied now for a few notes by one voice
+      only, Rose&rsquo;s.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Suddenly there burst a shriek from Josephine, so loud, so fearful, that it
+      made even Raynal stagger back a step, the screen in his hand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then another scream of terror and anguish from Rose. Then a fainter cry,
+      and the heavy helpless fall of a human body.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Raynal sprang forward whirling the screen to the earth in terrible
+      agitation, and Edouard bounded over it as it fell at his feet. He did not
+      take a second step. The scene that caught his eye stupefied and paralyzed
+      him in full career, and froze him to the spot with amazement and strange
+      misgivings.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0019" id="link2HCH0019">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XIX.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      To return for a moment to Rose. She parted from Edouard, and went in at
+      the front door: but the next moment she opened it softly and watched her
+      lover unseen. &ldquo;Dear Edouard!&rdquo; she murmured: and then she thought, &ldquo;how sad
+      it is that I must deceive him, even to-night: must make up an excuse to
+      get him from me, when we were so happy together. Ah! he little knows how I
+      shall welcome our wedding-day. When once I can see my poor martyr on the
+      road to peace and content under the good doctor&rsquo;s care. And oh! the
+      happiness of having no more secrets from him I love! Dear Edouard! when
+      once we are married, I never, never, will have a secret from you again&mdash;I
+      swear it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      As a comment on these words she now stepped cautiously out, and peered in
+      every direction.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;St&mdash;st!&rdquo; she whispered. No answer came to this signal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose returned into the house and bolted the door inside. She went up to
+      the tapestried room, and found the doctor in the act of wishing Josephine
+      good-night. The baroness, fatigued a little by her walk, had mounted no
+      higher than her own bedroom, which was on the first floor just under the
+      tapestried room. Rose followed the doctor out. &ldquo;Dear friend, one word.
+      Josephine talked of telling Raynal. You have not encouraged her to do
+      that?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Certainly not, while he is in Egypt.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Still less on his return. Doctor, you don&rsquo;t know that man. Josephine does
+      not know him. But I do. He would kill her if he knew. He would kill her
+      that minute. He would not wait: he would not listen to excuses: he is a
+      man of iron. Or if he spared her he would kill Camille: and that would
+      destroy her by the cruellest of all deaths! My friend, I am a wicked,
+      miserable girl. I am the cause of all this misery!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She then told Aubertin all about the anonymous letter, and what Raynal had
+      said to her in consequence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He never would have married her had he known she loved another. He asked
+      me was it so. I told him a falsehood. At least I equivocated, and to
+      equivocate with one so loyal and simple was to deceive him. I am the only
+      sinner: that sweet angel is the only sufferer. Is this the justice of
+      Heaven? Doctor, my remorse is great. No one knows what I feel when I look
+      at my work. Edouard thinks I love her so much better than I do him. He is
+      wrong: it is not love only, it is pity: it is remorse for the sorrow I
+      have brought on her, and the wrong I have done poor Raynal.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The high-spirited girl was greatly agitated: and Aubertin, though he did
+      not acquit her of all blame, soothed her, and made excuses for her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We must not always judge by results,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;Things turned
+      unfortunately. You did for the best. I forgive you for one. That is, I
+      will forgive you if you promise not to act again without my advice.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, never! never!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And, above all, no imprudence about that child. In three little weeks
+      they will be together without risk of discovery. Well, you don&rsquo;t answer
+      me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose&rsquo;s blood turned cold. &ldquo;Dear friend,&rdquo; she stammered, &ldquo;I quite agree
+      with you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Promise, then.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not to let Josephine go to Frejus?&rdquo; said Rose hastily. &ldquo;Oh, yes! I
+      promise.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are a good girl,&rdquo; said Aubertin. &ldquo;You have a will of your own. But
+      you can submit to age and experience.&rdquo; The doctor then kissed her, and
+      bade her farewell.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I leave for Paris at six in the morning,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;I will not try your
+      patience or hers unnecessarily. Perhaps it will not be three weeks ere she
+      sees her child under her friend&rsquo;s roof.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The moment Rose was alone, she sat down and sighed bitterly. &ldquo;There is no
+      end to it,&rdquo; she sobbed despairingly. &ldquo;It is like a spider&rsquo;s web: every
+      struggle to be free but multiplies the fine yet irresistible thread that
+      seems to bind me. And to-night I thought to be so happy; instead of that,
+      he has left me scarce the heart to do what I have to do.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She went back to the room, opened a window, and put out a white
+      handkerchief, then closed the window down on it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then she went to Josephine&rsquo;s bedroom-door: it opened on the tapestried
+      room.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Josephine,&rdquo; she cried, &ldquo;don&rsquo;t go to bed just yet.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, love. What are you doing? I want to talk to you. Why did you say
+      promise? and what did you mean by looking at me so? Shall I come out to
+      you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not just yet,&rdquo; said Rose; she then glided into the corridor, and passed
+      her mother&rsquo;s room and the doctor&rsquo;s, and listened to see if all was quiet.
+      While she was gone Josephine opened her door; but not seeing Rose in the
+      sitting-room, retired again.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose returned softly, and sat down with her head in her hand, in a calm
+      attitude belied by her glancing eye, and the quick tapping of her other
+      hand upon the table.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Presently she raised her head quickly; a sound had reached her ear,&mdash;a
+      sound so slight that none but a high-strung ear could have caught it. It
+      was like a mouse giving a single scratch against a stone wall.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose coughed slightly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      On this a clearer sound was heard, as of a person scratching wood with the
+      finger-nail. Rose darted to the side of the room, pressed against the
+      wall, and at the same time put her other hand against the rim of one of
+      the panels and pushed it laterally; it yielded, and at the opening stood
+      Jacintha in her cloak and bonnet.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said Jacintha, &ldquo;under my cloak&mdash;look!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah! you found the things on the steps?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes! I nearly tumbled over them. Have you locked that door?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, but I will.&rdquo; And Rose glided to the door and locked it. Then she put
+      the screen up between Josephine&rsquo;s room and the open panel: then she and
+      Jacintha were wonderfully busy on the other side the screen, but presently
+      Rose said, &ldquo;This is imprudent; you must go down to the foot of the stairs
+      and wait till I call you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Jacintha pleaded hard against this arrangement, and represented that there
+      was no earthly chance of any one coming to that part of the chateau.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No matter; I will be guarded on every side.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mustn&rsquo;t I stop and just see her happy for once?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, my poor Jacintha, you must hear it from my lips.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Jacintha retired to keep watch as she was bid. Rose went to Josephine&rsquo;s
+      room, and threw her arms round her neck and kissed her vehemently.
+      Josephine returned her embrace, then held her out at arm&rsquo;s length and
+      looked at her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your eyes are red, yet your little face is full of joy. There, you
+      smile.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I can&rsquo;t help that; I am so happy.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am glad of it. Are you coming to bed?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not yet. I invite you to take a little walk with me first. Come!&rdquo; and she
+      led the way slowly, looking back with infinite archness and tenderness.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You almost frighten me,&rdquo; said Josephine; &ldquo;it is not like you to be all
+      joy when I am sad. Three whole weeks more!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That is it. Why are you sad? because the doctor would not let you go to
+      Frejus. And why am I not sad? because I had already thought of a way to
+      let you see Edouard without going so far.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Rose! O Rose! O Rose!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This way&mdash;come!&rdquo; and she smiled and beckoned with her finger, while
+      Josephine followed like one under a spell, her bosom heaving, her eye
+      glancing on every side, hoping some strange joy, yet scarce daring to
+      hope.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose drew back the screen, and there was a sweet little berceau that had
+      once been Josephine&rsquo;s own, and in it, sunk deep in snow-white lawn, was a
+      sleeping child, that lay there looking as a rose might look could it fall
+      upon new-fallen snow.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At sight of it Josephine uttered a little cry, not loud but deep&mdash;ay,
+      a cry to bring tears into the eye of the hearer, and she stood trembling
+      from head to foot, her hands clasped, and her eye fascinated and fixed on
+      the cradle.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My child under this roof! What have you done?&rdquo; but her eye, fascinated
+      and fixed, never left the cradle.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I saw you languishing, dying, for want of him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, if anybody should come?&rdquo; But her eye never stirred an inch from the
+      cradle.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, no, no! the door is locked. Jacintha watches below; there is no dan&mdash;Ah,
+      oh, poor sister!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      For, as Rose was speaking, the young mother sprang silently upon her
+      child. You would have thought she was going to kill him; her head reared
+      itself again and again like a crested snake&rsquo;s, and again and again and
+      again and again plunged down upon the child, and she kissed his little
+      body from head to foot with soft violence, and murmured, through her
+      streaming tears, &ldquo;My child! my darling! my angel! oh, my poor boy! my
+      child! my child!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      I will ask my female readers of every degree to tell their brothers and
+      husbands all the young noble did: how she sat on the floor, and had her
+      child on her bosom; how she smiled over it through her tears; how she
+      purred over it; how she, the stately one, lisped and prattled over it; and
+      how life came pouring into her heart from it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Before she had had it in her arms five minutes, her pale cheek was as red
+      as a rose, and her eyes brighter than diamonds.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Bless you, Rose! bless you! bless you! in one moment you have made me
+      forget all I ever suffered in my life.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There is a cold draught,&rdquo; cried she presently, with maternal anxiety;
+      &ldquo;close the panel, Rose.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, dear; or I could not call to Jacintha, or she to me; but I will shift
+      the screen round between him and the draught. There, now, come to his aunt&mdash;a
+      darling!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Then Rose sat on the floor too, and Josephine put her boy on aunt&rsquo;s lap,
+      and took a distant view of him. But she could not bear so vast a
+      separation long. She must have him to her bosom again.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Presently my lord, finding himself hugged, opened his eyes, and, as a
+      natural consequence, his mouth.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, that will never do,&rdquo; cried Rose, and they put him back in the cradle
+      with all expedition, and began to rock it. Young master was not to be
+      altogether appeased even by that. So Rose began singing an old-fashioned
+      Breton chant or lullaby.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine sang with her, and, singing, watched with a smile her boy drop
+      off by degrees to sleep under the gentle motion and the lulling song. They
+      sang and rocked till the lids came creeping down, and hid the great blue
+      eyes; but still they sang and rocked, lulling the boy, and gladdening
+      their own hearts; for the quaint old Breton ditty was tunable as the lark
+      that carols over the green wheat in April; and the words so simple and
+      motherly, that a nation had taken them to heart. Such songs bind ages
+      together and make the lofty and the low akin by the great ties of music
+      and the heart. Many a Breton peasant&rsquo;s bosom in the olden time had gushed
+      over her sleeping boy as the young dame&rsquo;s of Beaurepaire gushed now&mdash;in
+      this quaint, tuneful lullaby.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Now, as they kneeled over the cradle, one on each side, and rocked it, and
+      sang that ancient chant, Josephine, who was opposite the screen, happening
+      to raise her eyes, saw a strange thing.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      There was the face of a man set close against the side of the screen, and
+      peeping and peering out of the gloom. The light of her candle fell full on
+      this face; it glared at her, set pale, wonder-struck, and vivid in the
+      surrounding gloom.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Horror! It was her husband&rsquo;s face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At first she was quite stupefied, and looked at it with soul and senses
+      benumbed. Then she trembled, and put her hand to her eyes; for she thought
+      it a phantom or a delusion of the mind. No: there it glared still. Then
+      she trembled violently, and held out her left hand, the fingers working
+      convulsively, to Rose, who was still singing.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But, at the same moment, the mouth of this face suddenly opened in a
+      long-drawn breath. At this, Josephine uttered a violent shriek, and sprang
+      to her feet, with her right hand quivering and pointing at that pale face
+      set in the dark.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose started up, and, wheeling her head round, saw Raynal&rsquo;s gloomy face
+      looking over her shoulder. She fell screaming upon her knees, and, almost
+      out of her senses, began to pray wildly and piteously for mercy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine uttered one more cry, but this was the faint cry of nature,
+      sinking under the shock of terror. She swooned dead away, and fell
+      senseless on the floor ere Raynal could debarrass himself of the screen,
+      and get to her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      This, then, was the scene that met Edouard&rsquo;s eyes. His affianced bride on
+      her knees, white as a ghost, trembling, and screaming, rather than crying,
+      for mercy. And Raynal standing over his wife, showing by the working of
+      his iron features that he doubted whether she was worthy he should raise
+      her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      One would have thought nothing could add to the terror of this scene. Yet
+      it was added to. The baroness rang her bell violently in the room below.
+      She had heard Josephine&rsquo;s scream and fall.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At the ringing of this shrill bell Rose shuddered like a maniac, and
+      grovelled on her knees to Raynal, and seized his very knees and implored
+      him to show some pity.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;O sir! kill us! we are culpable&rdquo;&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Dring! dring! dring! dring! dring! pealed the baroness&rsquo;s bell again.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But do not tell our mother. Oh, if you are a man! do not! do not! Show us
+      some pity. We are but women. Mercy! mercy! mercy!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Speak out then,&rdquo; groaned Raynal. &ldquo;What does this mean? Why has my wife
+      swooned at sight of me?&mdash;whose is this child?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Whose?&rdquo; stammered Rose. Till he said that, she never thought there COULD
+      be a doubt whose child.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Dring! dring! dring! dring! dring!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, my God!&rdquo; cried the poor girl, and her scared eyes glanced every way
+      like some wild creature looking for a hole, however small, to escape by.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Edouard, seeing her hesitation, came down on her other side. &ldquo;Whose is the
+      child, Rose?&rdquo; said he sternly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You, too? Why were we born? mercy! oh! pray let me go to my sister.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Dring! dring! dring! dring! dring! went the terrible bell.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The men were excited to fury by Rose&rsquo;s hesitation; they each seized an
+      arm, and tore her screaming with fear at their violence, from her knees up
+      to her feet between them with a single gesture.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Whose is the child?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You hurt me!&rdquo; said she bitterly to Edouard, and she left crying and was
+      terribly calm and sullen all in a moment.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Whose is the child?&rdquo; roared Edouard and Raynal, in one raging breath.
+      &ldquo;Whose is the child?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is mine.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0020" id="link2HCH0020">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XX.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      These were not words; they were electric shocks.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The two arms that gripped Rose&rsquo;s arms were paralyzed, and dropped off
+      them; and there was silence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then first the thought of all she had done with those three words began to
+      rise and grow and surge over her. She stood, her eyes turned downwards,
+      yet inwards, and dilating with horror.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Silence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Now a mist began to spread over her eyes, and in it she saw indistinctly
+      the figure of Raynal darting to her sister&rsquo;s side, and raising her head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She dared not look round on the other side. She heard feet stagger on the
+      floor. She heard a groan, too; but not a word.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Horrible silence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      With nerves strung to frenzy, and quivering ears, that magnified every
+      sound, she waited for a reproach, a curse; either would have been some
+      little relief. But no! a silence far more terrible.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then a step wavered across the room. Her soul was in her ear. She could
+      hear and feel the step totter, and it shook her as it went. All sounds
+      were trebled to her. Then it struck on the stone step of the staircase,
+      not like a step, but a knell; another step, another and another; down to
+      the very bottom. Each slow step made her head ring and her heart freeze.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At last she heard no more. Then a scream of anguish and recall rose to her
+      lips. She fought it down, for Josephine and Raynal. Edouard was gone. She
+      had but her sister now, the sister she loved better than herself; the
+      sister to save whose life and honor she had this moment sacrificed her
+      own, and all a woman lives for.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She turned, with a wild cry of love and pity, to that sister&rsquo;s side to
+      help her; and when she kneeled down beside her, an iron arm was promptly
+      thrust out between the beloved one and her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This is my care, madame,&rdquo; said Raynal, coldly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      There was no mistaking his manner. The stained one was not to touch his
+      wife.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She looked at him in piteous amazement at his ingratitude. &ldquo;It is well,&rdquo;
+       said she. &ldquo;It is just. I deserve this from you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She said no more, but drooped gently down beside the cradle, and hid her
+      forehead in the clothes beside the child that had brought all this woe,
+      and sobbed bitterly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then honest Raynal began to be sorry for her, in spite of himself. But
+      there was no time for this. Josephine stirred; and, at the same moment, a
+      violent knocking came at the door of the apartment, and the new servant&rsquo;s
+      voice, crying, &ldquo;Ladies, for Heaven&rsquo;s sake, what is the matter? The
+      baroness heard a fall&mdash;she is getting up&mdash;she will be here. What
+      shall I tell her is the matter?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Raynal was going to answer, but Rose, who had started up at the knocking,
+      put her hand in a moment right before his mouth, and ran to the door.
+      &ldquo;There is nothing the matter; tell mamma I am coming down to her
+      directly.&rdquo; She flew back to Raynal in an excitement little short of
+      frenzy. &ldquo;Help me carry her into her own room,&rdquo; cried she imperiously.
+      Raynal obeyed by instinct; for the fiery girl spoke like a general, giving
+      the word of command, with the enemy in front. He carried the true culprit
+      in his arms, and laid her gently on her bed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now put IT out of sight&mdash;take this, quick, man! quick!&rdquo; cried Rose.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Raynal went to the cradle. &ldquo;Ah! my poor girl,&rdquo; said he, as he lifted it in
+      his arms, &ldquo;this is a sorry business; to have to hide your own child from
+      your own mother!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Colonel Raynal,&rdquo; said Rose, &ldquo;do not insult a poor, despairing girl. C&rsquo;est
+      lache.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am silent, young woman,&rdquo; said Raynal, sternly. &ldquo;What is to be done?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Take it down the steps, and give it to Jacintha. Stay, here is a candle;
+      I go to tell mamma you are come; and, Colonel Raynal, I never injured YOU:
+      if you tell my mother you will stab her to the heart, and me, and may the
+      curse of cowards light on you!&mdash;may&rdquo;&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Enough!&rdquo; said Raynal, sternly. &ldquo;Do you take me for a babbling girl? I
+      love your mother better than you do, or this brat of yours would not be
+      here. I shall not bring her gray hairs down with sorrow to the grave. I
+      shall speak of this villany to but one person; and to him I shall talk
+      with this, and not with the idle tongue.&rdquo; And he tapped his sword-hilt
+      with a sombre look of terrible significance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He carried out the cradle. The child slept sweetly through it all.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose darted into Josephine&rsquo;s room, took the key from the inside to the
+      outside, locked the door, put the key in her pocket, and ran down to her
+      mother&rsquo;s room; her knees trembled under her as she went.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Meantime, Jacintha, sleeping tranquilly, suddenly felt her throat griped,
+      and heard a loud voice ring in her ear; then she was lifted, and wrenched,
+      and dropped. She found herself lying clear of the steps in the moonlight;
+      her head was where her feet had been, and her candle out.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She uttered shriek upon shriek, and was too frightened to get up. She
+      thought it was supernatural; some old De Beaurepaire had served her thus
+      for sleeping on her post. A struggle took place between her fidelity and
+      her superstitious fears. Fidelity conquered. Quaking in every limb, she
+      groped up the staircase for her candle.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was gone.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then a still more sickening fear came over her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      What if this was no spirit&rsquo;s work, but a human arm&mdash;a strong one&mdash;some
+      man&rsquo;s arm?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Her first impulse was to dart up the stairs, and make sure that no
+      calamity had befallen through her mistimed drowsiness. But, when she came
+      to try, her dread of the supernatural revived. She could not venture
+      without a light up those stairs, thronged perhaps with angry spirits. She
+      ran to the kitchen. She found the tinderbox, and with trembling hands
+      struck a light. She came back shading it with her shaky hands; and,
+      committing her soul to the care of Heaven, she crept quaking up the
+      stairs. Then she heard voices above, and that restored her more; she
+      mounted more steadily. Presently she stopped, for a heavy step was coming
+      down. It did not sound like a woman&rsquo;s step. It came further down; she
+      turned to fly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Jacintha!&rdquo; said a deep voice, that in this stone cylinder rang like
+      thunder from a tomb.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh! saints and angels save me!&rdquo; yelled Jacintha; and fell on her knees,
+      and hid her head for security; and down went her candlestick clattering on
+      the stone.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t be a fool!&rdquo; said the iron voice. &ldquo;Get up and take this.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She raised her head by slow degrees, shuddering. A man was holding out a
+      cradle to her; the candle he carried lighted up his face; it was Colonel
+      Raynal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She stared at him stupidly, but never moved from her knees, and the candle
+      began to shake violently in her hand, as she herself trembled from head to
+      foot.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then Raynal concluded she was in the plot; but, scorning to reproach a
+      servant, he merely said, &ldquo;Well, what do you kneel there for, gaping at me
+      like that? Take this, I tell you, and carry it out of the house.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He shoved the cradle roughly down into her hands, then turned on his heel
+      without a word.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Jacintha collapsed on the stairs, and the cradle beside her, for all the
+      power was driven out of her body; she could hardly support her own weight,
+      much less the cradle.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She rocked herself, and moaned out, &ldquo;Oh, what&rsquo;s this? oh, what&rsquo;s this?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      A cold perspiration came over her whole frame.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What could this mean? What on earth had happened?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She took up the candle, for it was lying burning and guttering on the
+      stairs; scraped up the grease with the snuffers, and by force of habit
+      tried to polish it clean with a bit of paper that shook between her
+      fingers; she did not know what she was doing. When she recovered her wits,
+      she took the child out of the cradle, and wrapped it carefully in her
+      shawl; then went slowly down the stairs; and holding him close to her
+      bosom, with a furtive eye, and brain confused, and a heart like lead,
+      stole away to the tenantless cottage, where Madame Jouvenel awaited her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Meantime, Rose, with quaking heart, had encountered the baroness. She
+      found her pale and agitated, and her first question was, &ldquo;What is the
+      matter? what have you been all doing over my head?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Darling mother,&rdquo; replied Rose, evasively, &ldquo;something has happened that
+      will rejoice your heart. Somebody has come home.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My son? eh, no! impossible! We cannot be so happy.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He will be with you directly.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The old lady now trembled with joyful agitation.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In five minutes I will bring him to you. Shall you be dressed? I will
+      ring for the girl to help you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But, Rose, the scream, and that terrible fall. Ah! where is Josephine?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Can&rsquo;t you guess, mamma? Oh, the fall was only the screen; they stumbled
+      over it in the dark.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;They! who?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Colonel Raynal, and&mdash;and Edouard. I will tell you, mamma, but don&rsquo;t
+      be angry, or even mention it; they wanted to surprise us. They saw a light
+      burning, and they crept on tiptoe up to the tapestried room, where
+      Josephine and I were, and they did give us a great fright.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What madness!&rdquo; cried the baroness, angrily; &ldquo;and in Josephine&rsquo;s weak
+      state! Such a surprise might have driven her into a fit.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, it was foolish, but let it pass, mamma. Don&rsquo;t speak of it, for he is
+      so sorry about it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Then Rose slipped out, ordered a fire in the salon, and not in the
+      tapestried room, and the next minute was at her sister&rsquo;s door. There she
+      found Raynal knocking, and asking Josephine how she was.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pray leave her to me a moment,&rdquo; said she. &ldquo;I will bring her down to you.
+      Mamma is waiting for you in the salon.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Raynal went down. Rose unlocked the bedroom-door, went in, and, to her
+      horror, found Josephine lying on the floor. She dashed water in her face,
+      and applied every remedy; and at last she came back to life, and its
+      terrors.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Save me, Rose! save me&mdash;he is coming to kill me&mdash;I heard him at
+      the door,&rdquo; and she clung trembling piteously to Rose.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then Rose, seeing her terror, was almost glad at the suicidal falsehood
+      she had told. She comforted and encouraged Josephine and&mdash;deceived
+      her. (This was the climax.)
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;All is well, my poor coward,&rdquo; she cried; &ldquo;your fears are all imaginary;
+      another has owned the child, and the story is believed.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Another! impossible! He would not believe it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He does believe it&mdash;he shall believe it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose then, feeling by no means sure that Josephine, terrified as she was,
+      would consent to let her sister come to shame to screen her, told her
+      boldly that Jacintha had owned herself the mother of the child, and that
+      Raynal&rsquo;s only feeling towards HER was pity, and regret at having so
+      foolishly frightened her, weakened as she was by illness. &ldquo;I told him you
+      had been ill, dear. But how came you on the ground?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I had come to myself; I was on my knees praying. He tapped. I heard his
+      voice. I remember no more. I must have fainted again directly.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose had hard work to make her believe that her guilt, as she called it,
+      was not known; and even then she could not prevail on her to come
+      down-stairs, until she said, &ldquo;If you don&rsquo;t, he will come to you.&rdquo; On that
+      Josephine consented eagerly, and with trembling fingers began to adjust
+      her hair and her dress for the interview.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      All this terrible night Rose fought for her sister. She took her
+      down-stairs to the salon; she put her on the sofa; she sat by her and
+      pressed her hand constantly to give her courage. She told the story of the
+      surprise her own way, before the whole party, including the doctor, to
+      prevent Raynal from being called on to tell it his way. She laughed at
+      Josephine&rsquo;s absurdity, but excused it on account of her feeble health. In
+      short, she threw more and more dust in all their eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But by the time when the rising sun came faintly in and lighted the
+      haggard party, where the deceived were happy, the deceivers wretched, the
+      supernatural strength this young girl had shown was almost exhausted. She
+      felt an hysterical impulse to scream and weep: each minute it became more
+      and more ungovernable. Then came an unexpected turn. Raynal after a long
+      and tiring talk with his mother, as he called her, looked at his watch,
+      and in a characteristic way coolly announced his immediate departure, this
+      being the first hint he had given them that he was not come back for good.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness was thunderstruck.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose and Josephine pressed one another&rsquo;s hands, and had much ado not to
+      utter a loud cry of joy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Raynal explained that he was the bearer of despatches. &ldquo;I must be off: not
+      an hour to lose. Don&rsquo;t fret, mother, I shall soon be back again, if I am
+      not knocked on the head.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Raynal took leave of them all. When it came to Rose&rsquo;s turn, he drew her
+      aside and whispered into her ear, &ldquo;Who is the man?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She started, and seemed dumfounded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tell me, or I ask my wife.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She has promised me not to betray me: I made her swear. Spare me now,
+      brother; I will tell you all when you come back.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That is a bargain: now hear ME swear: he shall marry you, or he shall die
+      by my hand.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He confirmed this by a tremendous oath.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose shuddered, but said nothing, only she thought to herself, &ldquo;I am
+      forewarned. Never shall you know who is the father of that child.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He was no sooner gone than the baroness insisted on knowing what this
+      private communication between him and Rose was about.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh,&rdquo; said Rose, &ldquo;he was only telling me to keep up your courage and
+      Josephine&rsquo;s till he comes back.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      This was the last lie the poor entangled wretch had to tell that morning.
+      The next minute the sisters, exhausted by their terrible struggle, went
+      feebly, with downcast eyes, along the corridor and up the staircase to
+      Josephine&rsquo;s room.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They went hand in hand. They sank down, dressed as they were, on
+      Josephine&rsquo;s bed, and clung to one another and trembled together, till
+      their exhausted natures sank into uneasy slumbers, from which each in turn
+      would wake ever and anon with a convulsive start, and clasp her sister
+      tighter to her breast.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Theirs was a marvellous love. Even a course of deceit had not yet
+      prevailed to separate or chill their sister bosoms. But still in this deep
+      and wonderful love there were degrees: one went a shade deeper than the
+      other now&mdash;ay, since last night. Which? why, she who had sacrificed
+      herself for the other, and dared not tell her, lest the sacrifice should
+      be refused.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was the gray of the morning, and foggy, when Raynal, after taking
+      leave, went to the stable for his horse. At the stable-door he came upon a
+      man sitting doubled up on the very stones of the yard, with his head on
+      his knees. The figure lifted his head, and showed him the face of Edouard
+      Riviere, white and ghastly: his hair lank with the mist, his teeth
+      chattering with cold and misery. The poor wretch had walked frantically
+      all night round and round the chateau, waiting till Raynal should come
+      out. He told him so.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But why didn&rsquo;t you?&mdash;Ah! I see. No! you could not go into the house
+      after that. My poor fellow, there is but one thing for you to do. Turn
+      your back on her, and forget she ever lived; she is dead to you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There is something to be done besides that,&rdquo; said Edouard, gloomily.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Vengeance.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That is my affair, young man. When I come back from the Rhine, she will
+      tell me who her seducer is. She has promised.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And don&rsquo;t you see through that?&rdquo; said Edouard, gnashing his teeth; &ldquo;that
+      is only to gain time: she will never tell you. She is young in years, but
+      old in treachery.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He groaned and was silent a moment, then laying his hand on Raynal&rsquo;s arm
+      said grimly, &ldquo;Thank Heaven, we don&rsquo;t depend on her for information! I know
+      the villain.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Raynal&rsquo;s eyes flashed: &ldquo;Ah! then tell me this moment.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is that scoundrel Dujardin.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dujardin! What do you mean?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I mean that, while you were fighting for France, your house was turned
+      into a hospital for wounded soldiers.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And pray, sir, to what more honorable use could they put it?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, this Dujardin was housed by you, was nursed by your wife and all
+      the family; and in return has seduced your sister, my affianced.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I can hardly believe that. Camille Dujardin was always a man of honor,
+      and a good soldier.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Colonel, there has been no man near the place but this Dujardin. I tell
+      you it is he. Don&rsquo;t make me tear my bleeding heart out: must I tell you
+      how often I caught them together, how I suspected, and how she gulled me?
+      blind fool that I was, to believe a woman&rsquo;s words before my own eyes. I
+      swear to you he is the villain; the only question is, which of us two is
+      to kill him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Where is the man?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In the army of the Rhine.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah! all the better.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Covered with glory and honor. Curse him! oh, curse him! curse him!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am in luck. I am going to the Rhine.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I know it. That is why I waited here all through this night of misery.
+      Yes, you are in luck. But you will send me a line when you have killed
+      him; will you not? Then I shall know joy again. Should he escape you, he
+      shall not escape me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Young man,&rdquo; said Raynal, with dignity, &ldquo;this rage is unmanly. Besides, we
+      have not heard his side of the story. He is a good soldier; perhaps he is
+      not all to blame: or perhaps passion has betrayed him into a sin that his
+      conscience and honor disapprove: if so, he must not die. You think only of
+      your wrong: it is natural: but I am the girl&rsquo;s brother; guardian of her
+      honor and my own. His life is precious as gold. I shall make him marry
+      her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What! reward him for his villany?&rdquo; cried Edouard, frantically.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A mighty reward,&rdquo; replied Raynal, with a sneer.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You leave one thing out of the calculation, monsieur,&rdquo; said Edouard,
+      trembling with anger, &ldquo;that I will kill your brother-in-law at the altar,
+      before her eyes.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;YOU leave one thing out of the calculation: that you will first have to
+      cross swords, at the altar, with me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So be it. I will not draw on my old commandant. I could not; but be sure
+      I will catch him and her alone some day, and the bride shall be a widow in
+      her honeymoon.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;As you please,&rdquo; said Raynal, coolly. &ldquo;That is all fair, as you have been
+      wronged. I shall make her an honest wife, and then you may make her an
+      honest widow. (This is what they call LOVE, and sneer at me for keeping
+      clear of it.) But neither he nor you shall keep MY SISTER what she is now,
+      a &mdash;&mdash;,&rdquo; and he used a word out of camp.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Edouard winced and groaned. &ldquo;Oh! don&rsquo;t call her by such a name. There is
+      some mystery. She loved me once. There must have been some strange
+      seduction.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now you deceive yourself,&rdquo; said Raynal. &ldquo;I never saw a girl that could
+      take her own part better than she can; she is not like her sister at all
+      in character. Not that I excuse him; it was a dishonorable act, an
+      ungrateful act to my wife and my mother.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And to you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now listen to me: in four days I shall stand before him. I shall not go
+      into a pet like you; I am in earnest. I shall just say to him, &lsquo;Dujardin,
+      I know all!&rsquo; Then if he is guilty his face will show it directly. Then I
+      shall say, &lsquo;Comrade, you must marry her whom you have dishonored.&rsquo;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He will not. He is a libertine, a rascal.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are speaking of a man you don&rsquo;t know. He WILL marry her and repair
+      the wrong he has done.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Suppose he refuses?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why should he refuse? The girl is not ugly nor old, and if she has done a
+      folly, he was her partner in it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But SUPPOSE he refuses?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Raynal ground his teeth. &ldquo;Refuse? If he does, I&rsquo;ll run my sword through
+      his carcass then and there, and the hussy shall go into a convent.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0021" id="link2HCH0021">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XXI.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      The French army lay before a fortified place near the Rhine, which we will
+      call Philipsburg.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      This army knew Bonaparte by report only; it was commanded by generals of
+      the old school.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Philipsburg was defended on three sides by the nature of the ground; but
+      on the side that faced the French line of march there was only a zigzag
+      wall, pierced, and a low tower or two at each of the salient angles.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      There were evidences of a tardy attempt to improve the defences. In
+      particular there was a large round bastion, about three times the height
+      of the wall; but the masonry was new, and the very embrasures were not yet
+      cut.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Young blood was for assaulting these equivocal fortifications at the end
+      of the day&rsquo;s march that brought the French advanced guard in sight of the
+      place; but the old generals would not hear of it; the soldiers&rsquo; lives must
+      not be flung away assaulting a place that could be reduced in twenty-one
+      days with mathematical certainty. For at this epoch a siege was looked on
+      as a process with a certain result, the only problem was in how many days
+      would the place be taken; and even this they used to settle to a day or
+      two on paper by arithmetic; so many feet of wall, and so many guns on the
+      one side; so many guns, so many men, and such and such a soil to cut the
+      trenches in on the other: result, two figures varying from fourteen to
+      forty. These two figures represented the duration of the siege.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      For all that, siege arithmetic, right in general, has often been terribly
+      disturbed by one little incident, that occurs from time to time; viz.,
+      Genius INside. And, indeed, this is one of the sins of genius; it goes and
+      puts out calculations that have stood the brunt of years. Archimedes and
+      Todleben were, no doubt, clever men in their way and good citizens, yet
+      one characteristic of delicate men&rsquo;s minds they lacked&mdash;veneration;
+      they showed a sad disrespect for the wisdom of the ancients, deranged the
+      calculations which so much learning and patient thought had hallowed,
+      disturbed the minds of white-haired veterans, took sieges out of the grasp
+      of science, and plunged them back into the field of wild conjecture.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Our generals then sat down at fourteen hundred yards&rsquo; distance, and
+      planned the trenches artistically, and directed them to be cut at artful
+      angles, and so creep nearer and nearer the devoted town. Then the
+      Prussians, whose hearts had been in their shoes at first sight of the
+      French shakos, plucked up, and turned not the garrison only but the
+      population of the town into engineers and masons. Their fortifications
+      grew almost as fast as the French trenches.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The first day of the siege, a young but distinguished brigadier in the
+      French army rode to the quarters of General Raimbaut, who commanded his
+      division, and was his personal friend, and respectfully but firmly
+      entreated the general to represent to the commander-in-chief the propriety
+      of assaulting that new bastion before it should become dangerous. &ldquo;My
+      brigade shall carry it in fifteen minutes, general,&rdquo; said he.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What! cross all that open under fire? One-half your brigade would never
+      reach the bastion.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But the other half would take it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That is not so certain.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      General Raimbaut refused to forward the young colonel&rsquo;s proposal to
+      headquarters. &ldquo;I will not subject you to TWO refusals in one matter,&rdquo; said
+      he, kindly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The young colonel lingered. He said, respectfully, &ldquo;One question, general,
+      when that bastion cuts its teeth will it be any easier to take than now?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Certainly; it will always be easier to take it from the sap than to cross
+      the open under fire to it, and take it. Come, colonel, to your trenches;
+      and if your friend should cut its teeth, you shall have a battery in your
+      attack that will set its teeth on edge. Ha! ha!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The young colonel did not echo his chief&rsquo;s humor; he saluted gravely, and
+      returned to the trenches.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The next morning three fresh tiers of embrasures grinned one above another
+      at the besiegers. The besieged had been up all night, and not idle. In
+      half these apertures black muzzles showed themselves.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The bastion had cut its front teeth.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Thirteenth day of the siege.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The trenches were within four hundred yards of the enemy&rsquo;s guns, and it
+      was hot work in them. The enemy had three tiers of guns in the round
+      bastion, and on the top they had got a long 48-pounder, which they worked
+      with a swivel joint, or the like, and threw a great roaring shot into any
+      part of the French lines.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      As to the commander-in-chief and his generals, they were dotted about a
+      long way in the rear, and no shot came as far as them; but in the trenches
+      the men began now to fall fast, especially on the left attack, which faced
+      the round bastion. Our young colonel had got his heavy battery, and every
+      now and then he would divert the general efforts of the bastion, and
+      compel it to concentrate its attention on him, by pounding away at it till
+      it was all in sore places. But he meant it worse mischief than that.
+      Still, as heretofore, regarding it as the key to Philipsburg, he had got a
+      large force of engineers at work driving a mine towards it, and to this he
+      trusted more than to breaching it; for the bigger holes he made in it by
+      day were all stopped at night by the townspeople.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      This colonel was not a favorite in the division to which his brigade
+      belonged. He was a good soldier, but a dull companion. He was also accused
+      of hauteur and of an unsoldierly reserve with his brother officers.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Some loose-tongued ones even called him a milk-sop, because he was
+      constantly seen conversing with the priest&mdash;he who had nothing to say
+      to an honest soldier.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Others said, &ldquo;No, hang it, he is not a milk-sop: he is a tried soldier: he
+      is a sulky beggar all the same.&rdquo; Those under his immediate command were
+      divided in opinion about him. There was something about him they could not
+      understand. Why was his sallow face so stern, so sad? and why with all
+      that was his voice so gentle? somehow the few words that did fall from his
+      mouth were prized. One old soldier used to say, &ldquo;I would rather have a
+      word from our brigadier than from the commander-in-chief.&rdquo; Others thought
+      he must at some part of his career have pillaged a church, taken the
+      altar-piece, and sold it to a picture-dealer in Paris, or whipped the
+      earrings out of the Madonna&rsquo;s ears, or admitted the female enemy to
+      quarter upon ungenerous conditions: this, or some such crime to which we
+      poor soldiers are liable: and now was committing the mistake of remording
+      himself about it. &ldquo;Always alongside the chaplain, you see!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      This cold and silent man had won the heart of the most talkative sergeant
+      in the French army. Sergeant La Croix protested with many oaths that all
+      the best generals of the day had commanded him in turn, and that his
+      present colonel was the first that had succeeded in inspiring him with
+      unlimited confidence. &ldquo;He knows every point of war&mdash;this one,&rdquo; said
+      La Croix, &ldquo;I heard him beg and pray for leave to storm this thundering
+      bastion before it was armed: but no, the old muffs would be wiser than our
+      colonel. So now here we are kept at bay by a place that Julius Caesar and
+      Cannibal wouldn&rsquo;t have made two bites at apiece; no more would I if I was
+      the old boy out there behind the hill.&rdquo; In such terms do sergeants denote
+      commanders-in-chief&mdash;at a distance. A voluble sergeant has more
+      influence with the men than the minister of war is perhaps aware: on the
+      whole, the 24th brigade would have followed its gloomy colonel to grim
+      death and a foot farther. One thing gave these men a touch of
+      superstitious reverence for their commander. He seemed to them free from
+      physical weakness. He never SAT DOWN to dinner, and seemed never to sleep.
+      At no hour of the day or night were the sentries safe from his visits.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Very annoying. But, after awhile, it led to keen watchfulness: the more so
+      that the sad and gloomy colonel showed by his manner he appreciated it.
+      Indeed, one night he even opened his marble jaws, and told Sergeant La
+      Croix that a watchful sentry was an important soldier, not to his brigade
+      only, but to the whole army. Judge whether the maxim and the implied
+      encomium did not circulate next morning, with additions.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Sixteenth day of the siege. The round bastion opened fire at eight
+      o&rsquo;clock, not on the opposing battery, but on the right of the French
+      attack. Its advanced position enabled a portion of its guns to rake these
+      trenches slant-wise: and depressing its guns it made the round shot strike
+      the ground first and ricochet over.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      On this our colonel opened on them with all his guns: one of these he
+      served himself. Among his other warlike accomplishments, he was a
+      wonderful shot with a cannon. He showed them capital practice this
+      morning: drove two embrasures into one, and knocked about a ton of masonry
+      off the parapet. Then taking advantage of this, he served two of his guns
+      with grape, and swept the enemy off the top of the bastion, and kept it
+      clear. He made it so hot they could not work the upper guns. Then they
+      turned the other two tiers all upon him, and at it both sides went ding,
+      dong, till the guns were too hot to be worked. So then Sergeant La Croix
+      popped his head up from the battery, and showed the enemy a great white
+      plate. This was meant to convey to them an invitation to dine with the
+      French army: the other side of the table of course.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      To the credit of Prussian intelligence be it recorded, that this
+      pantomimic hint was at once taken and both sides went to dinner.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The fighting colonel, however, remained in the battery, and kept a
+      detachment of his gunners employed cooling the guns and repairing the
+      touch-holes. He ordered his two cutlets and his glass of water into the
+      battery.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Meantime, the enemy fired a single gun at long intervals, as much as to
+      say, &ldquo;We had the last word.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Let trenches be cut ever so artfully, there will be a little space exposed
+      here and there at the angles. These spaces the men are ordered to avoid,
+      or whip quickly across them into cover.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Now the enemy had just got the range of one of these places with their
+      solitary gun, and had already dropped a couple of shot right on to it. A
+      camp follower with a tray, two cutlets, and a glass of water, came to this
+      open space just as a puff of white smoke burst from the bastion. Instead
+      of instantly seeking shelter till the shot had struck, he, in his
+      inexperience, thought the shot must have struck, and all danger be over.
+      He stayed there mooning instead of pelting under cover: the shot
+      (eighteen-pound) struck him right on the breast, knocked him into
+      spilikins, and sent the mutton cutlets flying.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The human fragments lay quiet, ten yards off. But a soldier that was
+      eating his dinner kicked it over, and jumped up at the side of &ldquo;Death&rsquo;s
+      Alley&rdquo; (as it was christened next minute), and danced and yelled with
+      pain.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Haw! haw! haw!&rdquo; roared a soldier from the other side of the alley.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What is that?&rdquo; cried Sergeant La Croix. &ldquo;What do you laugh at, Private
+      Cadel?&rdquo; said he sternly, for, though he was too far in the trench to see,
+      he had heard that horrible sound a soldier knows from every other, the
+      &ldquo;thud&rdquo; of a round shot striking man or horse.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sergeant,&rdquo; said Cadel, respectfully, &ldquo;I laugh to see Private Dard, that
+      got the wind of the shot, dance and sing, when the man that got the shot
+      itself does not say a word.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The wind of the shot, you rascal!&rdquo; roared Private Dard: &ldquo;look here!&rdquo; and
+      he showed the blood running down his face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The shot had actually driven a splinter of bone out of the sutler into
+      Dard&rsquo;s temple.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am the unluckiest fellow in the army,&rdquo; remonstrated Dard: and he
+      stamped in a circle.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Seems to me you are only the second unluckiest this time,&rdquo; said a young
+      soldier with his mouth full; and, with a certain dry humor, he pointed
+      vaguely over his shoulder with the fork towards the corpse.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The trenches laughed and assented.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      This want of sympathy and justice irritated Dard. &ldquo;You cursed fools!&rdquo;
+       cried he. &ldquo;He is gone where we must all go&mdash;without any trouble. But
+      look at me. I am always getting barked. Dogs of Prussians! they pick me
+      out among a thousand. I shall have a headache all the afternoon, you see
+      else.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Some of our heads would never have ached again: but Dard had a good thick
+      skull.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Dard pulled out his spilikin savagely.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll wrap it up in paper for Jacintha,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;Then that will learn
+      her what a poor soldier has to go through.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Even this consolation was denied Private Dard.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Corporal Coriolanus Gand, a bit of an infidel from Lyons, who sometimes
+      amused himself with the Breton&rsquo;s superstition, told him with a grave face,
+      that the splinter belonged not to him, but to the sutler, and, though so
+      small, was doubtless a necessary part of his frame.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If you keep that, it will be a bone of contention between you two,&rdquo; said
+      he; &ldquo;especially at midnight. HE WILL BE ALWAYS COMING BACK TO YOU FOR IT.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There, take it away!&rdquo; said the Breton hastily, &ldquo;and bury it with the poor
+      fellow.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Sergeant La Croix presented himself before the colonel with a rueful face
+      and saluted him and said, &ldquo;Colonel, I beg a thousand pardons; your dinner
+      has been spilt&mdash;a shot from the bastion.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No matter,&rdquo; said the colonel. &ldquo;Give me a piece of bread instead.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      La Croix went for it himself, and on his return found Cadel sitting on one
+      side of Death&rsquo;s Alley, and Dard with his head bound up on the other. They
+      had got a bottle which each put up in turn wherever he fancied the next
+      round shot would strike, and they were betting their afternoon rations
+      which would get the Prussians to hit the bottle first.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      La Croix pulled both their ears playfully.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Time is up for playing marbles,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;Be off, and play at duty,&rdquo; and
+      he bundled them into the battery.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was an hour past midnight: a cloudy night. The moon was up, but seen
+      only by fitful gleams. A calm, peaceful silence reigned.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Dard was sentinel in the battery.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      An officer going his rounds found the said sentinel flat instead of
+      vertical. He stirred him with his scabbard, and up jumped Dard.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It&rsquo;s all right, sergeant. O Lord! it&rsquo;s the colonel. I wasn&rsquo;t asleep,
+      colonel.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have not accused you. But you will explain what you were doing.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Colonel,&rdquo; said Dard, all in a flutter, &ldquo;I was taking a squint at them,
+      because I saw something. The beggars are building a wall, now.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Where?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Between us and the bastion.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Show me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I can&rsquo;t, colonel; the moon has gone in; but I did see it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How long was it?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;About a hundred yards.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How high?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Colonel, it was ten feet high if it was an inch.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Have you good sight?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;La! colonel, wasn&rsquo;t I a bit of a poacher before I took to the bayonet?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Good! Now reflect. If you persist in this statement, I turn out the
+      brigade on your information.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll stand the fire of a corporal&rsquo;s guard at break of day if I make a
+      mistake now,&rdquo; said Dard.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The colonel glided away, called his captain and first lieutenants, and
+      said two words in each ear, that made them spring off their backs.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Dard, marching to an fro, musket on shoulder, found himself suddenly
+      surrounded by grim, silent, but deadly eager soldiers, that came pouring
+      like bees into the open space behind the battery. The officers came round
+      the colonel.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Attend to two things,&rdquo; said he to the captains. &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t fire till they are
+      within ten yards: and don&rsquo;t follow them unless I lead you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The men were then told off by companies, some to the battery, some to the
+      trenches, some were kept on each side Death&rsquo;s Alley, ready for a rush.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They were not all of them in position, when those behind the parapet saw,
+      as it were, something deepen the gloom of night, some fourscore yards to
+      the front: it was like a line of black ink suddenly drawn upon a sheet
+      covered with Indian ink.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It seems quite stationary. The novices wondered what it was. The veterans
+      muttered&mdash;&ldquo;Three deep.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Though it looked stationary, it got blacker and blacker. The soldiers of
+      the 24th brigade griped their muskets hard, and set their teeth, and the
+      sergeants had much ado to keep them quiet.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      All of a sudden, a loud yell on the right of the brigade, two or three
+      single shots from the trenches in that direction, followed by a volley,
+      the cries of wounded men, and the fierce hurrahs of an attacking party.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Our colonel knew too well those sounds: the next parallel had been
+      surprised, and the Prussian bayonet was now silently at work.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Disguise was now impossible. At the first shot, a guttural voice in front
+      of Dujardin&rsquo;s men was heard to give a word of command. There was a sharp
+      rattle and in a moment the thick black line was tipped with glittering
+      steel.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A roar and a rush, and the Prussian line three deep came furiously like a
+      huge steel-pointed wave, at the French lines. A tremendous wave of fire
+      rushed out to meet that wave of steel: a crash of two hundred muskets, and
+      all was still. Then you could see through the black steel-tipped line in a
+      hundred frightful gaps, and the ground sparkled with bayonets and the air
+      rang with the cries of the wounded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A tremendous cheer from the brigade, and the colonel charged at the head
+      of his column, out by Death&rsquo;s Alley.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The broken wall was melting away into the night. The colonel wheeled his
+      men to the right: one company, led by the impetuous young Captain Jullien,
+      followed the flying enemy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The other attack had been only too successful. They shot the sentries, and
+      bayoneted many of the soldiers in their tents: others escaped by running
+      to the rear, and some into the next parallel.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Several, half dressed, snatched up their muskets, killed one Prussian, and
+      fell riddled like sieves.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A gallant officer got a company together into the place of arms and formed
+      in line.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Half the Prussian force went at them, the rest swept the trenches: the
+      French company delivered a deadly volley, and the next moment clash the
+      two forces crossed bayonets, and a silent deadly stabbing match was
+      played: the final result of which was inevitable. The Prussians were five
+      to one. The gallant officer and the poor fellows who did their duty so
+      stoutly, had no thought left but to die hard, when suddenly a roaring
+      cheer seemed to come from the rear rank of the enemy. &ldquo;France! France!&rdquo;
+       Half the 24th brigade came leaping and swarming over the trenches in the
+      Prussian rear. The Prussians wavered. &ldquo;France!&rdquo; cried the little party
+      that were being overpowered, and charged in their turn with such fury that
+      in two seconds the two French corps went through the enemy&rsquo;s centre like
+      paper, and their very bayonets clashed together in more than one Prussian
+      body.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Broken thus in two fragments the Prussian corps ceased to exist as a
+      military force. The men fled each his own way back to the fort, and many
+      flung away their muskets, for French soldiers were swarming in from all
+      quarters. At this moment, bang! bang! bang! from the bastion.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;They are firing on my brigade,&rdquo; said our colonel. &ldquo;Who has led his
+      company there against my orders? Captain Neville, into the battery, and
+      fire twenty rounds at the bastion! Aim at the flashes from their middle
+      tier.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, colonel.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The battery opened with all its guns on the bastion. The right attack
+      followed suit. The town answered, and a furious cannonade roared and
+      blazed all down both lines till daybreak. Hell seemed broken loose.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Captain Jullien had followed the flying foe: but could not come up with
+      them: and, as the enemy had prepared for every contingency, the fatal
+      bastion, after first throwing a rocket or two to discover their position,
+      poured showers of grape into them, killed many, and would have killed more
+      but that Captain Neville and his gunners happened by mere accident to
+      dismount one gun and to kill a couple of gunners at the others. This gave
+      the remains of the company time to disperse and run back. When the men
+      were mustered, Captain Jullien and twenty-five of his company did not
+      answer to their names. At daybreak they were visible from the trenches
+      lying all by themselves within eighty yards of the bastion.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A flag of truce came from the fort: the dead were removed on both sides
+      and buried. Some Prussian officers strolled into the French lines.
+      Civilities and cigars exchanged: &ldquo;Bon jour,&rdquo; &ldquo;Gooten daeg:&rdquo; then at it
+      again, ding dong all down the line blazing and roaring.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At twelve o&rsquo;clock the besieged had got a man on horseback, on top of a
+      hill, with colored flags in his hand, making signals.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What are you up to now?&rdquo; inquired Dard.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You will see,&rdquo; said La Croix, affecting mystery; he knew no more than the
+      other.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Presently off went Long Tom on the top of the bastion, and the shot came
+      roaring over the heads of the speakers.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The flags were changed, and off went Long Tom again at an elevation.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Ten seconds had scarcely elapsed when a tremendous explosion took place on
+      the French right. Long Tom was throwing red-hot shot; one had fallen on a
+      powder wagon, and blown it to pieces, and killed two poor fellows and a
+      horse, and turned an artillery man at some distance into a seeming nigger,
+      but did him no great harm; only took him three days to get the powder out
+      of his clothes with pipe clay, and off his face with raw potato-peel.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      When the tumbril exploded, the Prussians could be heard to cheer, and they
+      turned to and fired every iron spout they owned. Long Tom worked all day.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They got into a corner where the guns of the battery could not hit them or
+      him, and there was his long muzzle looking towards the sky, and sending
+      half a hundredweight of iron up into the clouds, and plunging down a mile
+      off into the French lines.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And, at every shot, the man on horseback made signals to let the gunners
+      know where the shot fell.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At last, about four in the afternoon, they threw a forty-eight-pound shot
+      slap into the commander-in-chief&rsquo;s tent, a mile and a half behind
+      trenches.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Down comes a glittering aide-de-camp as hard as he can gallop.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Colonel Dujardin, what are you about, sir? YOUR BASTION has thrown a
+      round shot into the commander-in-chief&rsquo;s tent.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The colonel did not appear so staggered as the aide-de-camp expected.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, indeed!&rdquo; said he quietly. &ldquo;I observed they were trying distances.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Must not happen again, colonel. You must drive them from the gun.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, where is the difficulty?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If you will do me the honor to step into the battery, I will show you,&rdquo;
+       said the colonel.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If you please,&rdquo; said the aide-de-camp stiffly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Colonel Dujardin took him to the parapet, and began, in a calm,
+      painstaking way, to show him how and why none of his guns could be brought
+      to bear upon Long Tom.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In the middle of the explanation a melodious sound was heard in the air
+      above them, like a swarm of Brobdingnag bees.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What is that?&rdquo; inquired the aide-de-camp.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What? I see nothing.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That humming noise.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, that? Prussian bullets. Ah, by-the-by, it is a compliment to your
+      uniform, monsieur; they take you for some one of importance. Well, as I
+      was observing&rdquo;&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your explanation is sufficient, colonel; let us get out of this. Ha, ha!
+      you are a cool hand, colonel, I must say. But your battery is a warm place
+      enough: I shall report it so at headquarters.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The grim colonel relaxed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Captain,&rdquo; said he politely, &ldquo;you shall not have ridden to my post in
+      vain. Will you lend me your horse for ten minutes?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Certainly; and I will inspect your trenches meantime.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do so; oblige me by avoiding that angle; it is exposed, and the enemy
+      have got the range to an inch.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Colonel Dujardin slipped into his quarters; off with his half-dress jacket
+      and his dirty boots, and presently out he came full fig, glittering
+      brighter than the other, with one French and two foreign orders shining on
+      his breast, mounted the aide-de-camp&rsquo;s horse, and away full pelt.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Admitted, after some delay, into the generalissimo&rsquo;s tent, Dujardin found
+      the old gentleman surrounded by his staff and wroth: nor was the danger to
+      which he had been exposed his sole cause of ire.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The shot had burst through his canvas, struck a table on which was a large
+      inkstand, and had squirted the whole contents over the despatches he was
+      writing for Paris.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Now this old gentleman prided himself upon the neatness of his despatches:
+      a blot on his paper darkened his soul.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Colonel Dujardin expressed his profound regret. The commander, however,
+      continued to remonstrate. &ldquo;I have a great deal of writing to do,&rdquo; said he,
+      &ldquo;as you must be aware; and, when I am writing, I expect to be quiet.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Colonel Dujardin assented respectfully to the justice of this. He then
+      explained at full length why he could not bring a gun in the battery to
+      silence &ldquo;Long Tom,&rdquo; and quietly asked to be permitted to run a gun out of
+      the trenches, and take a shot at the offender.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is a point-blank distance, and I have a new gun, with which a man
+      ought to be able to hit his own ball at three hundred yards.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The commander hesitated.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I cannot have the men exposed.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I engage not to lose a man&mdash;except him who fires the gun. HE must
+      take his chance.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, colonel, it must be done by volunteers. The men must not be ORDERED
+      out on such a service as that.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Colonel Dujardin bowed, and retired.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Volunteers to go out of the trenches!&rdquo; cried Sergeant La Croix, in a
+      stentorian voice, standing erect as a poker, and swelling with importance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      There were fifty offers in less than as many seconds.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Only twelve allowed to go,&rdquo; said the sergeant; &ldquo;and I am one,&rdquo; added he,
+      adroitly inserting himself.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A gun was taken down, placed on a carriage, and posted near Death&rsquo;s Alley,
+      but out of the line of fire.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The colonel himself superintended the loading of this gun; and to the
+      surprise of the men had the shot weighed first, and then weighed out the
+      powder himself.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He then waited quietly a long time till the bastion pitched one of its
+      periodical shots into Death&rsquo;s Alley, but no sooner had the shot struck,
+      and sent the sand flying past the two lanes of curious noses, than Colonel
+      Dujardin jumped upon the gun and waved his cocked hat. At this
+      preconcerted signal, his battery opened fire on the bastion, and the
+      battery to his right opened on the wall that fronted them; and the colonel
+      gave the word to run the gun out of the trenches. They ran it out into the
+      cloud of smoke their own guns were belching forth, unseen by the enemy;
+      but they had no sooner twisted it into the line of Long Tom, than the
+      smoke was gone, and there they were, a fair mark.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Back into the trenches, all but one!&rdquo; roared Dujardin.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And in they ran like rabbits.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Quick! the elevation.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Colonel Dujardin and La Croix raised the muzzle to the mark&mdash;hoo,
+      hoo, hoo! ping, ping, ping! came the bullets about their ears.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Away with you!&rdquo; cried the colonel, taking the linstock from him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then Colonel Dujardin, fifteen yards from the trenches, in full blazing
+      uniform, showed two armies what one intrepid soldier can do. He kneeled
+      down and adjusted his gun, just as he would have done in a practising
+      ground. He had a pot shot to take, and a pot shot he would take. He
+      ignored three hundred muskets that were levelled at him. He looked along
+      his gun, adjusted it, and re-adjusted it to a hair&rsquo;s breadth. The enemy&rsquo;s
+      bullets pattered upon it: still he adjusted it delicately. His men were
+      groaning and tearing their hair inside at his danger.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At last it was levelled to his mind, and then his movements were as quick
+      as they had hitherto been slow. In a moment he stood erect in the
+      half-fencing attitude of a gunner, and his linstock at the touch-hole: a
+      huge tongue of flame, a volume of smoke, a roar, and the iron thunderbolt
+      was on its way, and the colonel walked haughtily but rapidly back to the
+      trenches; for in all this no bravado. He was there to make a shot; not to
+      throw a chance of life away watching the effect.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Ten thousand eyes did that for him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Both French and Prussians risked their own lives craning out to see what a
+      colonel in full uniform was doing under fire from a whole line of forts,
+      and what would be his fate; but when he fired the gun their curiosity left
+      the man and followed the iron thunderbolt.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      For two seconds all was uncertain; the ball was travelling.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tom gave a rear like a wild horse, his protruding muzzle went up sky-high,
+      then was seen no more, and a ring of old iron and a clatter of fragments
+      was heard on the top of the bastion. Long Tom was dismounted. Oh! the roar
+      of laughter and triumph from one end to another of the trenches; and the
+      clapping of forty thousand hands that went on for full five minutes; then
+      the Prussians, either through a burst of generous praise for an act so
+      chivalrous and so brilliant, or because they would not be crowed over,
+      clapped their tea thousand hands as loudly, and thus thundering,
+      heart-thrilling salvo of applause answered salvo on both sides that
+      terrible arena.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      That evening came a courteous and flattering message from the
+      commander-in-chief to Colonel Dujardin; and several officers visited his
+      quarters to look at him; they went back disappointed. The cry was, &ldquo;What a
+      miserable, melancholy dog! I expected to see a fine, dashing fellow.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The trenches neared the town. Colonel Dujardin&rsquo;s mine was far advanced;
+      the end of the chamber was within a few yards of the bastion. Of late, the
+      colonel had often visited this mine in person. He seemed a little uneasy
+      about something in that quarter; but no one knew what: he was a silent
+      man. The third evening, after he dismounted Long Tom, he received private
+      notice that an order was coming down from the commander-in-chief to
+      assault the bastion. He shrugged his shoulders, but said nothing. That
+      same night the colonel and one of his lieutenants stole out of the
+      trenches, and by the help of a pitch-dark, windy night, got under the
+      bastion unperceived, and crept round it, and made their observations, and
+      got safe back. About noon down came General Raimbaut.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, colonel, you are to have your way at last. Your bastion is to be
+      stormed this afternoon previous to the general assault. Why, how is this?
+      you don&rsquo;t seem enchanted?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am not.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, it was you who pressed for the assault.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;At the right time, general, not the wrong. In five days I undertake to
+      blow that bastion into the air. To assault it now would be to waste our
+      men.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      General Raimbaut thought this excess of caution a great piece of
+      perversity in Achilles. They were alone, and he said a little peevishly,&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is not this to blow hot and cold on the same thing?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, general,&rdquo; was the calm reply. &ldquo;Not on the same thing. I blew hot upon
+      timorous counsels; I blow cold on rash ones. General, last night
+      Lieutenant Fleming and I were under that bastion; and all round it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah! my prudent colonel, I thought we should not talk long without your
+      coming out in your true light. If ever a man secretly enjoyed risking his
+      life, it is you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, general,&rdquo; said Dujardin looking gloomily down; &ldquo;I enjoy neither that
+      nor anything else. Live or die, it is all one to me; but to the lives of
+      my soldiers I am not indifferent, and never will be while I live. My
+      apparent rashness of last night was pure prudence.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Raimbaut&rsquo;s eye twinkled with suppressed irony. &ldquo;No doubt!&rdquo; said he; &ldquo;no
+      doubt!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The impassive colonel would not notice the other&rsquo;s irony; he went calmly
+      on:&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I suspected something; I went to confute, or confirm that suspicion. I
+      confirmed it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rat! tat! tat! tat! tat! tat! tat! was heard a drum. Relieving guard in
+      the mine.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Colonel Dujardin interrupted himself.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That comes apropos,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;I expect one proof more from that quarter.
+      Sergeant, send me the sentinel they are relieving.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Sergeant La Croix soon came back, as pompous as a hen with one chick,
+      predominating with a grand military air over a droll figure that chattered
+      with cold, and held its musket in hands clothed in great mittens. Dard.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      La Croix marched him up as if he had been a file; halted him like a file,
+      sang out to him as to a file, stentorian and unintelligible, after the
+      manner of sergeants.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Private No. 4.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      DARD. P-p-p-present!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      LA CROIX. Advance to the word of command, and speak to the colonel.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The shivering figure became an upright statue directly, and carried one of
+      his mittens to his forehead. Then, suddenly recognizing the rank of the
+      gray-haired officer, he was morally shaken, but remained physically erect,
+      and stammered,&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Colonel!&mdash;general!&mdash;colonel!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t be frightened, my lad. But look at the general and answer me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes! general! colonel!&rdquo; and he levelled his eye dead at the general, as
+      he would a bayonet at a foe, being so commanded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now answer in as few syllables as you can.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes! general&mdash;colonel.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have been on guard in the mine.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, general.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What did you see there?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nothing; it was night down there.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What did you feel?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Cold! I&mdash;was&mdash;in&mdash;water&mdash;hugh!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Did you hear nothing, then?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Bum! bum! bum!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Are you sure you did not hear particles of earth fall at the end of the
+      trench?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I think it did, and this (touching his musket) sounded of its own
+      accord.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Good! you have answered well; go.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sergeant, I did not miss a word,&rdquo; cried Dard, exulting. He thought he had
+      passed a sort of military college examination. The sergeant was awe-struck
+      and disgusted at his familiarity, speaking to him before the great: he
+      pushed Private Dard hastily out of the presence, and bundled him into the
+      trenches.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Are you countermined, then?&rdquo; asked General Raimbaut.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I think not, general; but the whole bastion is. And we found it had been
+      opened in the rear, and lately half a dozen broad roads cut through the
+      masonry.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To let in re-enforcements?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Or to let the men run out in ease of an assault. I have seen from the
+      first an able hand behind that part of the defences. If we assault the
+      bastion, they will pick off as many of us as they can with their muskets
+      then they will run for it, and fire a train, and blow it and us into the
+      air.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Colonel, this is serious. Are you prepared to lay this statement before
+      the commander-in-chief?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am, and I do so through you, the general of my division. I even beg you
+      to say, as from me, that the assault will be mere suicide&mdash;bloody and
+      useless.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      General Raimbaut went off to headquarters in some haste, a thorough
+      convert to Colonel Dujardin&rsquo;s opinion. Meantime the colonel went slowly to
+      his tent. At the mouth of it a corporal, who was also his body-servant,
+      met him, saluted, and asked respectfully if there were any orders.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A few minutes&rsquo; repose, Francois, that is all. Do not let me be disturbed
+      for an hour.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Attention!&rdquo; cried Francois. &ldquo;Colonel wants to sleep.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The tent was sentinelled, and Dujardin was alone with the past.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then had the fools, that took (as fools will do) deep sorrow for
+      sullenness, seen the fiery soldier droop, and his wan face fall into
+      haggard lines, and his martial figure shrink, and heard his stout heart
+      sigh! He took a letter from his bosom: it was almost worn to pieces. He
+      had read it a thousand times, yet he read it again. A part of the sweet
+      sad words ran thus:&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We must bow. We can never be happy together on earth; let us make Heaven
+      our friend. This is still left us,&mdash;not to blush for our love; to do
+      our duty, and to die.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How tender, but how firm,&rdquo; thought Camille. &ldquo;I might agitate, taunt,
+      grieve her I love, but I could not shake her. No! God and the saints to my
+      aid! they saved me from a crime I now shudder at. And they have given me
+      the good chaplain: he prays with me, he weeps for me. His prayers still my
+      beating heart. Yes, poor suffering angel! I read your will in these
+      tender, but bitter, words: you prefer duty to love. And one day you will
+      forget me; not yet awhile, but it will be so. It wounds me when I think of
+      it, but I must bow. Your will is sacred. I must rise to your level, not
+      drag you to mine.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Then the soldier that had stood between two armies in a hail of bullets,
+      and fired a master-shot, took a little book of offices in one hand,&mdash;the
+      chaplain had given it him,&mdash;and fixed his eyes upon the pious words,
+      and clung like a child to the pious words, and kissed his lost wife&rsquo;s
+      letter, and tried hard to be like her he loved: patient, very patient,
+      till the end should come.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Qui vive?&rdquo; cried the sentinel outside to a strange officer.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;France,&rdquo; was his reply. He then asked the sentinel, &ldquo;Where is the colonel
+      commanding the brigade?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The sentinel lowered his voice, &ldquo;Asleep, my officer,&rdquo; said he; for the
+      new-comer carried two epaulets.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Wake him,&rdquo; said the officer in a tone of a man used to command on a large
+      scale.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Dujardin heard, and did not choose a stranger should think he was asleep
+      in broad day. He came hastily out of the tent, therefore, with Josephine&rsquo;s
+      letter in his hand, and, in the very act of conveying it to his bosom,
+      found himself face to face with&mdash;her husband.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Did you ever see two duellists cross rapiers?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      How unlike a theatrical duel! How smooth and quiet the bright blades are!
+      they glide into contact. They are polished and slippery, yet they hold
+      each other. So these two men&rsquo;s eyes met, and fastened: neither spoke: each
+      searched the other&rsquo;s face keenly. Raynal&rsquo;s countenance, prepared as he was
+      for this meeting, was like a stern statue&rsquo;s. The other&rsquo;s face flushed, and
+      his heart raged and sickened at sight of the man, that, once his comrade
+      and benefactor, was now possessor of the woman he loved. But the figures
+      of both stood alike haughty, erect, and immovable, face to face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Colonel Raynal saluted Colonel Dujardin ceremoniously. Colonel Dujardin
+      returned the salute in the same style.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You thought I was in Egypt,&rdquo; said Raynal with grim significance that
+      caught Dujardin&rsquo;s attention, though he did not know quite how to interpret
+      it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He answered mechanically, &ldquo;Yes, I did.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am sent here by General Bonaparte to take a command,&rdquo; explained Raynal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are welcome. What command?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yours.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mine?&rdquo; cried Dujardin, his forehead flushing with mortification and
+      anger. &ldquo;What, is it not enough that you take my&rdquo;&mdash;He stopped then.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come, colonel,&rdquo; said the other calmly, &ldquo;do not be unjust to an old
+      comrade. I take your demi-brigade; but you are promoted to Raimbaut&rsquo;s
+      brigade. The exchange is to be made to-morrow.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Was it then to announce to me my promotion you came to my quarters?&rdquo; and
+      Camille looked with a strange mixture of feelings at his old comrade.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That was the first thing, being duty, you know.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What? have you anything else to say to me, then?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is it important? for my own duties will soon demand me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is so important that, command or no command, I should have come
+      further than the Rhine to say it to you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Let a man be as bold as a lion, a certain awe still waits upon doubt and
+      mystery; and some of this vague awe crept over Camille Dujardin at
+      Raynal&rsquo;s mysterious speech, and his grave, quiet, significant manner.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Had he discovered something, and what? For Josephine&rsquo;s sake, more than his
+      own, Camille was on his guard directly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Raynal looked at him in silence a moment.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What?&rdquo; said he with a slight sneer, &ldquo;has it never occurred to you that I
+      MUST have a serious word to say to you? First, let me put you a question:
+      did they treat you well at my house? at the chateau de Beaurepaire?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; faltered Camille.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You met, I trust, all the kindness and care due to a wounded soldier and
+      an officer of merit. It would annoy me greatly if I thought you were not
+      treated like a brother in my house.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Colonel Dujardin writhed inwardly at this view of matters. He could not
+      reply in few words. This made him hesitate.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      His inquisitor waited, but, receiving no reply, went on, &ldquo;Well, colonel,
+      have you shown the sense of gratitude we had a right to look for in
+      return? In a word, when you left Beaurepaire, had your conscience nothing
+      to reproach you with?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Dujardin still hesitated. He scarcely knew what to think or what to say.
+      But he thought to himself, &ldquo;Who has told him? does he know all?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Colonel Dujardin, I am the husband of Josephine, the son of Madame de
+      Beaurepaire, and the brother of Rose. You know very well what brings me
+      here. Your answer?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Colonel Raynal, between men of honor, placed as you and I are, few words
+      should pass, for words are idle. You will never prove to me that I have
+      wronged you: I shall never convince you that I have not. Let us therefore
+      close this painful interview in the way it is sure to close. I am at your
+      service, at any hour and place you please.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And pray is that all the answer you can think of?&rdquo; asked Raynal somewhat
+      scornfully.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, what other answer can I give you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A more sensible, a more honest, and a less boyish one. Who doubts that
+      you can fight, you silly fellow? haven&rsquo;t I seen you? I want you to show me
+      a much higher sort of courage: the courage to repair a wrong, not the
+      paltry valor to defend one.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I really do not understand you, sir. How can I undo what is done?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, of course you cannot. And therefore I stand here ready to forgive
+      all that is past; not without a struggle, which you don&rsquo;t seem to
+      appreciate.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Camille was now utterly mystified. Raynal continued, &ldquo;But of course it is
+      upon condition that you consent to heal the wound you have made. If you
+      refuse&mdash;hum! but you will not refuse.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But what is it you require of me?&rdquo; inquired Camille impatiently.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Only a little common honesty. This is the case: you have seduced a young
+      lady.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sir!&rdquo; cried Camille angrily.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What is the matter? The word is not so bad as the crime, I take it. You
+      have seduced her, and under circumstances&mdash;But we won&rsquo;t speak of
+      them, because I am resolved to keep cool. Well, sir, as you said just now,
+      it&rsquo;s no use crying over spilled milk; you can&rsquo;t unseduce the little fool;
+      so you must marry her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;M&mdash;m&mdash;marry her?&rdquo; and Dujardin flushed all over, and his heart
+      beat, and he stared in Raynal&rsquo;s face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, what is the matter again? If she has played the fool, it was with
+      you, and no other man: it is not as if she was depraved. Come, my lad,
+      show a little generosity! Take the consequences of your own act&mdash;or
+      your share of it&mdash;don&rsquo;t throw it all on the poor feeble woman. If she
+      has loved you too much, you are the man of all others that should forgive
+      her. Come, what do you say?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      This was too much for Camille; that Raynal should come and demand of him
+      to marry his own wife, for so he understood the proposal. He stared at
+      Raynal in silence ever so long, and even when he spoke it was only to
+      mutter, &ldquo;Are you out of your senses, or am I?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At this it cost Raynal a considerable effort to restrain his wrath.
+      However, he showed himself worthy of the office he had undertaken. He
+      contained himself, and submitted to argue the matter. &ldquo;Why, colonel,&rdquo; said
+      he, &ldquo;is it such a misfortune to marry poor Rose? She is young, she is
+      lovely, she has many good qualities, and she would have walked straight to
+      the end of her days but for you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Now here was another surprise for Dujardin, another mystification.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Rose de Beaurepaire?&rdquo; said he, putting his hand to his head, as if to see
+      whether his reason was still there.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, Rose de Beaurepaire&mdash;Rose Dujardin that ought to be, and that
+      is to be, if you please.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;One word, monsieur: is it of Rose we have been talking all this time?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Raynal nearly lost his temper at this question, and the cold, contemptuous
+      tone with which it was put; but he gulped down his ire.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is,&rdquo; said he.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;One question more. Did she tell you I had&mdash;I had&rdquo;&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, as to that, she was in no condition to deny she had fallen, poor
+      girl; the evidence was too strong. She did not reveal her seducer&rsquo;s name;
+      but I had not far to go for that.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;One question more,&rdquo; said Dujardin, with a face of anguish. &ldquo;Is it Jos&mdash;is
+      it Madame Raynal&rsquo;s wish I should marry her sister?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, of course,&rdquo; said Raynal, in all sincerity, assuming that naturally
+      enough as a matter of course; &ldquo;if you have any respect for HER feelings,
+      look on me as her envoy in this matter.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At this Camille turned sick with disgust; then rage and bitterness swelled
+      his heart. A furious impulse seized him to expose Josephine on the spot.
+      He overcame that, however, and merely said, &ldquo;She wishes me to marry her
+      sister, does she? very well then, I decline.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Raynal was shocked. &ldquo;Oh,&rdquo; said he, sorrowfully, &ldquo;I cannot believe this of
+      you; such heartlessness as this is not written in your face; it is
+      contradicted by your past actions.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I refuse,&rdquo; said Dujardin, hastily; and to tell the truth, not sorry to
+      inflict some pain on the honest soldier who had unintentionally driven the
+      iron so deep into his own soul.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And I,&rdquo; said Raynal, losing his temper, &ldquo;insist, in the name of my dear
+      Josephine&rdquo;&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Perdition!&rdquo; snarled Dujardin, losing his self-command in turn.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And of the whole family.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And I tell you I will never marry her. Upon my honor, never.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your honor! you have none. The only question is would you rather marry
+      her&mdash;or die.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Die, to be sure.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then die you shall.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah!&rdquo; said Dujardin; &ldquo;did I not tell you we were wasting time?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Let us waste no more then. WHEN and WHERE?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;At the rear of the commander-in-chief&rsquo;s tent; when you like.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This afternoon, then&mdash;at five.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;At five.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Seconds?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What for?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are right. They are only in the way of men who carry sabres; and
+      besides the less gossip the better. Good-by, till five,&rdquo; and the two
+      saluted one another with grim ceremony; and Raynal turned on his heel.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Camille stood transfixed; a fierce, guilty joy throbbed in his heart. His
+      rival had quarrelled with him, had insulted him, had challenged him. It
+      was not his fault. The sun shone bright now upon his cold despair. An hour
+      ago life offered nothing. A few hours more, and then joy beyond
+      expression, or an end of all. Death or Josephine! Then he remembered that
+      this very Josephine wished to marry him to Rose. Then he remembered Raynal
+      had saved his life. Cold chills crossed his breaking heart. Of all that
+      could happen to him death alone seemed a blessing without alloy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He stood there so torn with conflicting passions, that he noted neither
+      the passing hours nor the flying bullets.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He was only awakened from his miserable trance by the even tread of
+      soldiers marching towards him; he looked up and there were several
+      officers coming along the edge of the trench, escorted by a corporal&rsquo;s
+      guard.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He took a step or two to meet them. After the usual salutes, one of the
+      three colonels delivered a large paper, with a large seal, to Dujardin. He
+      read it out to his captains and lieutenants, who had assembled at sight of
+      the cocked hats and full uniforms.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Attack by the army to-morrow upon all the lines. Attack of the bastion
+      St. Andre this evening. The 22d, the 24th, and 12th brigades will furnish
+      the contingents; the operation will be conducted by one of the colonels of
+      the second division, to be appointed by General Raimbaut.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Aha!&rdquo; sounded a voice like a trombone at the reader&rsquo;s elbow. &ldquo;I am just
+      in the nick of time. When, colonel, when?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;At five this evening, Colonel Raynal.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There,&rdquo; said Raynal, in a half-whisper, to Dujardin; &ldquo;could they choose
+      no hour but that?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do not be uneasy,&rdquo; replied Dujardin, under his breath. He explained aloud&mdash;&ldquo;the
+      assault will not take place, gentlemen; the bastion is mined.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What of that? half of them are mined. We will take our engineers in with
+      us,&rdquo; said Raynal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Such an assault will be a useless massacre,&rdquo; resumed Dujardin. &ldquo;I
+      reconnoitred the bastion last night, and saw their preparations for
+      blowing us to the devil; and General Raimbaut, at my request, is even now
+      presenting my remarks to the commander-in-chief, and enforcing them. There
+      will be no assault. In a day or two we shall blow the bastion, mines, and
+      all into the air.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At this moment Raynal caught sight of a gray-haired officer coming at some
+      distance. &ldquo;There IS General Raimbaut,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;I will go and pay my
+      respects to him.&rdquo; General Raimbaut shook his hand warmly, and welcomed him
+      to the army. They were old and warm friends. &ldquo;And you are come at the
+      right time,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;It will soon be as hot here as in Egypt.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Raynal laughed and said all the better.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      General Raimbaut now joined the group of officers, and entered at once in
+      the business which had brought him. Addressing himself to Colonel
+      Dujardin, first he informs that officer he had presented his observations
+      to the commander-in-chief, who had given them the attention they merited.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Colonel Dujardin bowed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But,&rdquo; continued General Raimbaut, &ldquo;they are overruled by imperious
+      circumstances, some of which he did not reveal; they remain in his own
+      breast. However, on the eve of a general attack, which he cannot postpone,
+      that bastion must be disarmed, otherwise it would be too fatal to all the
+      storming parties. It is a painful necessity.&rdquo; He added, &ldquo;Tell Colonel
+      Dujardin I count greatly on the courage and discipline of his brigade, and
+      on his own wise measures.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Colonel Dujardin bowed. Then he whispered in the other&rsquo;s ear, &ldquo;Both will
+      alike be wasted.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The other colonels waved their hats in triumph at the commander-in-chief&rsquo;s
+      decision, and Raynal&rsquo;s face showed he looked on Dujardin as a sort of
+      spoil-sport happily defeated.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, then, gentlemen,&rdquo; said General Raimbaut, &ldquo;we begin by settling the
+      contingents to be furnished by your several brigades. Say, an equal number
+      from each. The sum total shall be settled by Colonel Dujardin, who has so
+      long and ably baffled the bastion at this post.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Colonel Dujardin bowed stiffly and not very graciously. In his heart he
+      despised these old fogies, compounds of timidity and rashness.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So, how many men in all, colonel?&rdquo; asked General Raimbaut.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The fewer the better,&rdquo; replied the other solemnly, &ldquo;since&rdquo;&mdash;and then
+      discipline tied his tongue.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I understand you,&rdquo; said the old man. &ldquo;Shall we say eight hundred men?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I should prefer three hundred. They have made a back door to the bastion,
+      and the means of flight at hand will put flight into their heads. They
+      will pick off some of our men as we go at them. When the rest jump in they
+      will jump out, and&rdquo;&mdash;He paused.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, he knows all about it before it comes,&rdquo; said one of the colonels
+      naively.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I do. I see the whole operation and its result before me, as I see this
+      hand. Three hundred men will do.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But, general,&rdquo; objected Raynal, &ldquo;you are not beginning at the beginning.
+      The first thing in these cases is to choose the officer to command the
+      storming party.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, Raynal, unquestionably; but you must be aware that is a painful and
+      embarrassing part of my duty, especially after Colonel Dujardin&rsquo;s
+      remarks.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, bah!&rdquo; cried Raynal. &ldquo;He is prejudiced. He has been digging a
+      thundering long mine here, and now you are going to make his child
+      useless. We none of us like that. But when he gets the colors in his hand,
+      and the storming column at his back, his misgivings will all go to the
+      wind, and the enemy after them, unless he has been committing some crime,
+      and is very much changed from what I knew him four years ago.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Colonel Raynal,&rdquo; said one of the other colonels, politely but firmly,
+      &ldquo;pray do not assume that Colonel Dujardin is to lead the column; there are
+      three other claimants. General Raimbaut is to select from us four.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, gentlemen, and in a service of this kind I would feel grateful to
+      you all if you would relieve me of that painful duty.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Gentlemen,&rdquo; said Dujardin, with an imperceptible sneer, &ldquo;the general
+      means to say this: the operation is so glorious that he could hardly
+      without partiality assign the command to either of us four claimants.
+      Well, then, let us cast lots.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The proposal was received by acclamation.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The general will mark a black cross on one lot, and he who draws it wins
+      the command.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The young colonels prepared their lots with almost boyish eagerness. These
+      fiery spirits were sick to death of lying and skulking in the trenches.
+      They flung their lots into the hat. After them, who should approach the
+      hat, lot in hand, but Raynal. Dujardin instantly interfered, and held his
+      arm as he was in the act of dropping in his lot.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What is the matter?&rdquo; said Raynal, sharply.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This is our affair, Colonel Raynal. You have no command in this army.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I beg your pardon, sir, I have yours.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not till to-morrow.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, you would not take such a pettifogging advantage of an old comrade
+      as that.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tell him the day ends at twelve o&rsquo;clock,&rdquo; said one of the colonels
+      interested by this strange strife.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah!&rdquo; cried Raynal, triumphantly; &ldquo;but no,&rdquo; said he, altering his tone,
+      &ldquo;let us leave that sort of argument to lawyers. I have come a good many
+      miles to fight with you, general; and now you must decide to pay me this
+      little compliment on my arrival, or put a bitter affront on me&mdash;choose!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      While the old general hesitated, Camille replied, &ldquo;Since you take that
+      tone there can be but one answer. You are too great a credit to the French
+      army for even an apparent slight to be put on you here. The rule, I think,
+      is, that one of the privates shall hold the hat.&mdash;Hallo! Private
+      Dard, come here&mdash;there&mdash;hold this hat.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, colonel.&mdash;Lord, here is my young mistress&rsquo;s husband!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Silence!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And they began to draw, and, in the act of drawing, a change of manner was
+      first visible in these gay and ardent spirits.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is not I,&rdquo; said one, throwing away his lot.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nor I.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is I,&rdquo; said Raynal; then with sudden gravity, &ldquo;I am the lucky one.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And now that the honor and the danger no longer floated vaguely over four
+      heads, but had fixed on one, a sudden silence and solemnity took the place
+      of eager voices.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was first broken by Private Dard saying, with foolish triumph, &ldquo;And I
+      held the hat for you, colonel.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, Raynal!&rdquo; said General Raimbaut, sorrowfully, &ldquo;it was not worth while
+      to come from Egypt for this.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Raynal made no reply to this. He drew out his watch, and said calmly, he
+      had no time to lose; he must inspect the detachments he was to command.
+      &ldquo;Besides,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;I have some domestic arrangements to make. Hitherto
+      on these occasions I was a bachelor, now I am married.&rdquo; General Raimbaut
+      could not help sighing. Raynal read this aright, and turned to him, &ldquo;A
+      droll marriage, my old friend; I&rsquo;ll tell you all about it if ever I have
+      the time. It began with a purchase, general, and ends with&mdash;with a
+      bequest, which I might as well write now, and so have nothing to think of
+      but duty afterwards. Where can I write?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Colonel Dujardin will lend you his tent, I am sure.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Certainly.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And, messieurs,&rdquo; said Raynal, &ldquo;if I waste time you need not. You can pick
+      me my men from your brigades. Give me a strong spice of old hands.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The colonels withdrew on this, and General Raimbaut walked sadly and
+      thoughtfully towards the battery. Dujardin and Raynal were left alone.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This postpones our affair, sir.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, Raynal.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Have you writing materials in your tent?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes; on the table.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are quite sure the bastion is mined, comrade?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      This unexpected word and Raynal&rsquo;s gentle appeal touched Dujardin deeply.
+      It was in a broken voice he replied that he was unfortunately too sure of
+      it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Raynal received this reply as a sentence of death, and without another
+      word walked slowly into Dujardin&rsquo;s tent.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Dujardin&rsquo;s generosity was up in arms; he followed Raynal, and said
+      eagerly, &ldquo;Raynal, for Heaven&rsquo;s sake resign this command!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Allow me to write to my wife, colonel,&rdquo; was the cold reply.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Camille winced at this affront, and drew back a moment; but his nobler
+      part prevailed. He seized Raynal by the wrist. &ldquo;You shall not affront me,
+      you cannot affront me. You go to certain death I tell you, if you attack
+      that bastion.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t be a fool, colonel,&rdquo; said Raynal: &ldquo;somebody must lead the men.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes; but not you. Who has so good a right to lead them as I, their
+      colonel?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And be killed in my place, eh?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I know the ground better than you,&rdquo; said Camille. &ldquo;Besides, who cares for
+      me? I have no friends, no family. But you are married&mdash;and so many
+      will mourn if you&rdquo;&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Raynal interrupted him sternly. &ldquo;You forget, sir, that Rose de Beaurepaire
+      is my sister, when you tell me you have no tie to life.&rdquo; He added, with
+      wonderful dignity and sobriety, &ldquo;Allow me to write to my wife, sir; and,
+      while I write, reflect that you can embitter an old comrade&rsquo;s last moments
+      by persisting in your refusal to restore his sister the honor you have
+      robbed her of.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And leaving the other staggered and confused by this sudden blow, he
+      retired into Dujardin&rsquo;s tent, and finding writing materials on a little
+      table that was there, sat down to pen a line to Josephine.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Camille knew to whom he was writing, and a jealous pang passed through
+      him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      What he wrote ran thus,&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A bastion is to be attacked at five. I command. Colonel Dujardin proposed
+      we should draw lots, and I lost. The service is honorable, but the result
+      may, I fear, give you some pain. My dear wife, it is our fate. I was not
+      to have time to make you know, and perhaps love me. God bless you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      In writing these simple words, Raynal&rsquo;s hard face worked, and his mustache
+      quivered, and once he had to clear his eye with his hand to form the
+      letters. He, the man of iron.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He who stood there, leaning on his scabbard and watching the writer, saw
+      this, and it stirred all that was great and good in that grand though
+      passionate heart of his.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Poor Raynal!&rdquo; thought he, &ldquo;you were never like that before on going into
+      action. He is loath to die. Ay, and it is a coward&rsquo;s trick to let him die.
+      I shall have her, but shall I have her esteem? What will the army say?
+      What will my conscience say? Oh! I feel already it will gnaw my heart to
+      death; the ghost of that brave fellow&mdash;once my dear friend, my rival
+      now, by no fault of his&mdash;will rise between her and me, and reproach
+      me with my bloody inheritance. The heart never deceives; I feel it now
+      whispering in my ear: &lsquo;Skulking captain, white-livered soldier, that stand
+      behind a parapet while a better man does your work! you assassinate the
+      husband, but the rival conquers you.&rsquo; There, he puts his hand to his eyes.
+      What shall I do?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Colonel,&rdquo; said a low voice, and at the same time a hand was laid on his
+      shoulder.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was General Raimbaut. The general looked pale and distressed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come apart, colonel, for Heaven&rsquo;s sake! One word, while he is writing.
+      Ah! that was an unlucky idea of yours.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of mine, general?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;&lsquo;Twas you proposed to cast lots.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Good God! so it was.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I thought of course it was to be managed so that Raynal should not be the
+      one. Between ourselves, what honorable excuse can we make?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;None, general.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The whole division will be disgraced, and forgive me if I say a portion
+      of the discredit will fall on you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Help me to avert that shame then,&rdquo; cried Camille, eagerly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah! that I will: but how?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Take your pencil and write&mdash;&lsquo;I authorize Colonel Dujardin to save
+      the honor of the colonels of the second division.&rsquo;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The general hesitated. He had never seen an order so worded. But at last
+      he took out his pencil and wrote the required order, after his own
+      fashion; i.e., in milk and water:&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      On account of the singular ability and courage with which Colonel Dujardin
+      has conducted the operations against the Bastion St. Andre, a
+      discretionary power is given him at the moment of assault to carry into
+      effect such measures, as, without interfering with the
+      commander-in-chief&rsquo;s order, may sustain his own credit, and that of the
+      other colonels of the second division.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      RAIMBAUT, General of Division.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Camille put the paper into his bosom.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now, general, you may leave all to me. I swear to you, Raynal shall not
+      die&mdash;shall not lead this assault.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your hand, colonel. You are an honor to the French armies. How will you
+      do it?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Leave it to me, general, it shall be done.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I feel it will, my noble fellow: but, alas! I fear not without risking
+      some valuable life or other, most likely your own. Tell me!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;General, I decline.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You refuse me, sir?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes; this order gives me a discretionary power. I will hand back the
+      order at your command; but modify it I will not. Come, sir, you veteran
+      generals have been unjust to me, and listened to me too little all through
+      this siege, but at last you have honored me. This order is the greatest
+      honor that was ever done me since I wore a sword.&rdquo;.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My poor colonel!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Let me wear it intact, and carry it to my grave.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Say no more! One word&mdash;Is there anything on earth I can do for you,
+      my brave soldier?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, general. Be so kind as to retire to your quarters; there are reasons
+      why you ought not to be near this post in half an hour.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I go. Is there NOTHING else?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, general, ask the good priest Ambrose, to pray for all those who
+      shall die doing their duty to their country this afternoon.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They parted. General Raimbaut looked back more than once at the firm,
+      intrepid figure that stood there unflinching, on the edge of the grave.
+      But HE never took his eye off Raynal. The next minute the sad letter was
+      finished, and Raynal walked out of the tent, and confronted the man he had
+      challenged to single combat.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      I have mentioned elsewhere that Colonel Dujardin had eyes strangely
+      compounded of battle and love, of the dove and the hawk. And these,
+      softened by a noble act he meditated, now rested on Raynal with a strange
+      expression of warmth and goodness. This strange gaze struck Raynal, so far
+      at least as this; he saw it was no hostile eye. He was glad of that, for
+      his own heart was calmed and softened by the solemn prospect before him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We, too, have a little account to settle before I order out the men,&rdquo;
+       said he, calmly, &ldquo;and I can&rsquo;t give you a long credit. I am pressed for
+      time.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Our quarrel is at an end. When duty sounds the recall, a soldier&rsquo;s heart
+      leaves private feuds. See! I come to you without anger and ill-will. Just
+      now my voice was loud, my manner, I dare say, offensive, and menacing
+      even, and that always tempts a brave fellow like you to resist. But now,
+      you see, I am harmless as a woman. We are alone. Humbug to the winds! I
+      know that you are the only man in this army fit to command a division. I
+      know that when you say the assault of that bastion is death, death it is.
+      To the point then; now that my manner is no longer irritating, now that I
+      am going to die, Camille Dujardin, my old comrade, have you the heart to
+      refuse me? am I to die unhappy?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No; no: I will do whatever you like.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You will marry that poor girl, then?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Aha! did not I always say he was a good fellow? Clench the nail; give me
+      your honor.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I give you my honor to marry her, if I live.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You take a load off me; may Heaven reward you. In one hour those poor
+      women, whose support I had promised to be, will lose their protector; but
+      I give them another in you. We shall not leave that family in tears, Rose
+      in shame, and your child without a name.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Dujardin stared at the speaker. What new and devilish deception was this?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My child!&rdquo; he faltered. &ldquo;What child?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah,&rdquo; said Raynal, &ldquo;what a fool I was! That is the first thing I ought to
+      have told you. Poor little fellow! I surprised him in his cradle; his
+      mother and Josephine were rocking him, and singing over him. Oh! it was a
+      scene, I can tell you. My poor wife had been ill for some time, and was so
+      weakened by it, that I frightened her into a fit, stealing a march on her
+      that way. She fainted away. Perhaps it is as well she did; for I&mdash;I
+      did not know what to think; it looked ugly; but while she lay at our feet
+      insensible, I forced the truth from Rose; she owned the boy was hers.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      While Raynal told him this strange story, Camille turned hot and cold.
+      First came a thrill of glowing joy; he had some clew to all this: he was a
+      father; that child was Josephine&rsquo;s and his; the next moment he froze
+      within. So Josephine had not only gulled her husband, but him, too; she
+      had refused him the sad consolation of knowing he had a child. Cruelty,
+      calculation, and baseness unexampled! Here was a creature who could
+      sacrifice anything and anybody to her comfort, to the peace and sordid
+      smoothness of her domestic life. She stood between two men&mdash;a thing.
+      Between two truths&mdash;a double lie.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      His heart, in one moment, turned against her like a stone. A musket-bullet
+      through the body does not turn life to death quicker than Raynal turned
+      his rival&rsquo;s love to despair and scorn: that love which neither wounds,
+      absence, prison, nor even her want of constancy had prevailed to shake.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Out of my bosom!&rdquo; he cried&mdash;&ldquo;out of it, in this world and the next!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He forgot, in his lofty rage, who stood beside him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What?&mdash;what?&rdquo; cried Raynal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No matter,&rdquo; said Camille; &ldquo;only I esteem YOU, Raynal. You are truth; you
+      are a man, and deserve a better lot.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t say that,&rdquo; replied Raynal, quite misunderstanding him. &ldquo;It is a
+      soldier&rsquo;s end: I never desired nor hoped a better: only, of course, I feel
+      sad. You are a happy fellow, to have a child and to live to see it, and
+      her you love.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, yes, I am very happy,&rdquo; replied the poor fellow, his lip quivering.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Watch over all those poor women, comrade, and sometimes speak to them of
+      me. It is foolish, but we like to be remembered.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes! but do not let us speak of that. Raynal, you and I were lieutenants
+      together; do you remember saving my life in the Arno?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then promise me, if you should live, to remember not our quarrel of
+      to-day, nor anything; but only those early days, AND THIS AFTERNOON.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I do.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your hand, comrade.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There, comrade, there.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They wrung one another&rsquo;s hands, and turned away and hid their faces from
+      each other, for their eyes were moist.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This won&rsquo;t do, comrade, I must go. I shall attack from your position. So
+      I shall go down the line, and bring the men up. Meantime, pick me your
+      detachment. Give me a good spice of veterans. I shall get one word with
+      you before we go out. God bless you!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;God bless you, Raynal!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The moment Raynal was gone, Camille beckoned a lieutenant to him, and
+      ordered half the brigade to form in a strong column on both sides Death&rsquo;s
+      Alley.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      His eye fell upon private Dard, as luck would have it. &ldquo;Come here,&rdquo; said
+      he. Dard came and saluted.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Have you anybody at Beaurepaire that would be sorry if you were killed?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, colonel! Jacintha, that used to make your broth, colonel.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Take this line to Colonel Raynal. You will find him with the 12th
+      brigade.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He wrote a few lines in pencil, folded them, and Dard went off with them,
+      little dreaming that the colonel of his brigade was taking the trouble to
+      save his life, because he came from Beaurepaire. Colonel Dujardin then
+      went into his tent, and closed the aperture, and took the good book the
+      priest had given him, and prayed humbly, and forgave all the world.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then he sat down, his head in his hands, and thought of his child, and how
+      hard it was he must die and never see him. Then he lighted a candle, and
+      sealed up his orders of valor, and wrote a line, begging that they might
+      be sent to his sister. He also sealed up his purse, and left a memorandum
+      that the contents should be given to disabled soldiers of his brigade upon
+      their being invalided.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then he took out Josephine&rsquo;s letter. &ldquo;Poor coward,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;let me not
+      be unkind. See, I burn your letter, lest it should be found, and disturb
+      the peace you prize so highly. I, too, shall soon be at peace.&rdquo; He lighted
+      the letter, and dropped it on the ground: it burned slowly away. He eyed
+      it, despairingly. &ldquo;Ay,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;you perish, last record of an unhappy
+      love: and even so pass away my life; my hopes of glory, and my dreams of
+      love; it all ends to-day: at nine and twenty.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He put his white handkerchief to his eyes. Josephine had given it him. He
+      cried a little.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      When he had done crying, he put his white handkerchief in his bosom, and
+      the whole man was transformed beyond language to express. Powder does not
+      change more when it catches fire. He rose that moment and went like a
+      flash of lightning out of the tent. The next, he came down between the
+      lines of the strong column that stood awaiting orders in Death&rsquo;s Alley.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Attention!&rdquo; cried the sergeants; &ldquo;the colonel!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      There was a dead silence, for the bare sight of that erect and inspired
+      figure made the men&rsquo;s bosoms thrill with the certainty of great deeds to
+      come: the light of battle was in his eye. No longer the moody colonel, but
+      a thunderbolt of war, red-hot, and waiting to be launched.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Officers, sergeants, soldiers, a word with you!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      La Croix. Attention!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you know what passed here five minutes ago?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The attack of the bastion was settled!&rdquo; cried a captain.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It was; and who was to lead the assault? do you know that?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A colonel FROM EGYPT.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At that there was a groan from the men.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;With detachments from the other brigades.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;AH!&rdquo; an angry roar.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Colonel Dujardin walked quickly down between the two lines, looking with
+      his fiery eye into the men&rsquo;s eyes on his right. Then he came back on the
+      other side, and, as he went, he lighted those men&rsquo;s eyes with his own. It
+      was a torch passing along a line of ready gas-lights.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The work to us!&rdquo; he cried in a voice like a clarion (it fired the hearts
+      as his eye had fired the eyes)&mdash;&ldquo;The triumph to strangers! Our
+      fatigues and our losses have not gained the brigade the honor of going out
+      at those fellows that have killed so many of our comrades.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      A fierce groan broke from the men.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What! shall the colors of another brigade and not ours fly from that
+      bastion this afternoon?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No! no!&rdquo; in a roar like thunder.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah! you are of my mind. Attention! the attack is fixed for five o&rsquo;clock.
+      Suppose you and I were to carry the bastion ten minutes before the colonel
+      from Egypt can bring his men upon the ground.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At this there was a fierce burst of joy and laughter; the strange laughter
+      of veterans and born invincibles. Then a yell of exulting assent,
+      accompanied by the thunder of impatient drums, and the rattle of fixing
+      bayonets.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The colonel told off a party to the battery.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Level the guns at the top tier. Fire at my signal, and keep firing over
+      our heads, till you see our colors on the place.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He then darted to the head of the column, which instantly formed behind
+      him in the centre of Death&rsquo;s Alley.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The colors! No hand but mine shall hold them to-day.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They were instantly brought him: his left hand shook them free in the
+      afternoon sun.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A deep murmur of joy rolled out from the old hands at the now unwonted
+      sight. Out flashed the colonel&rsquo;s sword like steel lightning. He pointed to
+      the battery.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Bang! bang! bang! bang! went his cannon, and the smoke rolled over the
+      trenches. At the same moment up went the colors waving, and the colonel&rsquo;s
+      clarion voice pealed high above all:&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Twenty-fourth brigade&mdash;FORWARD!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They went so swiftly out of the trenches that they were not seen through
+      their own smoke until they had run some sixty yards. As soon as they were
+      seen, coming on like devils through their own smoke, two thousand muskets
+      were levelled at them from the Prussian line. It was not a rattle of small
+      arms&mdash;it was a crash, and the men fell fast: but in a moment they
+      were seen to spread out like a fan, and to offer less mark, and when the
+      fan closed again, it half encircled the bastion. It was a French attack:
+      part swarmed at it in front like bees, part swept round the glacis and
+      flanked it. They were seen to fall in numbers, shot down from the
+      embrasures. But the living took the place of the dead: and the fight
+      ranged evenly there. Where are the colors? Towards the rear there. The
+      colonel and a hundred men are fighting hand to hand with the Prussians,
+      who have charged out at the back doors of the bastion. Success there, and
+      the bastion must fall&mdash;both sides know this.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The colors disappeared. There was a groan from the French lines. The
+      colors reappeared, and close under the bastion.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And now in front the attack was so hot, that often the Prussian gunners
+      were seen to jump down, driven from their posts; and the next moment a
+      fierce hurrah from the rear told that the French had won some great
+      advantage there. The fire slackening told a similar tale and presently
+      down came the Prussian flag-staff. That might be an accident. A few
+      moments of thirsting expectation, and up went the colors of the 24th
+      brigade upon the Bastion St. Andre.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The French army raised a shout that rent the sky, and their cannon began
+      to play on the Prussian lines and between the bastion and the nearest
+      fort, to prevent a recapture.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Sudden there shot from the bastion a cubic acre of fire: it carried up a
+      heavy mountain of red and black smoke that looked solid as marble. There
+      was a heavy, sullen, tremendous explosion that snuffed out the sound of
+      the cannon, and paralyzed the French and Prussian gunners&rsquo; hands, and
+      checked the very beating of their hearts. Thirty thousand pounds of
+      gunpowder were in that awful explosion. War itself held its breath, and
+      both armies, like peaceable spectators, gazed wonder-struck,
+      terror-struck. Great hell seemed to burst through the earth&rsquo;s crust, and
+      to be rushing at heaven. Huge stones, cannons, corpses, and limbs of
+      soldiers, were seen driven or falling through the smoke. Some of these
+      last came quite clear of the ruins, ay, into the French and Prussian
+      lines, that even the veterans put their hands to their eyes. Raynal felt
+      something patter on him from the sky&mdash;it was blood&mdash;a comrade&rsquo;s
+      perhaps.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The smoke cleared. Where, a moment before, the great bastion stood and
+      fought, was a monstrous pile of blackened, bloody stones and timbers, with
+      dismounted cannon sticking up here and there.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And, rent and crushed to atoms beneath the smoking mass, lay the relics of
+      the gallant brigade, and their victorious colors.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0022" id="link2HCH0022">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XXII.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      A few wounded soldiers of the brigade lay still till dusk. Then they crept
+      back to the trenches. These had all been struck down or disabled short of
+      the bastion. Of those that had taken the place no one came home.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Raynal, after the first stupefaction, pressed hard and even angrily for an
+      immediate assault on the whole Prussian line. Not they. It was on paper
+      that the assault should be at daybreak to-morrow. Such leaders as they
+      were cannot IMPROVISE.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rage and grief in his heart, Raynal waited chafing in the trenches till
+      five minutes past midnight. He then became commander of the brigade, gave
+      his orders, and took thirty men out to creep up to the wreck of the
+      bastion, and find the late colonel&rsquo;s body.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Going for so pious a purpose, he was rewarded by an important discovery.
+      The whole Prussian lines had been abandoned since sunset, and, mounting
+      cautiously on the ramparts, Raynal saw the town too was evacuated, and
+      lights and other indications on a rising ground behind it convinced him
+      that the Prussians were in full retreat, probably to effect that junction
+      with other forces which the assault he had recommended would have rendered
+      impossible.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They now lighted lanterns, and searched all over and round the bastion for
+      the poor colonel, in the rear of the bastion they found many French
+      soldiers, most of whom had died by the bayonet. The Prussian dead had all
+      been carried off.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Here they found the talkative Sergeant La Croix. The poor fellow was
+      silent enough now. A terrible sabre-cut on the skull. The colonel was not
+      there. Raynal groaned, and led the way on to the bastion. The ruins still
+      smoked. Seven or eight bodies were discovered by an arm or a foot
+      protruding through the masses of masonry. Of these some were Prussians; a
+      proof that some devoted hand had fired the train, and destroyed both
+      friend and foe.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They found the tube of Long Tom sticking up, just as he had shown over the
+      battlements that glorious day, with this exception, that a great piece was
+      knocked off his lip, and the slice ended in a long, broad crack.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The soldiers looked at this. &ldquo;That is our bullet&rsquo;s work,&rdquo; said they. Then
+      one old veteran touched his cap, and told Raynal gravely, he knew where
+      their beloved colonel was. &ldquo;Dig here, to the bottom,&rdquo; said he. &ldquo;HE LIES
+      BENEATH HIS WORK.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Improbable and superstitious as this was, the hearts of the soldiers
+      assented to it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Presently there was a joyful cry outside the bastion. A rush was made
+      thither. But it proved to be only Dard, who had discovered that Sergeant
+      La Croix&rsquo;s heart still beat. They took him up carefully, and carried him
+      gently into camp. To Dard&rsquo;s delight the surgeon pronounced him curable.
+      For all that, he was three days insensible, and after that unfit for duty.
+      So they sent him home invalided, with a hundred francs out of the poor
+      colonel&rsquo;s purse.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Raynal reported the evacuation of the place, and that Colonel Dujardin was
+      buried under the bastion, and soon after rode out of the camp.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The words Camille had scratched with a pencil, and sent him from the edge
+      of the grave, were few but striking.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A dead man takes you once more by the hand. My last thought, thank God,
+      is France. For her sake and mine, Raynal. GO FOR GENERAL BONAPARTE. Tell
+      him, from a dying soldier, the Rhine is a river to these generals, but to
+      him a field of glory. He will lay out our lives, not waste them.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      There was nothing to hinder Raynal from carrying out this sacred request:
+      for the 24th brigade had ceased to exist: already thinned by hard service,
+      it was reduced to a file or two by the fatal bastion. It was incorporated
+      with the 12th; and Raynal rode heavy at heart to Paris, with a black scarf
+      across his breast.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0023" id="link2HCH0023">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XXIII.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      You see now into what a fatal entanglement two high-minded young ladies
+      were led, step by step, through yielding to the natural foible of their
+      sex&mdash;the desire to hide everything painful from those they love, even
+      at the expense of truth.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A nice mess they made of it with their amiable dishonesty. And pray take
+      notice that after the first White Lie or two, circumstances overpowered
+      them, and drove them on against their will. It was no small part of all
+      their misery that they longed to get back to truth and could not.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      We shall see presently how far they succeeded in that pious object, for
+      the sake of which they first entered on concealments. But first a word is
+      due about one of the victims of their amiable, self-sacrificing lubricity.
+      Edouard Riviere fell in one night, from happiness and confidence, such as
+      till that night he had never enjoyed, to deep and hopeless misery.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He lost that which, to every heart capable of really loving, is the
+      greatest earthly blessing, the woman he adored. But worse than that, he
+      lost those prime treasures of the masculine soul, belief in human
+      goodness, and in female purity. To him no more could there be in nature a
+      candid eye, a virtuous ready-mantling cheek: for frailty and treachery had
+      put on these signs of virtue and nobility. Henceforth, let him live a
+      hundred years, whom could he trust or believe in?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Here was a creature whose virtues seemed to make frailty impossible:
+      treachery, doubly impossible: a creature whose very faults&mdash;for
+      faults she had&mdash;had seemed as opposite to treachery as her very
+      virtues were. Yet she was all frailty and falsehood.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He passed in that one night of anguish from youth to age. He went about
+      his business like a leaden thing. His food turned tasteless. His life
+      seemed ended. Nothing appeared what it had been. The very landscape seemed
+      cut in stone, and he a stone in the middle of it, and his heart a stone in
+      him. At times, across that heavy heart came gushes of furious rage and
+      bitter mortification; his heart was broken, and his faith was gone, for
+      his vanity had been stabbed as fiercely as his love. &ldquo;Georges Dandin!&rdquo; he
+      would cry, &ldquo;curse her! curse her!&rdquo; But love and misery overpowered these
+      heats, and froze him to stone again.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The poor boy pined and pined. His clothes hung loose about him; his face
+      was so drawn with suffering, you would not have known him. He hated
+      company. The things he was expected to talk about!&mdash;he with his
+      crushed heart. He could not. He would not. He shunned all the world; he
+      went alone like a wounded deer. The good doctor, on his return from Paris,
+      called on him to see if he was ill: since he had not come for days to the
+      chateau. He saw the doctor coming and bade the servant say he was not in
+      the village.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He drew down the blind, that he might never see the chateau again. He drew
+      it up again: he could not exist without seeing it. &ldquo;She will be miserable,
+      too,&rdquo; he cried, gnashing his teeth. &ldquo;She will see whether she has chosen
+      well.&rdquo; At other times, all his courage, and his hatred, and his wounded
+      vanity, were drowned in his love and its despair, and then he bowed his
+      head, and sobbed and cried as if his heart would burst. One morning he was
+      so sobbing with his head on the table, when his landlady tapped at his
+      door. He started up and turned his head away from the door.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A young woman from Beaurepaire, monsieur.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;From Beaurepaire?&rdquo; his heart gave a furious leap. &ldquo;Show her in.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He wiped his eyes and seated himself at a table, and, all in a flutter,
+      pretended to be the state&rsquo;s.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was not Jacintha, as he expected, but the other servant. She made a low
+      reverence, cast a look of admiration on him, and gave him a letter. His
+      eye darted on it: his hand trembled as he took it. He turned away again to
+      open it. He forced himself to say, in a tolerably calm voice, &ldquo;I will send
+      an answer.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The letter was apparently from the baroness de Beaurepaire; a mere line
+      inviting him to pay her a visit. It was written in a tremulous hand.
+      Edouard examined the writing, and saw directly it was written by Rose.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Being now, naturally enough, full of suspicion, he set this down as an
+      attempt to disguise her hand. &ldquo;So,&rdquo; said he, to himself, &ldquo;this is the
+      game. The old woman is to be drawn into it, too. She is to help to make
+      Georges Dandin of me. I will go. I will baffle them all. I will expose
+      this nest of depravity, all ceremony on the surface, and voluptuousness
+      and treachery below. O God! who could believe that creature never loved
+      me! They shall none of them see my weakness. Their benefactor shall be
+      still their superior. They shall see me cold as ice, and bitter as gall.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      But to follow him farther just now, would be to run too far in advance of
+      the main story. I must, therefore, return to Beaurepaire, and show,
+      amongst other things, how this very letter came to be written.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      When Josephine and Rose awoke from that startled slumber that followed the
+      exhaustion of that troubled night, Rose was the more wretched of the two.
+      She had not only dishonored herself, but stabbed the man she loved.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine, on the other hand, was exhausted, but calm. The fearful escape
+      she had had softened down by contrast her more distant terrors.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She began to shut her eyes again, and let herself drift. Above all, the
+      doctor&rsquo;s promise comforted her: that she should go to Paris with him, and
+      have her boy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      This deceitful calm of the heart lasted three days.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Carefully encouraged by Rose, it was destroyed by Jacintha.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Jacintha, conscious that she had betrayed her trust, was almost
+      heart-broken. She was ashamed to appear before her young mistress, and,
+      coward-like, wanted to avoid knowing even how much harm she had done.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She pretended toothache, bound up her face, and never stirred from the
+      kitchen. But she was not to escape: the other servant came down with a
+      message: &ldquo;Madame Raynal wanted to see her directly.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She came quaking, and found Josephine all alone.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine rose to meet her, and casting a furtive glance round the room
+      first, threw her arms round Jacintha&rsquo;s neck, and embraced her with many
+      tears.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Was ever fidelity like yours? how COULD you do it, Jacintha? and how can
+      I ever repay it? But, no; it is too base of me to accept such a sacrifice
+      from any woman.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Jacintha was so confounded she did not know what to say. But it was a
+      mystification that could not endure long between two women, who were both
+      deceived by a third. Between them they soon discovered that it must have
+      been Rose who had sacrificed herself.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And Edouard has never been here since,&rdquo; said Josephine.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And never will, madame.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, he shall! there must be some limit even to my feebleness, and my
+      sister&rsquo;s devotion. You shall take a line to him from me. I will write it
+      this moment.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The letter was written. But it was never sent. Rose found Josephine and
+      Jacintha together; saw a letter was being written, asked to see it; on
+      Josephine&rsquo;s hesitating, snatched it out of her hand, read it, tore it to
+      pieces, and told Jacintha to leave the room. She hated the sight of poor
+      Jacintha, who had slept at the very moment when all depended on her
+      watchfulness.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So you were going to send to HIM, unknown to me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Forgive me, Rose.&rdquo; Rose burst out crying.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;O Josephine! is it come to this? Would you deceive ME?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have deceived ME! Yes! it has come to that. I know all. Twill not
+      consent to destroy ALL I love.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She then begged hard for leave to send the letter.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose gave an impetuous refusal. &ldquo;What could you say to him? foolish thing,
+      don&rsquo;t you know him, and his vanity? When you had exposed yourself to him,
+      and showed him I had insulted him for you, do you think he would forgive
+      me? No! this is to make light of my love&mdash;to make me waste the
+      sacrifice I have made. I feel that sacrifice as much as you do, more
+      perhaps, and I would rather die in a convent than waste that night of
+      shame and agony. Come, promise me, no more attempts of that kind, or we
+      are sisters no more, friends no more, one heart and one blood no more.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The weaker nature, weakened still more by ill-health and grief, was
+      terrified into submission, or rather temporized. &ldquo;Kiss me then,&rdquo; said
+      Josephine, &ldquo;and love me to the end. Ah, if I was only in my grave!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose kissed her with many sighs, but Josephine smiled. Rose eyed her with
+      suspicion. That deep smile; what did it mean? She had formed some
+      resolution. &ldquo;She is going to deceive me somehow,&rdquo; thought Rose.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      From that day she watched Josephine like a spy. Confidence was gone
+      between them. Suspicion took its place.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose was right in her misgivings. The moment Josephine saw that Edouard&rsquo;s
+      happiness and Rose&rsquo;s were to be sacrificed for her whom nothing could make
+      happy, the poor thing said to herself, &ldquo;I CAN DIE.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And that was the happy thought that made her smile.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The doctor gave her laudanum: he found she could not sleep: and he thought
+      it all-important that she should sleep.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine, instead of taking these small doses, saved them all up,
+      secreted them in a phial, and so, from the sleep of a dozen nights,
+      collected the sleep of death: and now she was tranquil. This young
+      creature that could not bear to give pain to any one else, prepared her
+      own death with a calm resolution the heroes of our sex have not often
+      equalled. It was so little a thing to her to strike Josephine. Death would
+      save her honor, would spare her the frightful alternative of deceiving her
+      husband, or of telling him she was another&rsquo;s. &ldquo;Poor Raynal,&rdquo; said she to
+      herself, &ldquo;it is so cruel to tie him to a woman who can never be to him
+      what he deserves. Rose would then prove her innocence to Edouard. A few
+      tears for a weak, loving soul, and they would all be happy and forget
+      her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      One day the baroness, finding herself alone with Rose and Dr. Aubertin,
+      asked the latter what he thought of Josephine&rsquo;s state.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, she was better: had slept last night without her usual narcotic.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness laid down her knitting and said, with much meaning, &ldquo;And I
+      tell you, you will never cure her body till you can cure her mind. My poor
+      child has some secret sorrow.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sorrow!&rdquo; said Aubertin, stoutly concealing the uneasiness these words
+      created, &ldquo;what sorrow?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, she has some deep sorrow. And so have you, Rose.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Me, mamma! what DO you mean?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness&rsquo;s pale cheek flushed a little. &ldquo;I mean,&rdquo; said she, &ldquo;that my
+      patience is worn out at last; I cannot live surrounded by secrets.
+      Raynal&rsquo;s gloomy looks when he left us, after staying but one hour;
+      Josephine ill from that day, and bursting into tears at every word;
+      yourself pale and changed, hiding an unaccountable sadness under forced
+      smiles&mdash;Now, don&rsquo;t interrupt me. Edouard, who was almost like a son,
+      gone off, without a word, and never comes near us now.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Really you are ingenious in tormenting yourself. Josephine is ill! Well,
+      is it so very strange? Have you never been ill? Rose is pale! you ARE
+      pale, my dear; but she has nursed her sister for a month; is it a wonder
+      she has lost color? Edouard is gone a journey, to inherit his uncle&rsquo;s
+      property: a million francs. But don&rsquo;t you go and fall ill, like Josephine;
+      turn pale, like Rose; and make journeys in the region of fancy, after
+      Edouard Riviere, who is tramping along on the vulgar high road.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      This tirade came from Aubertin, and very clever he thought himself. But he
+      had to do with a shrewd old lady, whose suspicions had long smouldered;
+      and now burst out. She said quietly, &ldquo;Oh, then Edouard is not in this part
+      of the world. That alters the case: where IS he?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In Normandy, probably,&rdquo; said Rose, blushing.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness looked inquiringly towards Aubertin. He put on an innocent
+      face and said nothing.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Very good,&rdquo; said the baroness. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s plain I am to learn nothing from you
+      two. But I know somebody who will be more communicative. Yes: this
+      uncomfortable smiling, and unreasonable crying, and interminable
+      whispering; these appearances of the absent, and disappearances of the
+      present; I shall know this very day what they all mean.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Really, I do not understand you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, never mind; I am an old woman, and I am in my dotage. For all that,
+      perhaps you will allow me two words alone with my daughter.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I retire, madame,&rdquo; and he disappeared with a bow to her, and an anxious
+      look at Rose. She did not need this; she clenched her teeth, and braced
+      herself up to stand a severe interrogatory.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Mother and daughter looked at one another, as if to measure forces, and
+      then, instead of questioning her as she had intended, the baroness sank
+      back in her chair and wept aloud. Rose was all unprepared for this. She
+      almost screamed in a voice of agony, &ldquo;O mamma! mamma! O God! kill me where
+      I stand for making my mother weep!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My girl,&rdquo; said the baroness in a broken voice, and with the most touching
+      dignity, &ldquo;may you never know what a mother feels who finds herself shut
+      out from her daughters&rsquo; hearts. Sometimes I think it is my fault; I was
+      born in a severer age. A mother nowadays seems to be a sort of elder
+      sister. In my day she was something more. Yet I loved my mother as well,
+      or better than I did my sisters. But it is not so with those I have borne
+      in my bosom, and nursed upon my knee.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At this Rose flung herself, sobbing and screaming, at her mother&rsquo;s knees.
+      The baroness was alarmed. &ldquo;Come, dearest, don&rsquo;t cry like that. It is not
+      too late to take your poor old mother into your confidence. What is this
+      mystery? and why this sorrow? How comes it I intercept at every instant
+      glances that were not intended for me? Why is the very air loaded with
+      signals and secrecy? (Rose replied only by sobs.) Is some deceit going on?
+      (Rose sobbed.) Am I to have no reply but these sullen sobs? will you
+      really tell me nothing?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve nothing to tell,&rdquo; sobbed Rose.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, then, will you do something for me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Such a proposal was not only a relief, but a delight to the deceiving but
+      loving daughter. She started up crying, &ldquo;Oh, yes, mamma; anything,
+      everything. Oh, thank you!&rdquo; In the ardor of her gratitude, she wanted to
+      kiss her mother; but the baroness declined the embrace politely, and said,
+      coldly and bitterly, &ldquo;I shall not ask much; I should not venture now to
+      draw largely on your affection; it&rsquo;s only to write a few lines for me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose got paper and ink with great alacrity, and sat down all beaming, pen
+      in hand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness dictated the letter slowly, with an eye gimleting her
+      daughter all the time.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dear&mdash;Monsieur&mdash;Riviere.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The pen fell from Rose&rsquo;s hand, and she turned red and then pale.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What! write to him?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not in your own name; in mine. But perhaps you prefer to give me the
+      trouble.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Cruel! cruel!&rdquo; sighed Rose, and wrote the words as requested.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness dictated again,&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oblige me by coming here at your very earliest convenience.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But, mamma, if he is in Normandy,&rdquo; remonstrated Rose, fighting every inch
+      of the ground.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Never you mind where he is,&rdquo; said the baroness. &ldquo;Write as I request.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, mamma,&rdquo; said Rose with sudden alacrity; for she had recovered her
+      ready wit, and was prepared to write anything, being now fully resolved
+      the letter should never go.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now sign my name.&rdquo; Rose complied. &ldquo;There; now fold it, and address it to
+      his lodgings.&rdquo; Rose did so; and, rising with a cheerful air, said she
+      would send Jacintha with it directly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She was half across the room when her mother called her quietly back.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, mademoiselle,&rdquo; said she sternly. &ldquo;You will give me the letter. I can
+      trust neither the friend of twenty years, nor the servant that stayed by
+      me in adversity, nor the daughter I suffered for and nursed. And why don&rsquo;t
+      I trust you? Because YOU HAVE TOLD ME A LIE.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At this word, which in its coarsest form she had never heard from those
+      high-born lips till then, Rose cowered like a hare.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay, A LIE,&rdquo; said the baroness. &ldquo;I saw Edouard Riviere in the park but
+      yesterday. I saw him. My old eyes are feeble, but they are not deceitful.
+      I saw him. Send my breakfast to my own room. I come of an ancient race: I
+      could not sit with liars; I should forget courtesy; you would see in my
+      face how thoroughly I scorn you all.&rdquo; And she went haughtily out with the
+      letter in her hand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose for the first time, was prostrated. Vain had been all this deceit;
+      her mother was not happy; was not blinded. Edouard might come and tell her
+      his story. Then no power could keep Josephine silent. The plot was
+      thickening; the fatal net was drawing closer and closer.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She sank with a groan into a chair, and body and spirit alike succumbed.
+      But that was only for a little while. To this prostration succeeded a
+      feverish excitement. She could not, would not, look Edouard in the face.
+      She would implore Josephine to be silent; and she herself would fly from
+      the chateau. But, if Josephine would not be silent? Why, then she would go
+      herself to Edouard, and throw herself upon his honor, and tell him the
+      truth. With this, she ran wildly up the stairs, and burst into Josephine&rsquo;s
+      room so suddenly, that she caught her, pale as death, on her knees, with a
+      letter in one hand and a phial of laudanum in the other.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0024" id="link2HCH0024">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XXIV.
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Josephine conveyed the phial into her bosom with wonderful rapidity and
+      dexterity, and rose to her feet. But Rose just saw her conceal something,
+      and resolved to find out quietly what it was. So she said nothing about
+      it, but asked Josephine what on earth she was doing.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I was praying.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And what is that letter?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A letter I have just received from Colonel Raynal.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose took the letter and read it. Raynal had written from Paris. He was
+      coming to Beaurepaire to stay a month, and was to arrive that very day.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then Rose forgot all about herself, and even what she had come for. She
+      clung about her sister&rsquo;s neck, and implored her, for her sake, to try and
+      love Raynal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine shuddered, and clung weeping to her sister in turn. For in
+      Rose&rsquo;s arms she realized more powerfully what that sister would suffer if
+      she were to die. Now, while they clung together, Rose felt something hard,
+      and contrived just to feel it with her cheek. It was the phial.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A chill suspicion crossed the poor girl. The attitude in which she had
+      found Josephine; the letter, the look of despair, and now this little
+      bottle, which she had hidden. WHY HIDE IT? She resolved not to let
+      Josephine out of her sight; at all events, until she had seen this little
+      bottle, and got it away from her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She helped her to dress, and breakfasted with her in the tapestried room,
+      and dissembled, and put on gayety, and made light of everything but
+      Josephine&rsquo;s health.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Her efforts were not quite in vain. Josephine became more composed; and
+      Rose even drew from her a half promise that she would give Raynal and time
+      a fair trial.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And now Rose was relieved of her immediate apprehensions for Josephine,
+      but the danger of another kind, from Edouard, remained. So she ran into
+      her bedroom for her bonnet and shawl, determined to take the strong
+      measure of visiting Edouard at once, or intercepting him. While she was
+      making her little toilet, she heard her mother&rsquo;s voice in the room. This
+      was unlucky; she must pass through that room to go out. She sat down and
+      fretted at this delay. And then, as the baroness appeared to be very
+      animated, Rose went to the keyhole, and listened. Their mother was telling
+      Josephine how she had questioned Rose, and how Rose had told her an
+      untruth, and how she had made that young lady write to Edouard, etc.; in
+      short, the very thing Rose wanted to conceal from Josephine.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose lost all patience, and determined to fly through the room and out
+      before anybody could stop her. She heard Jacintha come in with some
+      message, and thought that would be a good opportunity to slip out
+      unmolested. So she opened the door softly. Jacintha, it seemed, had been
+      volunteering some remark that was not well received, for the baroness was
+      saying, sharply, &ldquo;Your opinion is not asked. Go down directly, and bring
+      him up here, to this room.&rdquo; Jacintha cast a look of dismay at Rose, and
+      vanished.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose gathered from that look, as much as from the words, who the visitor
+      was. She made a dart after Jacintha. But the room was a long one, and the
+      baroness intercepted her: &ldquo;No,&rdquo; said she, gravely, &ldquo;I cannot spare you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose stood pale and panting, but almost defiant. &ldquo;Mamma,&rdquo; said she, &ldquo;if it
+      is Monsieur Riviere, I MUST ask your leave to retire. And you have neither
+      love nor pity, nor respect for me, if you detain me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mademoiselle!&rdquo; was the stern reply, &ldquo;I FORBID you to move. Be good enough
+      to sit there;&rdquo; with which the baroness pointed imperiously to a sofa at
+      the other side of the room. &ldquo;Josephine, go to your room.&rdquo; Josephine
+      retired, casting more than one anxious glance over her shoulder.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose looked this way and that in despair and terror; but ended by sinking,
+      more dead than alive, into the seat indicated; and even as she drooped,
+      pale and trembling, on that sofa, Edouard Riviere, worn and agitated,
+      entered the room, and bowed low to them all, without a word.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness looked at him, and then at her daughter, as much as to say,
+      now I have got you; deceive me now if you can. &ldquo;Rose, my dear,&rdquo; said this
+      terrible old woman, affecting honeyed accents, &ldquo;don&rsquo;t you see Monsieur
+      Riviere?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The poor girl at this challenge rose with difficulty, and courtesied
+      humbly to Edouard.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He bowed to her, and stealing a rapid glance saw her pallor and distress;
+      and that showed him she was not so hardened as he had thought.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have not come to see us lately,&rdquo; said the baroness, quietly, &ldquo;yet you
+      have been in the neighborhood.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      These words puzzled Edouard. Was the old lady all in the dark, then? As a
+      public man he had already learned to be on his guard; so he stammered out,
+      &ldquo;That he had been much occupied with public duties.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Madame de Beaurepaire despised this threadbare excuse too much to notice
+      it at all. She went on as if he had said nothing. &ldquo;Intimate as you were
+      with us, you must have some reason for deserting us so suddenly.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have,&rdquo; said Edouard, gravely.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What is it?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Excuse me,&rdquo; said Edouard, sullenly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, monsieur, I cannot. This neglect, succeeding to a somewhat ardent
+      pursuit of my daughter, is almost an affront. You shall, of course,
+      withdraw yourself altogether, if you choose. But not without an
+      explanation. This much is due to me; and, if you are a gentleman, you will
+      not withhold it from me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If he is a gentleman!&rdquo; cried Rose; &ldquo;O mamma, do not you affront a
+      gentleman, who never, never gave you nor me any ground of offence. Why
+      affront the friends and benefactors we have lost by our own fault?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, then, it is all your fault,&rdquo; said the baroness. &ldquo;I feared as much.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;All my fault, all,&rdquo; said Rose; then putting her pretty palms together,
+      and casting a look of abject supplication on Edouard, she murmured, &ldquo;my
+      temper!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do not you put words into his mouth,&rdquo; said the shrewd old lady. &ldquo;Come,
+      Monsieur Riviere, be a man, and tell me the truth. What has she said to
+      you? What has she done?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      By this time the abject state of terror the high-spirited Rose was in, and
+      her piteous glances, had so disarmed Edouard, that he had not the heart to
+      expose her to her mother.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madame,&rdquo; said he, stiffly, taking Rose&rsquo;s hint, &ldquo;my temper and
+      mademoiselle&rsquo;s could not accord.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, her temper is charming: it is joyous, equal, and gentle.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You misunderstand me, madame; I do not reproach Mademoiselle Rose. It is
+      I who am to blame.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;For what?&rdquo; inquired the baroness dryly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;For not being able to make her love me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh! that is it! She did not love you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ask herself, madame,&rdquo; said Edouard, bitterly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Rose,&rdquo; said the baroness, her eye now beginning to twinkle, &ldquo;were you
+      really guilty of such a want of discrimination? Didn&rsquo;t you love monsieur?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose flung her arms round her mother&rsquo;s neck, and said, &ldquo;No, mamma, I did
+      not love Monsieur Edouard,&rdquo; in an exquisite tone of love, that to a female
+      ear conveyed the exact opposite of the words.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But Edouard had not that nice discriminating ear. He sighed deeply, and
+      the baroness smiled. &ldquo;You tell me that?&rdquo; said she, &ldquo;and you are crying!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She is crying, madame?&rdquo; said Edouard, inquiringly, and taking a step
+      towards them.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, you see she is, you foolish boy. Come, I must put an end to this;&rdquo;
+       and she rose coolly from her seat, and begging Edouard to forgive her for
+      leaving him a moment with his deadly enemy, went off with knowing little
+      nods into Josephine&rsquo;s room; only, before she entered it, she turned, and
+      with a maternal smile discharged this word at the pair.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Babies!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      But between the alienated lovers was a long distressing silence. Neither
+      knew what to say; and their situation was intolerable. At last Rose
+      ventured in a timorous voice to say, &ldquo;I thank you for your generosity. But
+      I knew that you would not betray me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your secret is safe for me,&rdquo; sighed Edouard. &ldquo;Is there anything else I
+      can do for you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose shook her head sadly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Edouard moved to the door.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose bowed her head with a despairing moan. It took him by the heart and
+      held him. He hesitated, then came towards her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I see you are sorry for what you have done to me who loved you so; and
+      you loved me. Oh! yes, do not deny it, Rose; there was a time you loved
+      me. And that makes it worse: to have given me such sweet hopes, only to
+      crush both them and me. And is not this cruel of you to weep so and let me
+      see your penitence&mdash;when it is too late?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Alas! how can I help my regrets? I have insulted so good a friend.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      There was a sad silence. Then as he looked at her, her looks belied the
+      charge her own lips had made against herself.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A light seemed to burst on Edouard from that high-minded, sorrow-stricken
+      face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tell me it is false!&rdquo; he cried.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She hid her face in her hands&mdash;woman&rsquo;s instinct to avoid being read.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tell me you were misled then, fascinated, perverted, but that your heart
+      returned to me. Clear yourself of deliberate deceit, and I will believe
+      and thank you on my knees.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Heaven have pity on us both!&rdquo; cried poor Rose.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;On us! Thank you for saying on us. See now, you have not gained happiness
+      by destroying mine. One word&mdash;do you love that man?&mdash;that
+      Dujardin?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You know I do not.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am glad of that; since his life is forfeited; if he escapes my friend
+      Raynal, he shall not escape me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose uttered a cry of terror. &ldquo;Hush! not so loud. The life of Camille! Oh!
+      if he were to die, what would become of&mdash;oh, pray do not speak so
+      loud.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Own then that you DO love him,&rdquo; yelled Edouard; &ldquo;give me truth, if you
+      have no love to give. Own that you love him, and he shall be safe. It is
+      myself I will kill, for being such a slave as to love you still.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose&rsquo;s fortitude gave way.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I cannot bear it,&rdquo; she cried despairingly; &ldquo;it is beyond my strength;
+      Edouard, swear to me you will keep what I tell you secret as the grave!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah!&rdquo; cried Edouard, all radiant with hope, &ldquo;I swear.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then you are under a delirium. I have deceived, but never wronged you;
+      that unhappy child is not&mdash;Hush! HERE SHE COMES.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness came smiling out, and Josephine&rsquo;s wan, anxious face was seen
+      behind her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said the baroness, &ldquo;is the war at an end? What, are we still
+      silent? Let me try then what I can do. Edouard, lend me your hand.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      While Edouard hesitated, Josephine clasped her hands and mutely
+      supplicated him to consent. Her sad face, and the thought of how often she
+      had stood his friend, shook his resolution. He held out his hand, but
+      slowly and reluctantly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There is my hand,&rdquo; he groaned.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And here is mine, mamma,&rdquo; said Rose, smiling to please her mother.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Oh! the mixture of feeling, when her soft warm palm pressed his. How the
+      delicious sense baffled and mystified the cold judgment.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine raised her eyes thankfully to heaven.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      While the young lovers yet thrilled at each other&rsquo;s touch, yet could not
+      look one another in the face, a clatter of horses&rsquo; feet was heard.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That is Colonel Raynal,&rdquo; said Josephine, with unnatural calmness. &ldquo;I
+      expected him to-day.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness was at the side window in a moment.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is he!&mdash;it is he!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She hurried down to embrace her son.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine went without a word to her own room. Rose followed her the next
+      minute. But in that one minute she worked magic.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She glided up to Edouard, and looked him full in the face: not the sad,
+      depressed, guilty-looking humble Rose of a moment before, but the old
+      high-spirited, and some what imperious girl.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have shown yourself noble this day. I am going to trust you as only
+      the noble are trusted. Stay in the house till I can speak to you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She was gone, and something leaped within Edouard&rsquo;s bosom, and a flood of
+      light seemed to burst in on him. Yet he saw no object clearly: but he saw
+      light.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose ran into Josephine&rsquo;s room, and once more surprised her on her knees,
+      and in the very act of hiding something in her bosom.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What are you doing, Josephine, on your knees?&rdquo; said she, sternly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have a great trial to go through,&rdquo; was the hesitating answer.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose said nothing. She turned paler. She is deceiving me, thought she, and
+      she sat down full of bitterness and terror, and, affecting not to watch
+      Josephine, watched her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Go and tell them I am coming, Rose.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, Josephine, I will not leave you till this terrible meeting is over.
+      We will encounter him hand in hand, as we used to go when our hearts were
+      one, and we deceived others, but never each other.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At this tender reproach Josephine fell upon her neck and wept.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I will not deceive you,&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;I am worse than the poor doctor
+      thinks me. My life is but a little candle that a breath may put out any
+      day.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose said nothing, but trembled and watched her keenly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My little Henri,&rdquo; said Josephine imploringly, &ldquo;what would you do with him&mdash;if
+      anything should happen to me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What would I do with him? He is mine. I should be his mother. Oh! what
+      words are these: my heart! my heart!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, dearest; some day you will be married, and owe all the mother to your
+      children; and Henri is not ours only: he belongs to some one I have seemed
+      unkind to. Perhaps he thinks me heartless. For I am a foolish woman; I
+      don&rsquo;t know how to be virtuous, yet show a man my heart. But THEN he will
+      understand me and forgive me. Rose, love, you will write to him. He will
+      come to you. You will go together to the place where I shall be sleeping.
+      You will show him my heart. You will tell him all my long love that lasted
+      to the end. YOU need not blush to tell him all. I have no right. Then you
+      will give him his poor Josephine&rsquo;s boy, and you will say to him, &lsquo;She
+      never loved but you: she gives you all that is left of her, her child. She
+      only prays you not to give him a bad mother.&rsquo;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Poor soul! this was her one bit of little, gentle jealousy; but it made
+      her eyes stream. She would have put out her hand from the tomb to keep her
+      boy&rsquo;s father single all his life.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh! my Josephine, my darling sister,&rdquo; cried Rose, &ldquo;why do you speak of
+      death? Do you meditate a crime?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No; but it was on my heart to say it: it has done me good.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;At least, take me to your bosom, my well-beloved, that I may not SEE your
+      tears.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There&mdash;tears? No, you have lightened my heart. Bless you! bless
+      you!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The sisters twined their bosoms together in a long, gentle embrace. You
+      might have taken them for two angels that flowed together in one love, but
+      for their tears.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A deep voice was now heard in the sitting-room.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine and Rose postponed the inevitable one moment more, by arranging
+      their hair in the glass: then they opened the door, and entered the
+      tapestried room.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Raynal was sitting on the sofa, the baroness&rsquo;s hand in his. Edouard was
+      not there.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Colonel Raynal had given him a strange look, and said, &ldquo;What, you here?&rdquo;
+       in a tone of voice that was intolerable.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Raynal came to meet the sisters. He saluted Josephine on the brow.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are pale, wife: and how cold her hand is.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She has been ill this month past,&rdquo; said Rose interposing.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You look ill, too, Mademoiselle Rose.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Never mind,&rdquo; cried the baroness joyously, &ldquo;you will revive them both.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Raynal made no reply to that.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How long do you stay this time, a day?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A month, mother.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The doctor now joined the party, and friendly greetings passed between him
+      and Raynal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But ere long somehow all became conscious this was not a joyful meeting.
+      The baroness could not alone sustain the spirits of the party, and soon
+      even she began to notice that Raynal&rsquo;s replies were short, and that his
+      manner was distrait and gloomy. The sisters saw this too, and trembled for
+      what might be coming.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At last Raynal said bluntly, &ldquo;Josephine, I want to speak to you alone.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness gave the doctor a look, and made an excuse for going
+      down-stairs to her own room. As she was going Josephine went to her and
+      said calmly,&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mother, you have not kissed me to-day.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There! Bless you, my darling!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Raynal looked at Rose. She saw she must go, but she lingered, and sought
+      her sister&rsquo;s eye: it avoided her. At that Rose ran to the doctor, who was
+      just going out of the door.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh! doctor,&rdquo; she whispered trembling, &ldquo;don&rsquo;t go beyond the door. I found
+      her praying. My mind misgives me. She is going to tell him&mdash;or
+      something worse.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What do you mean?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am afraid to say all I dread. She could not be so calm if she meant to
+      live. Be near! as I shall. She has a phial hid in her bosom.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She left the old man trembling, and went back.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Excuse me,&rdquo; said she to Raynal, &ldquo;I only came to ask Josephine if she
+      wants anything.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No!&mdash;yes!&mdash;a glass of eau sucree.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose mixed it for her. While doing this she noticed that Josephine shunned
+      her eye, but Raynal gazed gently and with an air of pity on her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She retired slowly into Josephine&rsquo;s bedroom, but did not quite close the
+      door.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Raynal had something to say so painful that he shrank from plunging into
+      it. He therefore, like many others, tried to creep into it, beginning with
+      something else.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your health,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;alarms me. You seem sad, too. I don&rsquo;t understand
+      that. You have no news from the Rhine, have you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Monsieur!&rdquo; said Josephine scared.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do not call me monsieur, nor look so frightened. Call me your friend. I
+      am your sincere friend.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, yes; you always were.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thank you. You will give me a dearer title before we part this time.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said Josephine in a low whisper, and shuddered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Have you forgiven me frightening you so that night?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It was a shock to me, too, I can tell you. I like the boy. She professed
+      to love him, and, to own the truth, I loathe all treachery and deceit. If
+      I had done a murder, I would own it. A lie doubles every crime. But I took
+      heart; we are all selfish, we men; of the two sisters one was all
+      innocence and good faith; and she was the one I had chosen.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At these words Josephine rose, like a statue moving, and took a phial from
+      her bosom and poured the contents into the glass.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But ere she could drink it, if such was her intention, Raynal, with his
+      eyes gloomily lowered, said, in a voice full of strange solemnity,&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I went to the army of the Rhine.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine put down the glass directly, though without removing her hand
+      from it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I see you understand me, and approve. Yes, I saw that your sister would
+      be dishonored, and I went to the army and saw her seducer.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You saw HIM. Oh, I hope you did not go and speak to him of&mdash;of
+      this?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, of course I did.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine resolved to know the worst at once. &ldquo;May I ask,&rdquo; said she, &ldquo;what
+      you told him?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, I told him all I had discovered, and pointed out the course he must
+      take; he must marry your sister at once. He refused. I challenged him. But
+      ere we met, I was ordered to lead a forlorn hope against a bastion. Then,
+      seeing me go to certain death, the noble fellow pitied me. I mean this is
+      how I understood it all at the time; at any rate, he promised to marry
+      Rose if he should live.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine put out her hand, and with a horrible smile said, &ldquo;I thank you;
+      you have saved the honor of our family;&rdquo; and with no more ado, she took
+      the glass in her hand to drink the fatal contents.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But Raynal&rsquo;s reply arrested her hand. He said solemnly, &ldquo;No, I have not.
+      Have you no inkling of the terrible truth? Do not fiddle with that glass:
+      drink it, or leave it alone; for, indeed, I need all your attention.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He took the glass out of her patient hand, and with a furtive look at the
+      bedroom-door, drew her away to the other end of the room; &ldquo;and,&rdquo; said he,
+      &ldquo;I could not tell your mother, for she knows nothing of the girl&rsquo;s folly;
+      still less Rose, for I see she loves him still, or why is she so pale?
+      Advise me, now, whilst we are alone. Colonel Dujardin was COMPARATIVELY
+      indifferent to YOU. Will you undertake the task? A rough soldier like me
+      is not the person to break the terrible tidings to that poor girl.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What tidings? You confuse, you perplex me. Oh! what does this horrible
+      preparation mean?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It means he will never marry your sister; he will never see her more.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Then Raynal walked the room in great agitation, which at once communicated
+      itself to his hearer. But the loving heart is ingenious in avoiding its
+      dire misgivings.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I see,&rdquo; said she; &ldquo;he told you he would never visit Beaurepaire again. He
+      was right.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Raynal shook his head sorrowfully.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, Josephine, you are far from the truth. I was to attack the bastion.
+      It was mined by the enemy, and he knew it. He took advantage of my back
+      being turned. He led his men out of the trenches; he assaulted the bastion
+      at the head of his brigade. He took it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, it was noble; it was like him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The enemy, retiring, blew the bastion into the air, and Dujardin&mdash;is
+      dead.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dead!&rdquo; said Josephine, in stupefied tones, as if the word conveyed no
+      meaning to her mind, benumbed and stunned by the blow.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t speak so loud,&rdquo; said Raynal; &ldquo;I hear the poor girl at the door. Ay,
+      he took my place, and is dead.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dead!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Swallowed up in smoke and flames, overwhelmed and crushed under the
+      ruins.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine&rsquo;s whole body gave way, and heaved like a tree falling under the
+      axe. She sank slowly to her knees, and low moans of agony broke from her
+      at intervals. &ldquo;Dead, dead, dead!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is it not terrible?&rdquo; he cried.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She did not see him nor hear him, but moaned out wildly, &ldquo;Dead, dead,
+      dead!&rdquo; The bedroom-door was opened.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She shrieked with sudden violence, &ldquo;Dead! ah, pity! the glass! the
+      composing draught.&rdquo; She stretched her hands out wildly. Raynal, with a
+      face full of concern, ran to the table, and got the glass. She crawled on
+      her knees to meet it; he brought it quickly to her hand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There, my poor soul!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Even as their hands met, Rose threw herself on the cup, and snatched it
+      with fury from them both. She was white as ashes, and her eyes,
+      supernaturally large, glared on Raynal with terror. &ldquo;Madman!&rdquo; she cried,
+      &ldquo;would you kill her?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He glared back on her: what did this mean? Their eyes were fixed on each
+      other like combatants for life and death; they did not see that the room
+      was filling with people, that the doctor was only on the other side of the
+      table, and that the baroness and Edouard were at the door, and all looking
+      wonderstruck at this strange sight&mdash;Josephine on her knees, and those
+      two facing each other, white, with dilating eyes, the glass between them.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But what was that to the horror, when the next moment the patient
+      Josephine started to her feet, and, standing in the midst, tore her hair
+      by handfuls, out of her head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, you snatch the kind poison from me!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Poison!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Poison!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Poison!&rdquo; cried the others, horror-stricken.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah! you won&rsquo;t let me die. Curse you all! curse you! I never had my own
+      way in anything. I was always a slave and a fool. I have murdered the man
+      I love&mdash;I love. Yes, my husband, do you hear? the man I love.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hush! daughter, respect my gray hairs.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your gray hairs! You are not so old in years as I am in agony. So this is
+      your love, Rose! Ah, you won&rsquo;t let me die&mdash;won&rsquo;t you? THEN I&rsquo;LL DO
+      WORSE&mdash;I&rsquo;LL TELL.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He who is dead; you have murdered him amongst you, and I&rsquo;ll follow him in
+      spite of you all&mdash;he was my betrothed. He struggled wounded,
+      bleeding, to my feet. He found me married. News came of my husband&rsquo;s
+      death; I married my betrothed.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Married him!&rdquo; exclaimed the baroness.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah, my poor mother. And she kissed me so kindly just now&mdash;she will
+      kiss me no more. Oh, I am not ashamed of marrying him. I am only ashamed
+      of the cowardice that dared not do it in face of all the world. We had
+      scarce been happy a fortnight, when a letter came from Colonel Raynal. He
+      was alive. I drove my true husband away, wretch that I was. None but bad
+      women have an atom of sense. I tried to do my duty to my legal husband. He
+      was my benefactor. I thought it was my duty. Was it? I don&rsquo;t know: I have
+      lost the sense of right and wrong. I turned from a living creature to a
+      lie. He who had scattered benefits on me and all this house; he whom it
+      was too little to love; he ought to have been adored: this man came here
+      one night to wife proud, joyous, and warm-hearted. He found a cradle, and
+      two women watching it. Now Edouard, now MONSIEUR, do you see that life is
+      IMPOSSIBLE to me? One bravely accused herself: she was innocent. One
+      swooned away like a guilty coward.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Edouard uttered an exclamation.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, Edouard, you shall not be miserable like me; she was guilty. You do
+      not understand me yet, my poor mother&mdash;and she was so happy this
+      morning&mdash;I was the liar, the coward, the double-faced wife, the
+      miserable mother that denied her child. Now will you let me die? Now do
+      you see that I can&rsquo;t and won&rsquo;t live upon shame and despair? Ah, Monsieur
+      Raynal, my dear friend, you were always generous: you will pity and kill
+      me. I have dishonored the name you gave me to keep: I am neither
+      Beaurepaire nor Raynal. Do pray kill me, monsieur&mdash;Jean, do pray
+      release me from my life!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And she crawled to his knees and embraced them, and kissed his hand, and
+      pleaded more piteously for death, than others have begged for life.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Raynal stood like a rock: he was pale, and drew his breath audibly, but
+      not a word. Then came a sight scarce less terrible than Josephine&rsquo;s
+      despair. The baroness, looking and moving twenty years older than an hour
+      before, tottered across the room to Raynal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sir, you whom I have called my son, but whom I will never presume so to
+      call again, I thought I had lived long enough never to have to blush
+      again. I loved you, monsieur. I prayed every day for you. But she who WAS
+      my daughter was not of my mind. Monsieur, I have never knelt but to God
+      and to my king, and I kneel to you: forgive us, sir, forgive us!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She tried to go down on her knees. He raised her with his strong arm, but
+      he could not speak. She turned on the others.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So this is the secret you were hiding from me! This secret has not killed
+      you all. Oh! I shall not live under its shame so long as you have. Chateau
+      of Beaurepaire&mdash;nest of treason, ingratitude, and immodesty&mdash;I
+      loathe you as much as once I loved you. I will go and hide my head, and
+      die elsewhere.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Stay, madame!&rdquo; said he, in a voice whose depth and dignity was such that
+      it seemed impossible to disobey it. &ldquo;It was sudden&mdash;I was shaken&mdash;but
+      I am myself again.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, show some pity!&rdquo; cried Rose.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I shall try to be just.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      There was a long, trembling silence; and during that silence and terrible
+      agitation, one figure stood firm among those quaking, beating hearts, like
+      a rock with the waves breaking round it&mdash;the MAN OF PRINCIPLE among
+      the creatures of impulse.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He raised Josephine from her knees, and placed her all limp and powerless
+      in an arm-chair. To her frenzy had now succeeded a sickness and feebleness
+      like unto death.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Widow Dujardin,&rdquo; said he, in a broken voice, &ldquo;listen to me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She moaned a sort of assent.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your mistake has been not trusting me. I was your friend, and not a
+      selfish friend. I was not enough in love with you to destroy your
+      happiness. Besides, I despise that sort of love. If you had told me all, I
+      would have spared you this misery. By the present law, civil contracts of
+      marriage can be dissolved by mutual consent.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At this the baroness uttered some sign of surprise.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah!&rdquo; continued Raynal, sadly, &ldquo;you are aristocrats, and cannot keep pace
+      with the times. This very day our mere contract shall be formally
+      dissolved. Indeed, it ceases to exist since both parties are resolved to
+      withdraw from it. So, if you married Dujardin in a church, you are Madame
+      Dujardin at this moment, and his child is legitimate. What does she say?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      This question was to Rose, for what Josephine uttered sounded like a mere
+      articulate moan. But Rose&rsquo;s quick ear had caught words, and she replied,
+      all in tears, &ldquo;My poor sister is blessing you, sir. We all bless you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She does not understand my position,&rdquo; said Raynal. He then walked up to
+      Josephine, and leaning over her arm, and speaking rather loud, under the
+      impression that her senses were blunted by grief, he said, &ldquo;Look here:
+      Colonel Dujardin, your husband, deliberately, and with his eyes open,
+      sacrificed his life for me, and for his own heroic sense of honor. Now, it
+      is my turn. If that hero stood here, and asked me for all the blood in my
+      body, I would give it him. He is gone; but, dying for me, he has left me
+      his widow and his child; they remain under my wing. To protect them is my
+      pride, and my only consolation. I am going to the mayor to annul our
+      unlucky contract in due form, and make us brother and sister instead.
+      But,&rdquo; turning to the baroness, &ldquo;don&rsquo;t you think to escape me as your
+      daughter has done: no, no, old lady, once a mother, always a mother. Stir
+      from your son&rsquo;s home if you dare!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And with these words, in speaking which his voice had recovered its iron
+      firmness, he strode out at the door, superb in manhood and principle, and
+      every eye turned with wonder and admiration after him. Even when he was
+      gone they gazed at the door by which a creature so strangely noble had
+      disappeared.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness was about to follow him without taking any notice of
+      Josephine. But Rose caught her by the gown. &ldquo;O mother, speak to poor
+      Josephine: bid her live.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness only made a gesture of horror and disgust, and turned her
+      back on them both.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine, who had tottered up from her seat at Rose&rsquo;s words, sank heavily
+      down again, and murmured, &ldquo;Ah! the grave holds all that love me now.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose ran to her side. &ldquo;Cruel Josephine! what, do not I love you? Mother,
+      will you not help me persuade her to live? Oh! if she dies, I will die
+      too; you will kill both your children.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Stern and indignant as the baroness was, yet these words pierced her
+      heart. She turned with a piteous, half apologetic air to Edouard and
+      Aubertin. &ldquo;Gentlemen,&rdquo; said she, &ldquo;she has been foolish, not guilty. Heaven
+      pardons the best of us. Surely a mother may forgive her child.&rdquo; And with
+      this nature conquered utterly; and she held out her arms, wide, wide, as
+      is a mother&rsquo;s heart. Her two erring children rushed sobbing violently into
+      them; and there was not a dry eye in the room for a long time.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      After this, Josephine&rsquo;s heart almost ceased to beat. Fear and misgivings,
+      and the heavy sense of deceit gnawing an honorable heart, were gone. Grief
+      reigned alone in the pale, listless, bereaved widow.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The marriage was annulled before the mayor; and, three days afterwards,
+      Raynal, by his influence, got the consummated marriage formally allowed in
+      Paris.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      With a delicacy for which one would hardly have given him credit, he never
+      came near Beaurepaire till all this was settled; but he brought the
+      document from Paris that made Josephine the widow Dujardin, and her boy
+      the heir of Beaurepaire; and the moment she was really Madame Dujardin he
+      avoided her no longer; and he became a comfort to her instead of a terror.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The dissolution of the marriage was a great tie between them. So much
+      that, seeing how much she looked up to Raynal, the doctor said one day to
+      the baroness, &ldquo;If I know anything of human nature, they will marry again,
+      provided none of you give her a hint which way her heart is turning.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They, who have habituated themselves to live for others, can suffer as
+      well as do great things. Josephine kept alive. A passion such as hers, in
+      a selfish nature, must have killed her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Even as it was, she often said, &ldquo;It is hard to live.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Then they used to talk to her of her boy. Would she leave him&mdash;Camille&rsquo;s
+      boy&mdash;without a mother? And these words were never spoken to her quite
+      in vain.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Her mother forgave her entirely, and loved her as before. Who could be
+      angry with her long? The air was no longer heavy with lies. Wretched as
+      she was, she breathed lighter. Joy and hope were gone. Sorrowful peace was
+      coming. When the heart comes to this, nothing but Time can cure; but what
+      will not Time do? What wounds have I seen him heal! His cures are
+      incredible.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The little party sat one day, peaceful, but silent and sad, in the
+      Pleasaunce, under the great oak.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Two soldiers came to the gate. They walked feebly, for one was lame, and
+      leaned upon the other, who was pale and weak, and leaned upon a stick.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Soldiers,&rdquo; said Raynal, &ldquo;and invalided.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Give them food and wine,&rdquo; said Josephine.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose went towards them; but she had scarcely taken three steps ere she
+      cried out,&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is Dard! it is poor Dard! Come in, Dard, come in.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Dard limped towards them, leaning upon Sergeant La Croix. A bit of Dard&rsquo;s
+      heel had been shot away, and of La Croix&rsquo;s head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Rose ran to the kitchen.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Jacintha, bring out a table into the Pleasaunce, and something for two
+      guests to eat.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The soldiers came slowly to the Pleasaunce, and were welcomed, and invited
+      to sit down, and received with respect; for France even in that day
+      honored the humblest of her brave.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Soon Jacintha came out with a little round table in her hands, and
+      affected a composure which was belied by her shaking hands and her glowing
+      cheek.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      After a few words of homely welcome&mdash;not eloquent, but very sincere&mdash;she
+      went off again with her apron to her eyes. She reappeared with the good
+      cheer, and served the poor fellows with radiant zeal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What regiment?&rdquo; asked Raynal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Dard was about to answer, but his superior stopped him severely; then,
+      rising with his hand to his forehead, he replied, with pride,
+      &ldquo;Twenty-fourth brigade, second company. We were cut up at Philipsburg, and
+      incorporated with the 12th.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Raynal instantly regretted his question; for Josephine&rsquo;s eye fixed on
+      Sergeant La Croix with an expression words cannot paint. Yet she showed
+      more composure, real or forced, than he expected.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Heaven sends him,&rdquo; said she. &ldquo;My friend, tell me, were you&mdash;ah!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Colonel Raynal interfered hastily. &ldquo;Think what you do. He can tell you
+      nothing but what we know, not so much, in fact, as we know; for, now I
+      look at him, I think this is the very sergeant we found lying insensible
+      under the bastion. He must have been struck before the bastion was taken
+      even.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I was, colonel, I was. I remember nothing but losing my senses, and
+      feeling the colors go out of my hand.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There, you see, he knows nothing,&rdquo; said Raynal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It was hot work, colonel, under that bastion, but it was hotter to the
+      poor fellows that got in. I heard all about it from Private Dard here.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So, then, it was you who carried the colors?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, I was struck down with the colors of the brigade in my hand,&rdquo; cried
+      La Croix.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;See how people blunder about, everything; they told me the colonel
+      carried the colors.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, of course he did. You don&rsquo;t think our colonel, the fighting colonel,
+      would let me hold the colors of the brigade so long as he was alive. No;
+      he was struck by a Prussian bullet, and he had just time to hand the
+      colors to me, and point with his sword to the bastion, and down he went.
+      It was hot work, I can tell you. I did not hold them long, not thirty
+      seconds, and if we could know their history, they passed through more
+      hands than that before they got to the Prussian flag-staff.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Raynal suddenly rose, and walked rapidly to and fro, with his hands behind
+      him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Poor colonel!&rdquo; continued La Croix. &ldquo;Well, I love to think he died like a
+      soldier, and not like some of my poor comrades, hashed to atoms, and not a
+      volley fired over him. I hope they put a stone over him, for he was the
+      best soldier and the best general in the army.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;O sir!&rdquo; cried Josephine, &ldquo;there is no stone even to mark the spot where
+      he fell,&rdquo; and she sobbed despairingly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, how is this, Private Dard?&rdquo; inquired La Croix, sternly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Dard apologized for his comrade, and touching his own head significantly
+      told them that since his wound the sergeant&rsquo;s memory was defective.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now, sergeant, didn&rsquo;t I tell you the colonel must have got the better of
+      his wound, and got into the battery?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It&rsquo;s false, Private Dard; don&rsquo;t I know our colonel better than that?
+      Would ever he have let those colors out of his hand, if there had been an
+      ounce of life left in him?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He died at the foot of the battery, I tell you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then why didn&rsquo;t we find him?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Here Jacintha put in a word with the quiet subdued meaning of her class.
+      &ldquo;I can&rsquo;t find that anybody ever saw the colonel dead.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;They did not find him, because they did not look for him,&rdquo; said Sergeant
+      La Croix.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;God forgive you, sergeant!&rdquo; said Dard, with some feeling. &ldquo;Not look for
+      OUR COLONEL! We turned over every body that lay there,&mdash;full thirty
+      there were,&mdash;and you were one of them.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Only thirty! Why, we settled more Prussians than that, I&rsquo;ll swear.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh! they carried off their dead.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay! but I don&rsquo;t see why they should carry our colonel off. His epaulets
+      was all the thieves could do any good with. Stop! yet I do, Private Dard;
+      I have a horrible suspicion. No, I have not; it is a certainty. What!
+      don&rsquo;t you see, ye ninny? Thunder and thousands of devils, here&rsquo;s a
+      disgrace. Dogs of Prussians! they have got our colonel, they have taken
+      him prisoner.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;O God bless them!&rdquo; cried Josephine; &ldquo;O God bless the mouth that tells me
+      so! O sir, I am his wife, his poor heart-broken wife. You would not be so
+      cruel as to mock my despair. Say again that he may be alive, pray, say it
+      again!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;His wife! Private Dard, why didn&rsquo;t you tell me? You tell me nothing. Yes,
+      my pretty lady, I&rsquo;ll say it again, and I&rsquo;ll prove it. Here is an enemy in
+      full retreat, would they encumber themselves with the colonel? If he was
+      dead, they&rsquo;d have whipped off his epaulets, and left him there. Alive? why
+      not? Look at me: I am alive, and I was worse wounded than he was. They
+      took me for dead, you see. Courage, madame! you will see him again, take
+      an old soldier&rsquo;s word for it. Dard, attention! this is the colonel&rsquo;s
+      wife.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She gazed on the speaker like one in a trance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Every eye and every soul had been so bent on Sergeant La Croix that it was
+      only now Raynal was observed to be missing. The next minute he came riding
+      out of the stable-yard, and went full gallop down the road.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ah!&rdquo; cried Rose, with a burst of hope; &ldquo;he thinks so too; he has hopes.
+      He is gone somewhere for information. Perhaps to Paris.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine&rsquo;s excitement and alternations of hope and fear were now
+      alarming. Rose held her hand, and implored her to try and be calm till
+      they could see Raynal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Just before dark he came riding fiercely home. Josephine flew down the
+      stairs. Raynal at sight of her forgot all his caution. He waved his cocked
+      hat in the air. She fell on her knees and thanked God. He gasped out,&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Prisoner&mdash;exchanged for two Prussian lieutenants&mdash;sent home&mdash;they
+      say he is in France!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The tears of joy gushed in streams from her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Some days passed in hope and joy inexpressible; but the good doctor was
+      uneasy for Josephine. She was always listening with supernatural keenness
+      and starting from her chair, and every fibre of her lovely person seemed
+      to be on the quiver.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Nor was Rose without a serious misgiving. Would husband and wife ever
+      meet? He evidently looked on her as Madame Raynal, and made it a point of
+      honor to keep away from Beaurepaire.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They had recourse to that ever-soothing influence&mdash;her child. Madame
+      Jouvenel was settled in the village, and Josephine visited her every day,
+      and came back often with red eyes, but always soothed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      One day Rose and she went to Madame Jouvenel, and, entering the house
+      without ceremony, found the nurse out, and no one watching the child.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How careless!&rdquo; said Rose.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine stopped eagerly to kiss him. But instead of kissing him, she
+      uttered a loud cry. There was a locket hanging round his neck.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was a locket containing some of Josephine&rsquo;s hair and Camille&rsquo;s. She had
+      given it him in the happy days that followed their marriage. She stood
+      gasping in the middle of the room. Madame Jouvenel came running in soon
+      after. Josephine, by a wonderful effort over herself, asked her calmly and
+      cunningly,&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Where is the gentleman who put this locket round my child&rsquo;s neck? I want
+      to speak with him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Madame Jouvenel stammered and looked confused.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A soldier&mdash;an officer?&mdash;come, tell me!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Woman,&rdquo; cried Rose, &ldquo;why do you hesitate?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What am I to do?&rdquo; said Madame Jouvenel. &ldquo;He made me swear never to
+      mention his coming here. He goes away, or hides whenever you come. And
+      since Madame does not love the poor wounded gentleman, what can he do
+      better?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not love him!&rdquo; cried Rose: &ldquo;why, she is his wife, his lawful wedded wife;
+      he is a fool or a monster to run away for her. She loves him as no woman
+      ever loved before. She pines for him. She dies for him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The door of a little back room opened at these words of Rose, and there
+      stood Camille, with his arm in a sling, pale and astounded, but great joy
+      and wonder working in his face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Josephine gave a cry of love that made the other two women weep, and in a
+      moment they were sobbing for joy upon each other&rsquo;s neck.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Away went sorrow, doubt, despair, and all they had suffered. That one
+      moment paid for all. And in that moment of joy and surprise, so great as
+      to be almost terrible, perhaps it was well for Josephine that Camille,
+      weakened by his wound, was quite overcome, and nearly fainted. She was
+      herself just going into hysterics; but, seeing him quite overcome, she
+      conquered them directly, and nursed, and soothed, and pitied, and
+      encouraged him instead.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then they sat hand in hand. Their happiness stopped their very breath.
+      They could not speak. So Rose told him all. He never owned why he had
+      slipped away when he saw them coming. He forgot it. He forgot all his hard
+      thoughts of her. They took him home in the carriage. His wife would not
+      let him out of her sight. For years and years after this she could hardly
+      bear to let him be an hour out of her sight.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The world is wide; there may be a man in it who can paint the sudden bliss
+      that fell on these two much suffering hearts; but I am not that man; this
+      is beyond me; it was not only heaven, but heaven after hell.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Leave we the indescribable and the unspeakable for a moment, and go to a
+      lighter theme.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The day Rose&rsquo;s character was so unexpectedly cleared, Edouard had no
+      opportunity of speaking to her, or a reconciliation would have taken
+      place. As it was, he went home intensely happy. But he did not resume his
+      visits to the chateau. When he came to think calmly over it, his vanity
+      was cruelly mortified. She was innocent of the greater offence; but how
+      insolently she had sacrificed him, his love, and his respect, to another&rsquo;s
+      interest.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      More generous thoughts prevailed by degrees. And one day that her pale
+      face, her tears, and her remorse got the better of his offended pride, he
+      determined to give her a good lecture that should drown her in penitent
+      tears; and then end by forgiving her. For one thing he could not be happy
+      till he had forgiven her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She walked into the room with a calm, dignified, stately air, and before
+      he could utter one word of his grave remonstrance, attacked him thus: &ldquo;You
+      wish to speak to me, sir. If it is to apologize to me, I will save your
+      vanity the mortification. I forgive you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;YOU forgive ME!&rdquo; cried Edouard furiously.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No violence, if you please,&rdquo; said the lady with cold hauteur. &ldquo;Let us be
+      friends, as Josephine and Raynal are. We cannot be anything more to one
+      another now. You have wounded me too deeply by your jealous, suspicious
+      nature.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Edouard gasped for breath, and was so far out-generalled that he accepted
+      the place of defendant. &ldquo;Wasn&rsquo;t I to believe your own lips? Did not
+      Colonel Raynal believe you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, that&rsquo;s excusable. He did not know me. But you were my lover; you
+      ought to have seen I was forced to deceive poor Raynal. How dare you
+      believe your eyes; much more your ears, against my truth, against my
+      honor; and then to believe such nonsense?&rdquo; Then, with a grand assumption
+      of superior knowledge, says she, &ldquo;You little simpleton, how could the
+      child be mine when I wasn&rsquo;t married at all?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At this reproach, Edouard first stared, then grinned. &ldquo;I forgot that,&rdquo;
+       said he.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, and you forgot the moon isn&rsquo;t made of green cheese. However, if I
+      saw you very humble, and very penitent, I might, perhaps, really forgive
+      you&mdash;in time.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, forgive me at once. I don&rsquo;t understand your angelical, diabolical,
+      incomprehensible sex: who on earth can? forgive me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh! oh! oh! oh!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Lo! the tears that could not come at a remonstrance were flowing in a
+      stream at his generosity.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What is the matter now?&rdquo; said he tenderly. She cried away, but at the
+      same time explained,&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What a f&mdash;f&mdash;foolish you must be not to see that it is I who am
+      without excuse. You were my betrothed. It was to you I owed my duty; not
+      my sister. I am a wicked, unhappy girl. How you must hate me!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I adore you. There, no more forgiving on either side. Let our only
+      quarrel be who shall love the other best.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, I know how that will be,&rdquo; said the observant toad. &ldquo;You will love me
+      best till you have got me; and then I shall love you best; oh, ever so
+      much.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      However, the prospect of loving best did not seem disagreeable to her; for
+      with this announcement she deposited her head on his shoulder, and in that
+      attitude took a little walk with him up and down the Pleasaunce: sixty
+      times; about eight miles.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      These two were a happy pair. This wayward, but generous heart never forgot
+      her offence, and his forgiveness. She gave herself to him heart and soul,
+      at the altar, and well she redeemed her vow. He rose high in political
+      life: and paid the penalty of that sort of ambition; his heart was often
+      sore. But by his own hearth sat comfort and ever ready sympathy. Ay, and
+      patient industry to read blue-books, and a ready hand and brain to write
+      diplomatic notes for him, off which the mind glided as from a ball of ice.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In thirty years she never once mentioned the servants to him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, let eternal honor crown her name!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      It was only a little bit of heel that Dard had left in Prussia. More
+      fortunate than his predecessor (Achilles), he got off with a slight but
+      enduring limp. And so the army lost him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He married Jacintha, and Josephine set them up in Bigot&rsquo;s, (deceased)
+      auberge. Jacintha shone as a landlady, and custom flowed in. For all that,
+      a hankering after Beaurepaire was observable in her. Her favorite stroll
+      was into the Beaurepaire kitchen, and on all fetes and grand occasions she
+      was prominent in gay attire as a retainer of the house. The last specimen
+      of her homely sagacity I shall have the honor to lay before you is a
+      critique upon her husband, which she vented six years after marriage.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My Dard,&rdquo; said she, &ldquo;is very good as far as he goes. What he has felt
+      himself, that he can feel FOR: nobody better. You come to him with an
+      empty belly, or a broken head, or all bleeding with a cut, or black and
+      blue, and you shall find a friend. But if it is a sore heart, or trouble,
+      and sorrow, and no hole in your carcass to show for it, you had better
+      come to ME; for you might as well tell your grief to a stone wall as to my
+      man.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The baroness took her son Raynal to Paris, and there, with keen eye,
+      selected him a wife. She proved an excellent one. It would have been hard
+      if she had not, for the baroness with the severe sagacity of her age and
+      sex, had set aside as naught a score of seeming angels, before she could
+      suit herself with a daughter-in-law. At first the Raynals very properly
+      saw little of the Dujardins; but when both had been married some years,
+      the recollection of that fleeting and nominal connection waxed faint,
+      while the memory of great benefits conferred on both sides remained lively
+      as ever in hearts so great, and there was a warm, a sacred friendship
+      between the two houses&mdash;a friendship of the ancient Greeks, not of
+      the modern club-house.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Camille and Josephine were blessed almost beyond the lot of humanity: none
+      can really appreciate sunshine but those who come out of the cold dark.
+      And so with happiness. For years they could hardly be said to live like
+      mortals: they basked in bliss. But it was a near thing; for they but just
+      scraped clear of life-long misery, and death&rsquo;s cold touch grazed them both
+      as they went.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Yet they had heroic virtues to balance White Lies in the great Judge&rsquo;s
+      eye.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A wholesome lesson, therefore, and a warning may be gathered from this
+      story: and I know many novelists who would have preached that lesson at
+      some length in every other chapter, and interrupted the sacred narrative
+      to do it. But when I read stories so mutilated, I think of a circumstance
+      related by Mr. Joseph Miller.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;An Englishman sojourning in some part of Scotland was afflicted with many
+      hairs in the butter, and remonstrated. He was told, in reply, that the
+      hairs and the butter came from one source&mdash;the cow; and that the just
+      and natural proportions hitherto observed, could not be deranged, and bald
+      butter invented&mdash;for ONE. &lsquo;So be it,&rsquo; said the Englishman; &lsquo;but let
+      me have the butter in one plate, and the hairs in another.&rsquo;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Acting on this hint, I have reserved some admirable remarks, reflections,
+      discourses, and tirades, until the story should be ended, and the other
+      plate be ready for the subsidiary sermon.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And now that the proper time is come, that love of intruding one&rsquo;s own
+      wisdom in one&rsquo;s own person on the reader, which has marred so many works
+      of art, is in my case restrained&mdash;first, by pure fatigue; secondly,
+      because the moral of this particular story stands out so clear in the
+      narrative, that he who runs may read it without any sermon at all.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Those who will not take the trouble to gather my moral from the living
+      tree, would not lift it out of my dead basket: would not unlock their
+      jaw-bones to bite it, were I to thrust it into their very mouths.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <br /> <br />
+    </p>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+
+
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+</html>
diff --git a/2472.txt b/2472.txt
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of White Lies, by Charles Reade
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: White Lies
+
+Author: Charles Reade
+
+Release Date: May 16, 2006 [EBook #2472]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WHITE LIES ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Donald Lainson
+
+
+
+
+
+WHITE LIES
+
+By Charles Reade
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+
+Towards the close of the last century the Baron de Beaurepaire lived
+in the chateau of that name in Brittany. His family was of prodigious
+antiquity; seven successive barons had already flourished on this spot
+when a younger son of the house accompanied his neighbor the Duke of
+Normandy in his descent on England, and was rewarded by a grant of
+English land, on which he dug a mote and built a chateau, and called it
+Beaurepaire (the worthy Saxons turned this into Borreper without delay).
+Since that day more than twenty gentlemen of the same lineage had held
+in turn the original chateau and lands, and handed them down to their
+present lord.
+
+Thus rooted in his native Brittany, Henri Lionel Marie St. Quentin de
+Beaurepaire was as fortunate as any man can be pronounced before he
+dies. He had health, rank, a good income, a fair domain, a goodly
+house, a loving wife, and two lovely young daughters, all veneration and
+affection. Two months every year he visited the Faubourg St. Germain and
+the Court. At both every gentleman and every lacquey knew his name, and
+his face: his return to Brittany after this short absence was celebrated
+by a rustic fete.
+
+Above all, Monsieur de Beaurepaire possessed that treasure of treasures,
+content. He hunted no heart-burns. Ambition did not tempt him; why
+should he listen to long speeches, and court the unworthy, and descend
+to intrigue, for so precarious and equivocal a prize as a place in the
+Government, when he could be De Beaurepaire without trouble or loss of
+self-respect? Social ambition could get little hold of him; let parvenus
+give balls half in doors, half out, and light two thousand lamps,
+and waste their substance battling and manoeuvring for fashionable
+distinction; he had nothing to gain by such foolery, nothing to lose by
+modest living; he was the twenty-ninth Baron of Beaurepaire. So wise,
+so proud, so little vain, so strong in health and wealth and honor,
+one would have said nothing less than an earthquake could shake
+this gentleman and his house. Yet both were shaken, though rooted by
+centuries to the soil; and by no vulgar earthquake.
+
+For years France had bowed in silence beneath two galling burdens--a
+selfish and corrupt monarchy, and a multitudinous, privileged, lazy, and
+oppressive aristocracy, by whom the peasant was handled like a Russian
+serf. [Said peasant is now the principal proprietor of the soil.]
+
+The lower orders rose upon their oppressors, and soon showed themselves
+far blacker specimens of the same breed. Law, religion, humanity, and
+common sense, hid their faces; innocent blood flowed in a stream, and
+terror reigned. To Monsieur de Beaurepaire these republicans--murderers
+of women, children, and kings--seemed the most horrible monsters nature
+had ever produced; he put on black, and retired from society; he felled
+timber, and raised large sums of money upon his estate. And one day he
+mounted his charger, and disappeared from the chateau.
+
+Three months after this, a cavalier, dusty and pale, rode into the
+courtyard of Beaurepaire, and asked to see the baroness. She came to
+him; he hung his head and held her out a letter.
+
+It contained a few sad words from Monsieur de Laroche-jaquelin. The
+baron had just fallen in La Vendee, fighting for the Crown.
+
+From that hour till her death the baroness wore black.
+
+The mourner would have been arrested, and perhaps beheaded, but for a
+friend, the last in the world on whom the family reckoned for any solid
+aid. Dr. Aubertin had lived in the chateau twenty years. He was a man of
+science, and did not care a button for money; so he had retired from
+the practice of medicine, and pursued his researches at ease under
+the baron's roof. They all loved him, and laughed at his occasional
+reveries, in the days of prosperity; and now, in one great crisis, the
+protege became the protector, to their astonishment and his own. But it
+was an age of ups and downs. This amiable theorist was one of the oldest
+verbal republicans in Europe. And why not? In theory a republic is
+the perfect form of government: it is merely in practice that it is
+impossible; it is only upon going off paper into reality, and trying
+actually to self-govern limited nations, after heating them white hot
+with the fire of politics and the bellows of bombast--that the thing
+resolves itself into bloodshed silvered with moonshine.
+
+Dr. Aubertin had for years talked and written speculative republicanism.
+So they applied to him whether the baroness shared her husband's
+opinions, and he boldly assured them she did not; he added, "She is a
+pupil of mine." On this audacious statement they contented themselves
+with laying a heavy fine on the lands of Beaurepaire.
+
+Assignats were abundant, but good mercantile paper, a notorious coward,
+had made itself wings and fled, and specie was creeping into strong
+boxes like a startled rabbit into its hole. The fine was paid; but
+Beaurepaire had to be heavily mortgaged, and the loan bore a high rate
+of interest. This, with the baron's previous mortgages, swamped the
+estate.
+
+The baroness sold her carriage and horses, and she and her daughters
+prepared to deny themselves all but the bare necessaries of life, and
+pay off their debts if possible. On this their dependants fell away from
+them; their fair-weather friends came no longer near them; and many a
+flush of indignation crossed their brows, and many an aching pang their
+hearts, as adversity revealed the baseness and inconstancy of common
+people high or low.
+
+When the other servants had retired with their wages, one Jacintha
+remained behind, and begged permission to speak to the baroness.
+
+"What would you with me, my child?" asked that lady, with an accent in
+which a shade of surprise mingled with great politeness.
+
+"Forgive me, madame," began Jacintha, with a formal courtesy; "but how
+can I leave you, and Mademoiselle Josephine, and Mademoiselle Rose? I
+was born at Beaurepaire; my mother died in the chateau: my father died
+in the village; but he had meat every day from the baron's own
+table, and fuel from the baron's wood, and died blessing the house of
+Beaurepaire. I CANNOT go. The others are gone because prosperity is here
+no longer. Let it be so; I will stay till the sun shines again upon the
+chateau, and then you shall send me away if you are bent on it; but
+not now, my ladies--oh, not now! Oh! oh! oh!" And the warm-hearted girl
+burst out sobbing ungracefully.
+
+"My child," said the baroness, "these sentiments touch me, and honor
+you. But retire, if you please, while I consult my daughters."
+
+Jacintha cut her sobs dead short, and retreated with a formal reverence.
+
+The consultation consisted of the baroness opening her arms, and both
+her daughters embracing her at once. Proud as they were, they wept
+with joy at having made one friend amongst all their servants. Jacintha
+stayed.
+
+As months rolled on, Rose de Beaurepaire recovered her natural gayety in
+spite of bereavement and poverty; so strong are youth, and health,
+and temperament. But her elder sister had a grief all her own: Captain
+Dujardin, a gallant young officer, well-born, and his own master, had
+courted her with her parents' consent; and, even when the baron began to
+look coldly on the soldier of the Republic, young Dujardin, though too
+proud to encounter the baron's irony and looks of scorn, would not yield
+love to pique. He came no more to the chateau, but he would wait hours
+and hours on the path to the little oratory in the park, on the bare
+chance of a passing word or even a kind look from Josephine. So much
+devotion gradually won a heart which in happier times she had been half
+encouraged to give him; and, when he left her on a military service
+of uncommon danger, the woman's reserve melted, and, in that moment of
+mutual grief and passion, she vowed she loved him better than all the
+world.
+
+Letters from the camp breathing a devotion little short of worship
+fed her attachment; and more than one public mention of his name and
+services made her proud as well as fond of the fiery young soldier.
+
+Still she did not open her heart to her parents. The baron, alive at
+that time, was exasperated against the Republic, and all who served it;
+and, as for the baroness, she was of the old school: a passionate
+love in a lady's heart before marriage was contrary to her notions of
+etiquette. Josephine loved Rose very tenderly; but shrank with modest
+delicacy from making her a confidante of feelings, the bare relation of
+which leaves the female hearer a child no longer.
+
+So she hid her heart, and delicious first love nestled deep in her
+nature, and thrilled in every secret vein and fibre.
+
+They had parted two years, and he had joined the army of the Pyrenees
+about one month, when suddenly all correspondence ceased on his part.
+
+Restless anxiety rose into terror as this silence continued; and
+starting and trembling at every sound, and edging to the window at every
+footstep, Josephine expected hourly the tidings of her lover's death.
+
+Months rolled on in silence.
+
+Then a new torture came. He must not be dead but unfaithful. At this all
+the pride of her race was fired in her.
+
+The struggle between love and ire was almost too much for nature:
+violently gay and moody by turns she alarmed both her mother and the
+good Dr. Aubertin. The latter was not, I think, quite without suspicion
+of the truth; however, he simply prescribed change of air and place;
+she must go to Frejus, a watering-place distant about five leagues.
+Mademoiselle de Beaurepaire yielded a languid assent. To her all places
+were alike.
+
+But when they returned from Frejus a change had taken place. Rose had
+extracted her sister's secret, and was a changed girl. Pity, and the
+keen sense of Josephine's wrong, had raised her sisterly love to a
+passion. The great-hearted girl hovered about her lovely, suffering
+sister like an angel, and paid her the tender attentions of a devoted
+lover, and hated Camille Dujardin with all her heart: hated him all the
+more that she saw Josephine shrink even from her whenever she inveighed
+against him.
+
+At last Rose heard some news of the truant lover. The fact is, this
+young lady was as intelligent as she was inexperienced; and she had
+asked Jacintha to tell Dard to talk to every soldier that passed through
+the village, and ask him if he knew anything about Captain Dujardin
+of the 17th regiment. Dard cross-examined about a hundred invalided
+warriors, who did not even recognize the captain's name; but at last,
+by extraordinary luck, he actually did fall in with two, who told him
+strange news about Captain Dujardin. And so then Dard told Jacintha; and
+Jacintha soon had the men into the kitchen and told Rose. Rose ran to
+tell Josephine; but stopped in the passage, and turned suddenly very
+cold. Her courage failed her; she feared Josephine would not take the
+news as she ought; and perhaps would not love her so well if SHE told
+her; so she thought to herself she would let the soldiers tell their own
+tale. She went into the room where Josephine was reading to the baroness
+and Dr. Aubertin; she sat quietly down; but at the first opportunity
+made Josephine one of those imperceptible signals which women, and above
+all, sisters, have reduced to so subtle a system. This done, she went
+carelessly out: and Josephine in due course followed her, and found her
+at the door.
+
+"What is it?" said Josephine, earnestly.
+
+"Have you courage?" was Rose's reply.
+
+"He is dead?" said Josephine, turning pale as ashes.
+
+"No, no;" said Rose hastily; "he is alive. But you will need all your
+courage."
+
+"Since he lives I fear nothing," said Josephine; and stood there and
+quivered from head to foot. Rose, with pitying looks, took her by the
+hand and drew her in silence towards the kitchen.
+
+Josephine yielded a mute submission at first; but at the very door hung
+back and faltered, "He loves another; he is married: let me go." Rose
+made no reply, but left her there and went into the kitchen and found
+two dragoons seated round a bottle of wine. They rose and saluted her.
+
+"Be seated, my brave men," said she; "only please tell me what you told
+Jacintha about Captain Dujardin."
+
+"Don't stain your mouth with the captain, my little lady. He is a
+traitor."
+
+"How do you know?"
+
+"Marcellus! mademoiselle asks us how we know Captain Dujardin to be a
+traitor. Speak."
+
+Marcellus, thus appealed to, told Rose after his own fashion that he
+knew the captain well: that one day the captain rode out of the camp and
+never returned: that at first great anxiety was felt on his behalf, for
+the captain was a great favorite, and passed for the smartest soldier in
+the division: that after awhile anxiety gave place to some very awkward
+suspicions, and these suspicions it was his lot and his comrade's here
+to confirm. About a month later he and the said comrade and two more
+were sent, well mounted, to reconnoitre a Spanish village. At the door
+of a little inn they caught sight of a French uniform. This so excited
+their curiosity that he went forward nearer than prudent, and distinctly
+recognized Captain Dujardin seated at a table drinking between two
+guerillas; then he rode back and told the others, who then came up and
+satisfied themselves it was so: that if any of the party had entertained
+a doubt, it was removed in an unpleasant way; he, Marcellus, disgusted
+at the sight of a French uniform drinking among Spaniards, took down his
+carabine and fired at the group as carefully as a somewhat restive horse
+permitted: at this, as if by magic, a score or so of guerillas poured
+out from Heaven knows where, musket in hand, and delivered a volley;
+the officer in command of the party fell dead, Jean Jacques here got a
+broken arm, and his own horse was wounded in two places, and fell from
+loss of blood a few furlongs from the French camp, to the neighborhood
+of which the vagabonds pursued them, hallooing and shouting and firing
+like barbarous banditti as they were.
+
+"However, here I am," concluded Marcellus, "invalided for awhile, my
+lady, but not expended yet: we will soon dash in among them again for
+death or glory. Meantime," concluded he, filling both glasses, "let
+us drink to the eyes of beauty (military salute); and to the renown
+of France; and double damnation to all her traitors, like that Captain
+Dujardin; whose neck may the devil twist."
+
+Ere they could drink to this energetic toast, a low wail at the door,
+like a dying hare's, arrested the glasses on their road, and the rough
+soldiers stood transfixed, and looked at one another in some dismay.
+Rose flew to the door with a face full of concern.
+
+Josephine was gone.
+
+Then Rose had the tact and resolution to say a few kind, encouraging
+words to the soldiers, and bid Jacintha be hospitable to them. This done
+she darted up-stairs after Josephine; she reached the main corridor just
+in time to see her creep along it with the air and carriage of a woman
+of fifty, and enter her own room.
+
+Rose followed softly with wet eyes, and turned the handle gently. But
+the door was locked.
+
+"Josephine! Josephine!"
+
+No answer.
+
+"I want to speak to you. I am frightened. Oh, do not be alone."
+
+A choking voice answered, "Give me a little while to draw my breath."
+Rose sank down at the door, and sat close to it, with her head against
+it, sobbing bitterly. She was hurt at not being let in; such a friend as
+she had proved herself. But this personal feeling was only a fraction of
+her grief and anxiety.
+
+A good half hour elapsed ere Josephine, pale and stern as no one had
+ever seen her till that hour, suddenly opened the door. She started at
+sight of Rose couched sorrowful on the threshold; her stern look relaxed
+into tender love and pity; she sank, blushing, on her knees, and took
+her sister's head quickly to her bosom. "Oh, my little love, have you
+been here all this time?"--"Oh! oh! oh!" was all the little love could
+reply. Then the deserted one, still kneeling, took Rose in her lap, and
+caressed and comforted her, and poured words of gratitude and affection
+over her like a warm shower.
+
+They rose hand in hand.
+
+Then Rose suddenly seized Josephine, and looked long and anxiously down
+into her eyes. They flashed fire under the scrutiny. "Yes, it is all
+over; I could not despise and love. I am dead to him, as he is dead to
+France."
+
+This was joyful news to Rose. "I hoped it would be so," said she; "but
+you frightened me. My noble sister, were I ever to lose your esteem, I
+should die. Oh, how awful yet how beautiful is your scorn. For worlds
+I would not be that Cam"--Josephine laid her hand imperiously on Rose's
+mouth. "To mention his name to me will be to insult me; De Beaurepaire
+I am, and a Frenchwoman. Come, dear, let us go down and comfort our
+mother."
+
+They went down; and this patient sufferer, and high minded conqueror, of
+her own accord took up a commonplace book, and read aloud for two mortal
+hours to her mother and Aubertin. Her voice only wavered twice.
+
+To feel that life is ended; to wish existence, too, had ceased; and so
+to sit down, an aching hollow, and take a part and sham an interest in
+twaddle to please others; such are woman's feats. How like nothing at
+all they look!
+
+A man would rather sit on the buffer of a steam-engine and ride at the
+Great Redan.
+
+Rose sat at her elbow, a little behind her, and turned the leaves, and
+on one pretence or other held Josephine's hand nearly all the rest of
+the day. Its delicate fibres remained tense, like a greyhound's sinews
+after a race, and the blue veins rose to sight in it, though her voice
+and eyes were mastered.
+
+So keen was the strife, so matched the antagonists, so hard the victory.
+
+For ire and scorn are mighty. And noble blood in a noble heart is
+heroic. And Love is a giant.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+
+The French provinces were now organized upon a half military plan, by
+which all the local authorities radiated towards a centre of government.
+By-the-by, this feature has survived subsequent revolutions and
+political changes.
+
+In days of change, youth is at a premium; because, though experience is
+valuable, the experience of one order of things unfits ordinary men for
+another order of things. So a good many old fogies in office were shown
+the door, and a good deal of youth and energy infused into the veins of
+provincial government. For instance, Edouard Riviere, who had but just
+completed his education with singular eclat at a military school, was
+one fine day ordered into Brittany to fill a responsible post under
+Commandant Raynal, a blunt, rough soldier, that had risen from the
+ranks, and bore a much higher character for zeal and moral integrity
+than for affability.
+
+This officer was the son of a widow that kept a grocer's shop in Paris.
+She intended him for spice, but he thirsted for glory, and vexed her. So
+she yielded, as mothers will.
+
+In the armies of the republic a good soldier rose with unparalleled
+certainty, and rapidity, too; for when soldiers are being mowed down
+like oats, it is a glorious time for such of them as keep their feet.
+Raynal mounted fast, and used to write to his mother, and joke her about
+the army being such a bad profession; and, as he was all for glory, not
+money, he lived with Spartan frugality, and saved half his pay and all
+his prize money for the old lady in Paris.
+
+But this prosperous man had to endure a deep disappointment; on the very
+day he was made commandant and one of the general's aides-de-camp, came
+a letter into the camp. His mother was dead after a short illness. This
+was a terrible blow to the simple, rugged soldier, who had never had
+much time nor inclination to flirt with a lot of girls, and toughen his
+heart. He came back to Paris honored and rich, but downcast. The old
+home, empty of his mother, seemed to him not to have the old look.
+It made him sadder. To cheer him up they brought him much money. The
+widow's trade had taken a wonderful start the last few years, and she
+had been playing the same game as he had, living on ten-pence a day, and
+saving all for him. This made him sadder, if anything.
+
+"What," said he, "have we both been scraping all this dross together
+for? I would give it all to sit one hour by the fire, with her hand in
+mine, and hear her say, 'Scamp, you made me unhappy when you were young,
+but I have lived to be proud of you.'"
+
+He applied for active service, no matter what: obtained at once this
+post in Brittany, and threw himself into it with that honest zeal and
+activity, which are the best earthly medicine for all our griefs. He was
+busy writing, when young Riviere first presented himself. He looked up
+for a moment, and eyed him, to take his measure; then put into his
+hand a report by young Nicole, a subordinate filling a post of the same
+nature as Riviere's; and bade him analyze that report on the spot: with
+this he instantly resumed his own work.
+
+Edouard Riviere was an adept at this sort of task, and soon handed him
+a neat analysis. Raynal ran his eye over it, nodded cold approval, and
+told him to take this for the present as a guide as to his own duties.
+He then pointed to a map on which Riviere's district was marked in
+blue ink, and bade him find the centre of it. Edouard took a pair
+of compasses off the table, and soon discovered that the village of
+Beaurepaire was his centre. "Then quarter yourself at Beaurepaire; and
+good-day," said Raynal.
+
+The chateau was in sight from Riviere's quarters, and he soon learned
+that it belonged to a royalist widow and her daughters, who all three
+held themselves quite aloof from the rest of the world. "Ah," said the
+young citizen, "I see. If these rococo citizens play that game with me,
+I shall have to take them down." Thus a fresh peril menaced this family,
+on whose hearts and fortunes such heavy blows had fallen.
+
+One evening our young official, after a day spent in the service of
+the country, deigned to take a little stroll to relieve the cares of
+administration. He imprinted on his beardless face the expression of
+a wearied statesman, and strolled through an admiring village. The men
+pretended veneration from policy; the women, whose views of this great
+man were shallower but more sincere, smiled approval of his airs; and
+the young puppy affected to take no notice of either sex.
+
+Outside the village, Publicola suddenly encountered two young ladies,
+who resembled nothing he had hitherto met with in his district; they
+were dressed in black, and with extreme simplicity; but their easy grace
+and composure, and the refined sentiment of their gentle faces, told at
+a glance they belonged to the high nobility. Publicola divined them at
+once, and involuntarily raised his hat to so much beauty and dignity,
+instead of poking it with a finger as usual. On this the ladies
+instantly courtesied to him after the manner of their party, with a
+sweep and a majesty, and a precision of politeness, that the pup would
+have laughed at if he had heard of it; but seeing it done, and well
+done, and by lovely women of rank, he was taken aback by it, and lifted
+his hat again, and bowed again after he had gone by, and was generally
+flustered. In short, instead of a member of the Consular Government
+saluting private individuals of a decayed party that existed only
+by sufferance, a handsome, vain, good-natured boy had met two
+self-possessed young ladies of distinction and breeding, and had cut the
+usual figure.
+
+For the next hundred yards his cheeks burned and his vanity cooled. But
+bumptiousness is elastic in France, as in England, and doubtless among
+the Esquimaux. "Well, they are pretty girls," says he to himself. "I
+never saw two such pretty girls together; they will do for me to flirt
+with while I am banished to this Arcadia." Banished from school, I beg
+to observe.
+
+And "awful beauty" being no longer in sight, Mr. Edouard resolved he
+would flirt with them to their hearts' content. But there are ladies
+with whom a certain preliminary is required before you can flirt with
+them. You must be on speaking terms. How was this to be managed?
+
+He used to watch at his window with a telescope, and whenever the
+sisters came out of their own grounds, which unfortunately was not
+above twice a week, he would throw himself in their way by the merest
+accident, and pay them a dignified and courteous salute, which he had
+carefully got up before a mirror in the privacy of his own chamber.
+
+One day, as he took off his hat to the young ladies, there broke from
+one of them a smile, so sudden, sweet, and vivid, that he seemed to feel
+it smite him first on the eyes then in the heart. He could not sleep for
+this smile.
+
+Yet he had seen many smilers; but to be sure most of them smiled without
+effect, because they smiled eternally; they seemed cast with their
+mouths open, and their pretty teeth forever in sight; and this has a
+saddening influence on a man of sense--when it has any. But here a fair,
+pensive face had brightened at sight of him; a lovely countenance, on
+which circumstances, not nature, had impressed gravity, had sprung back
+to its natural gayety for a moment, and had thrilled and bewitched the
+beholder.
+
+The next Sunday he went to church--and there worshipped--whom? Cupid.
+He smarted for his heathenism; for the young ladies went with higher
+motives, and took no notice of him. They lowered their long silken
+lashes over one breviary, and scarcely observed the handsome citizen.
+Meantime he, contemplating their pious beauty with earthly eyes, was
+drinking long draughts of intoxicating passion. And when after the
+service they each took an arm of Dr. Aubertin, and he with the air of an
+admiral convoying two ships choke-full of specie, conducted his precious
+charge away home, our young citizen felt jealous, and all but hated the
+worthy doctor.
+
+This went on till he became listless and dejected on the days he did not
+see them. Then he asked himself whether he was not a cowardly fool
+to keep at such a distance. After all he was a man in authority. His
+friendship was not to be despised, least of all by a family suspected of
+disaffection to the state.
+
+He put on his glossy beaver with enormous brim, high curved; his
+blue coat with brass buttons; his white waistcoat, gray breeches, and
+top-boots; and marched up to the chateau of Beaurepaire, and sent in his
+card with his name and office inscribed.
+
+Jacintha took it, bestowed a glance of undisguised admiration on
+the young Adonis, and carried it to the baroness. That lady sent her
+promptly down again with a black-edged note to this effect.
+
+
+Highly flattered by Monsieur de Riviere's visit, the baroness must
+inform him that she receives none but old acquaintances, in the present
+grief of the family, and of the KINGDOM.
+
+
+Young Riviere was cruelly mortified by this rebuff. He went off
+hurriedly, grinding his teeth with rage.
+
+"Cursed aristocrats! We have done well to pull you down, and we will
+have you lower still. How I despise myself for giving any one the chance
+to affront me thus. The haughty old fool; if she had known her interest,
+she would have been too glad to make a powerful friend. These royalists
+are in a ticklish position; I can tell her that. She calls me De
+Riviere; that implies nobody without a 'De' to their name would have the
+presumption to visit her old tumble-down house. Well, it is a lesson; I
+am a republican, and the Commonwealth trusts and honors me; yet I am
+so ungrateful as to go out of the way to be civil to her enemies, to
+royalists; as if those worn-out creatures had hearts, as if they could
+comprehend the struggle that took place in my mind between duty, and
+generosity to the fallen, before I could make the first overture to
+their acquaintance; as if they could understand the politeness of
+the heart, or anything nobler than curving and ducking and heartless
+etiquette. This is the last notice I will ever take of that old woman,
+unless it is to denounce her."
+
+He walked home to the town very fast, his heart boiling, and his lips
+compressed, and his brow knitted.
+
+To this mood succeeded a sullen and bitter one. He was generous, but
+vain, and his love had humiliated him so bitterly, he resolved to tear
+it out of his heart. He absented himself from church; he met the young
+ladies no more. He struggled fiercely with his passion; he went about
+dogged, silent, and sighing. Presently he devoted his leisure hours
+to shooting partridges instead of ladies. And he was right; partridges
+cannot shoot back; whereas beautiful women, like Cupid, are all archers
+more or less, and often with one arrow from eye or lip do more execution
+than they have suffered from several discharges of our small shot.
+
+In these excursions, Edouard was generally accompanied by a thick-set
+rustic called Dard, who, I believe, purposes to reveal his own character
+to you, and so save me that trouble.
+
+One fine afternoon, about four o'clock, this pair burst remorselessly
+through a fence, and landed in the road opposite Bigot's Auberge; a long
+low house, with "ICI ON LOGE A PIED ET A CHEVAL," written all across it
+in gigantic letters. Riviere was for moving homeward, but Dard halted
+and complained dismally of "the soldier's gripes." The statesman had
+never heard of that complaint, so Dard explained that the VULGAR name
+for it was hunger. "And only smell," said he, "the soup is just fit to
+come off the fire."
+
+Riviere smiled sadly, but consented to deign to eat a morsel in the
+porch. Thereat Dard dashed wildly into the kitchen.
+
+They dined at one little round table, each after his fashion. When Dard
+could eat no more, he proceeded to drink; and to talk in proportion.
+Riviere, lost in his own thoughts, attended to him as men of business do
+to a babbling brook; until suddenly from the mass of twaddle broke forth
+a magic word--Beaurepaire; then the languid lover pricked up his ears
+and found Mr. Dard was abusing that noble family right and left. Young
+Riviere inquired what ground of offence they had given HIM. "I'll tell
+you," said Dard; "they impose on Jacintha; and so she imposes on me."
+Then observing he had at last gained his employer's ear, he became
+prodigiously loquacious, as such people generally are when once they get
+upon their own griefs.
+
+"These Beaurepaire aristocrats," said he, with his hard peasant
+good-sense, "are neither the one thing nor the other; they cannot keep
+up nobility, they have not the means; they will not come down off their
+perch, they have not the sense. No, for as small as they are, they must
+look and talk as big as ever. They can only afford one servant, and
+I don't believe they pay her; but they must be attended on just as
+obsequious as when they had a dozen. And this is fatal to all us little
+people that have the misfortune to be connected with them."
+
+"Why, how are you connected with them?"
+
+"By the tie of affection."
+
+"I thought you hated them."
+
+"Of course I do; but I have the ill-luck to love Jacintha, and she loves
+these aristocrats, and makes me do little odd jobs for them." And at
+this Dard's eyes suddenly glared with horror.
+
+"Well, what of that?" asked Riviere.
+
+"What of it, citizen, what? you do not know the fatal meaning of those
+accursed words?"
+
+"Why, I never heard of a man's back being broken by little odd jobs."
+
+"Perhaps not his back, citizen, but his heart? if little odd jobs will
+not break that, why nothing will. Torn from place to place, and from
+trouble to trouble; as soon as one tiresome thing begins to go a bit
+smooth, off to a fresh plague, in-doors work when it is dry, out-a-doors
+when it snows; and then all bustle; no taking one's work quietly, the
+only way it agrees with a fellow. 'Milk the cow, Dard, but look sharp;
+the baroness's chair wants mending. Take these slops to the pig, but you
+must not wait to see him enjoy them: you are wanted to chop billets.'
+Beat the mats, take down the curtains, walk to church (best part of
+a league), and heat the pew cushions; come back and cut the cabbages,
+paint the door, and wheel the old lady about the terrace, rub
+quicksilver on the little dog's back,--mind he don't bite you to make
+hisself sick,--repair the ottoman, roll the gravel, scour the kettles,
+carry half a ton of water up two purostairs, trim the turf, prune the
+vine, drag the fish-pond; and when you ARE there, go in and gather water
+lilies for Mademoiselle Josephine while you are drowning the puppies;
+that is little odd jobs: may Satan twist her neck who invented them!"
+
+"Very sad all this," said young Riviere.
+
+Dard took the little sneer for sympathy, and proceeded to "the cruellest
+wrong of all."
+
+"When I go into their kitchen to court Jacintha a bit, instead of
+finding a good supper there, which a man has a right to, courting a
+cook, if I don't take one in my pocket, there is no supper, not to
+say supper, for either her or me. I don't call a salad and a bit of
+cheese-rind--SUPPER. Beggars in silk and satin! Every sou they have goes
+on to their backs, instead of into their bellies."
+
+"I have heard their income is much reduced," said Edouard gently.
+
+"Income! I would not change with them if they'd throw me in half a
+pancake a day. I tell you they are the poorest family for leagues round;
+not that they need be quite so starved, if they could swallow a little
+of their pride. But no, they must have china and plate and fine linen
+at dinner; so their fine plates are always bare, and their silver
+trays empty. Ask the butcher, if you don't believe ME. Just you ask him
+whether he does not go three times to the smallest shopkeeper, for once
+he goes to Beaurepaire. Their tenants send them a little meal and eggs,
+and now and then a hen; and their great garden is chock full of fruit
+and vegetables, and Jacintha makes me dig in it gratis; and so they
+muddle on. But, bless your heart, coffee! they can't afford it; so they
+roast a lot of horse-beans that cost nothing, and grind them, and serve
+up the liquor in a silver coffee-pot, on a silver salver. Haw, haw,
+haw!"
+
+"Is it possible? reduced to this?" said Edouard gravely.
+
+"Don't you be so weak as to pity them," cried the remorseless plebeian.
+"Why don't they melt their silver into soup, and cut down their plate
+into rashers of bacon? why not sell the superfluous, and buy the
+needful, which it is grub? And, above all, why don't they let their old
+tumble-down palace to some rich grocer, and that accursed garden along
+with it, where I sweat gratis, and live small and comfortable, and pay
+honest men for their little odd jobs, and"--
+
+Here Riviere interrupted him, and asked if it was really true about the
+beans.
+
+"True?" said Dard, "why, I have seen Rose doing it for the old woman's
+breakfast: it was Rose invented the move. A girl of nineteen beginning
+already to deceive the world! But they are all tarred with the same
+stick. Down with the aristocrats!"
+
+"Dard," said Riviere, "you are a brute."
+
+"Me, citizen?" inquired Dard with every appearance of genuine surprise.
+
+Edouard Riviere rose from his seat in great excitement. Dard's abuse of
+the family he was lately so bitter against had turned him right round.
+He pitied the very baroness herself, and forgave her declining his
+visit.
+
+"Be silent," said he, "for shame! There is such a thing as noble
+poverty; and you have described it. I might have disdained these people
+in their prosperity, but I revere them in their affliction. And I'll
+tell you what, don't you ever dare to speak slightly of them again in my
+presence, or"--
+
+He did not conclude his threat, for just then he observed that a
+strapping girl, with a basket at her feet, was standing against the
+corner of the Auberge, in a mighty careless attitude, but doing nothing,
+so most likely listening with all her ears and soul. Dard, however, did
+not see her, his back being turned to her as he sat; so he replied at
+his ease,--
+
+"I consent," said he very coolly: "that is your affair; but permit me,"
+and here he clenched his teeth at remembrance of his wrongs, "to say
+that I will no more be a scullery man without wages to these high-minded
+starvelings, these illustrious beggars." Then he heated himself red-hot.
+"I will not even be their galley slave. Next, I have done my last little
+odd job in this world," yelled the now infuriated factotum, bouncing
+up to his feet in brief fury. "Of two things one: either Jacintha quits
+those aristos, or I leave Jacin--eh?--ah!--oh!--ahem! How--'ow d'ye do,
+Jacintha?" And his roar ended in a whine, as when a dog runs barking
+out, and receives in full career a cut from his master's whip, his
+generous rage turns to whimper with ludicrous abruptness. "I was just
+talking of you, Jacintha," quavered Dard in conclusion.
+
+"I heard you, Dard," replied Jacintha slowly, softly, grimly.
+
+Dard withered.
+
+It was a lusty young woman, with a comely peasant face somewhat
+freckled, and a pair of large black eyes surmounted by coal-black brows.
+She stood in a bold attitude, her massive but well-formed arms folded so
+that the pressure of each against the other made them seem gigantic, and
+her cheek red with anger, and her eyes glistening like basilisks upon
+citizen Dard. She looked so grand, with her lowering black brows, that
+even Riviere felt a little uneasy. As for Jacintha, she was evidently
+brooding with more ire than she chose to utter before a stranger. She
+just slowly unclasped her arms, and, keeping her eye fixed on Dard,
+pointed with a domineering gesture towards Beaurepaire. Then the doughty
+Dard seemed no longer master of his limbs: he rose slowly, with his eyes
+fastened to hers, and was moving off like an ill-oiled automaton in the
+direction indicated; but at that a suppressed snigger began to shake
+Riviere's whole body till it bobbed up and down on the seat. Dard turned
+to him for sympathy.
+
+"There, citizen," he cried, "do you see that imperious gesture? That
+means you promised to dig in the aristocrat's garden this afternoon,
+so march! Here, then, is one that has gained nothing by kings being put
+down, for I am ruled with a mopstick of iron. Thank your stars, citizen,
+that you are not in may place."
+
+"Dard," retorted Jacintha, "if you don't like your place, I'd quit it.
+There are two or three young men down in the village will be glad to
+take it."
+
+"I won't give them the chance, the vile egotists!" cried Dard. And he
+returned to the chateau and little odd jobs.
+
+Jacintha hung behind, lowered her eyes, put on a very deferential
+manner, and thanked Edouard for the kind sentiments he had uttered; but
+at the same time she took the liberty to warn him against believing the
+extravagant stories Dard had been telling about her mistress's poverty.
+She said the simple fact was that the baron had contracted debts, and
+the baroness, being the soul of honor, was living in great economy to
+pay them off. Then, as to Dard getting no supper up at Beaurepaire, a
+complaint that appeared to sting her particularly, she assured him she
+was alone to blame: the baroness would be very angry if she knew it.
+"But," said she, "Dard is an egotist. Perhaps you may have noticed that
+trait in him."
+
+"Glimpses of it," replied Riviere, laughing.
+
+"Monsieur, he is so egotistic that he has not a friend in the world
+but me. I forgive him, because I know the reason; he has never had a
+headache or a heartache in his life."
+
+Edouard, aged twenty, and a male, did not comprehend this piece of
+feminine logic one bit: and, while he puzzled over it in silence,
+Jacintha went on to say that if she were to fill her egotist's paunch,
+she should never know whether he came to Beaurepaire for her, or
+himself. "Now, Dard," she added, "is no beauty, monsieur; why, he is
+three inches shorter than I am."
+
+"You are joking! he looks a foot," said Edouard.
+
+"He is no scholar neither, and I have had to wipe up many a sneer and
+many a sarcasm on his account; but up to now I have always been able
+to reply that this five feet one of egotism loves me sincerely; and the
+moment I doubt this, I give him the sack,--poor little fellow!"
+
+"In a word," said Riviere, a little impatiently, "the family at
+Beaurepaire are not in such straits as he pretends?"
+
+"Monsieur, do I look like one starved?"
+
+"By Jove, no! by Ceres, I mean."
+
+"Are my young mistresses wan, and thin?"
+
+"Treason! blasphemy! ah, no! By Venus and Hebe, no!"
+
+Jacintha smiled at this enthusiastic denial, and also because her sex is
+apt to smile when words are used they do not understand.
+
+"Dard is a fool," suggested Riviere, by way of general solution. He
+added, "And yet, do you know I wish every word he said had been true."
+(Jacintha's eyes expressed some astonishment.) "Because then you and I
+would have concerted means to do them kindnesses, secretly; for I see
+you are no ordinary servant; you love your young mistresses. Do you
+not?"
+
+These simple words seemed to touch a grander chord in Jacintha's nature.
+
+"Love them?" said she, clasping her hands; "ah, sir, do not be offended;
+but, believe me, it is no small thing to serve an old, old family. My
+grandfather lived and died with them; my father was their gamekeeper,
+and fed to his last from off the poor baron's plate (and now they have
+killed him, poor man); my mother died in the house and was buried in
+the sacred ground near the family chapel. They put an inscription on her
+tomb praising her fidelity and probity. Do you think these things do not
+sink into the heart of the poor?--praise on her tomb, and not a word on
+their own, but just the name, and when each was born and died, you know.
+Ah! the pride of the mean is dirt; but the pride of the noble is gold."
+
+"For, look you, among parvenues I should be a servant, and nothing more;
+in this proud family I am a humble friend; of course they are not always
+gossiping with me like vulgar masters and mistresses; if they did, I
+should neither respect nor love them; but they all smile on me whenever
+I come into the room, even the baroness herself. I belong to them, and
+they belong to me, by ties without number, by the many kind words in
+many troubles, by the one roof that sheltered us a hundred years, and
+the grave where our bones lie together till the day of judgment."*
+
+     * The French peasant often thinks half a sentence, and
+     utters the other half aloud, and so breaks air in the middle
+     of a thought. Probably Jacintha's whole thought, if we had
+     the means of knowing it, would have run like this--"Besides,
+     I have another reason: I could not be so comfortable myself
+     elsewhere--for, look you"--
+
+Jacintha clasped her hands, and her black eyes shone out warm through
+the dew. Riviere's glistened too.
+
+"That is well said," he cried; "it is nobly said: yet, after all, these
+are ties that owe their force to the souls they bind. How often have
+such bonds round human hearts proved ropes of sand! They grapple YOU
+like hooks of steel; because you are steel yourself to the backbone. I
+admire you, Jacintha. Such women as you have a great mission in France
+just now."
+
+Jacintha shook her head incredulously. "What can we poor women do?"
+
+"Bring forth heroes," cried Publicola with fervor. "Be the mothers of
+great men, the Catos and the Gracchi of the future!"
+
+Jacintha smiled. She did not know the Gracchi nor their politics; but
+the name rang well. "Gracchi!" Aristocrats, no doubt. "That would be too
+much honor," replied she modestly. "At present, I must say adieu!" and
+she moved off an inch at a time, in an uncertain hesitating manner, not
+very difficult to read; but Riviere, you must know, had more than once
+during this interview begged her to sit down, and in vain; she had
+always thanked him, but said she had not a moment to stay. So he made no
+effort to detain her now. The consequence was--she came slowly back
+of her own accord, and sat down in a corner of the porch, where nobody
+could see her, and then she sighed deeply.
+
+"What is the matter now?" said Edouard, opening his eyes.
+
+She looked at him point-blank for one moment; and her scale turned.
+
+"Monsieur," said she timidly, "you have a good face, and a good heart.
+All I told you was--give me your honor not to betray us."
+
+"I swear it," said Edouard, a little pompously.
+
+"Then--Dard was not so far from the truth; it was but a guess of his,
+for I never trusted my own sweetheart as I now trust a stranger. But to
+see what I see every day, and have no one I dare breathe a word to, oh,
+it is very hard! But on what a thread things turn! If any one had told
+me an hour ago it was you I should open my heart to! It's not economy:
+it's not stinginess; they are not paying off their debts. They never
+can. The baroness and the Demoiselles de Beaurepaire--are paupers."
+
+"Paupers, Jacintha?"
+
+"Ay, paupers! their debts are greater than their means. They live here
+by sufferance. They have only their old clothes to wear. They have
+hardly enough to eat. Just now our cow is in full milk, you know; so
+that is a great help: but, when she goes dry, Heaven knows what we shall
+do; for I don't. But that is not the worst; better a light meal than a
+broken heart. Your precious government offers the chateau for sale.
+They might as well send for the guillotine at once, and cut off all our
+heads. You don't know my mistress as I do. Ah, butchers, you will drag
+nothing out of that but her corpse. And is it come to this? the great
+old family to be turned adrift like beggars. My poor mistress! my pretty
+demoiselles that I played with and nursed ever since I was a child! (I
+was just six when Josephine was born) and that I shall love with my last
+breath"--
+
+She could say no more, but choked by the strong feeling so long pent up
+in her own bosom, fell to sobbing hysterically, and trembling like one
+in an ague.
+
+The statesman, who had passed all his short life at school and college,
+was frightened, and took hold of her and pulled her, and cried,
+"Oh! don't, Jacintha; you will kill yourself, you will die; this is
+frightful: help here! help!" Jacintha put her hand to his mouth, and,
+without leaving off her hysterics, gasped out, "Ah! don't expose me."
+So then he didn't know what to do; but he seized a tumbler and filled
+it with wine, and forced it between her lips. All she did was to bite a
+piece out of the glass as clean as if a diamond had cut it. This did
+her a world of good: destruction of sacred household property gave her
+another turn. "There, I've broke your glass now," she cried, with a
+marvellous change of tone; and she came-to and cried quietly like a
+reasonable person, with her apron to her eyes.
+
+When Edouard saw she was better, he took her hand and said proudly,
+"Secret for secret. I choose this moment to confide to you that I love
+Mademoiselle Rose de Beaurepaire. Love her? I did love her; but now you
+tell me she is poor and in distress, I adore her." The effect of this
+declaration on Jacintha was magical, comical. Her apron came down from
+one eye, and that eye dried itself and sparkled with curiosity: the
+whole countenance speedily followed suit and beamed with sacred joy.
+What! an interesting love affair confided to her all in a moment! She
+lowered her voice to a whisper directly. "Why, how did you manage? She
+never goes into company."
+
+"No; but she goes to church. Besides, I have met her eleven times out
+walking with her sister, and twice out of the eleven she smiled on me.
+O Jacintha! a smile such as angels smile; a smile to warm the heart and
+purify the soul and last forever in the mind."
+
+"Well, they say 'man is fire and woman tow:' but this beats all. Ha!
+ha!"
+
+"Oh! do not jest. I did not laugh at you. Jacintha, it is no laughing
+matter; I revere her as mortals revere the saints; I love her so that
+were I ever to lose all hope of her I would not live a day. And now that
+you have told me she is poor and in sorrow, and I think of her walking
+so calm and gentle--always in black, Jacintha,--and her low courtesy to
+me whenever we met, and her sweet smile to me though her heart must be
+sad, oh! my heart yearns for her. What can I do for her? How shall I
+surround her with myself unseen--make her feel that a man's love waits
+upon her feet every step she takes--that a man's love floats in the air
+round that lovely head?" Then descending to earth for a moment, "but I
+say, you promise not to betray me; come, secret for secret."
+
+"I will not tell a soul; on the honor of a woman," said Jacintha.
+
+The form of protestation was quite new to Edouard, and not exactly the
+one his study of the ancient writers would have led him to select. But
+the tone was convincing: he trusted her. They parted sworn allies; and,
+at the very moment of parting, Jacintha, who had cast many a furtive
+glance at the dead game, told Edouard demurely, Mademoiselle Rose was
+very fond of roast partridge. On this he made her take the whole bag;
+and went home on wings. Jacintha's revelation roused all that was noble
+and forgiving in him. His understanding and his heart expanded from that
+hour, and his fancy spread its pinions to the sun of love. Ah! generous
+Youth, let who will betray thee; let who will sneer at thee; let me,
+though young no longer, smile on thee and joy in thee! She he loved was
+sad, was poor, was menaced by many ills; then she needed a champion. He
+would be her unseen friend, her guardian angel. A hundred wild schemes
+whirled in his beating heart and brain. He could not go in-doors,
+indeed, no room could contain him: he made for a green lane he knew at
+the back of the village, and there he walked up and down for hours.
+The sun set, and the night came, and the stars glittered; but still he
+walked alone, inspired, exalted, full of generous and loving schemes: of
+sweet and tender fancies: a heart on fire; and youth the fuel, and the
+flame vestal.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+
+This very day was the anniversary of the baron's death.
+
+The baroness kept her room all the morning, and took no nourishment but
+one cup of spurious coffee Rose brought her. Towards evening she came
+down-stairs. In the hall she found two chaplets of flowers; they were
+always placed there for her on this sad day. She took them in her hand,
+and went into the little oratory that was in the park; there she found
+two wax candles burning, and two fresh chaplets hung up. Her daughters
+had been there before her.
+
+She knelt and prayed many hours for her husband's soul; then she rose
+and hung up one chaplet and came slowly away with the other in her hand.
+At the gate of the park, Josephine met her with tender anxiety in her
+sapphire eyes, and wreathed her arms round her, and whispered, "But you
+have your children still."
+
+The baroness kissed her and they came towards the house together, the
+baroness leaning gently on her daughter's elbow.
+
+Between the park and the angle of the chateau was a small plot of turf
+called at Beaurepaire the Pleasance, a name that had descended
+along with other traditions; and in the centre of this Pleasance,
+or Pleasaunce, stood a wonderful oak-tree. Its circumference was
+thirty-four feet. The baroness came to this ancient tree, and hung her
+chaplet on a mutilated limb called the "knights' bough."
+
+The sun was setting tranquil and red; a broad ruby streak lingered on
+the deep green leaves of the prodigious oak. The baroness looked at it
+awhile in silence.
+
+Then she spoke slowly to it and said, "You were here before us: you will
+be here when we are gone."
+
+A spasm crossed Josephine's face, but she said nothing at the time. And
+so they went in together.
+
+Now as this tree was a feat of nature, and, above all, played a curious
+part in our story, I will ask you to stay a few minutes and look at it,
+while I say what was known about it; not the thousandth part of what it
+could have told, if trees could speak as well as breathe.
+
+The baroness did not exaggerate; the tree was far older than even this
+ancient family. They possessed among other archives a manuscript written
+by a monk, a son of the house, about four hundred years before our
+story, and containing many of the oral traditions about this tree that
+had come down to him from remote antiquity. According to this authority,
+the first Baron of Beaurepaire had pitched his tent under a fair
+oak-tree that stood prope rivum, near a brook. His grandson built a
+square tower hard by, and dug a moat that enclosed both tree and tower,
+and received the waters of the brook aforesaid.
+
+At this time the tree seems only to have been remarked for its height.
+But, a century and a half before the monk wrote, it had become famous in
+all the district for its girth, and in the monk's own day had ceased
+to grow; but not begun to decay. The mutilated arm I have mentioned
+was once a long sturdy bough, worn smooth as velvet in one part from
+a curious cause: it ran about as high above the ground as a full-sized
+horse, and the knights and squires used to be forever vaulting upon
+it, the former in armor; the monk, when a boy, had seen them do it a
+thousand times. This bough broke in two, A.D. 1617: but the mutilated
+limb was still called the knights' bough, nobody knew why. So do names
+survive their ideas.
+
+What had not this tree seen since first it came green and tender as
+a cabbage above the soil, and stood at the mercy of the first hare or
+rabbit that should choose to cut short its frail existence!
+
+Since then eagles had perched on its crown, and wild boars fed without
+fear of man upon its acorns. Troubadours had sung beneath it to lords
+and ladies seated round, or walking on the grass and commenting the
+minstrel's tales of love by exchange of amorous glances. Mediaeval
+sculptors had taken its leaves, and wisely trusting to nature, had
+adorned churches with those leaves cut in stone.
+
+It had seen a Norman duke conquer England, and English kings invade
+France and be crowned at Paris. It had seen a girl put knights to the
+rout, and seen the warrior virgin burned by envious priests with common
+consent both of the curs she had defended and the curs she had defeated.
+
+Why, in its old age it had seen the rise of printing, and the first dawn
+of national civilization in Europe. It flourished and decayed in France;
+but it sprung in Gaul. And more remarkable still, though by all accounts
+it may see the world to an end, it was a tree in ancient history: its
+old age awaits the millennium; its first youth belonged to that great
+tract of time which includes the birth of Christ, the building of Rome,
+and the siege of Troy.
+
+The tree had, ere this, mingled in the fortunes of the family. It had
+saved their lives and taken their lives. One lord of Beaurepaire, hotly
+pursued by his feudal enemies, made for the tree, and hid himself partly
+by a great bough, partly by the thick screen of leaves. The foe darted
+in, made sure he had taken to the house, ransacked it, and got into the
+cellar, where by good-luck was a store of Malvoisie: and so the oak and
+the vine saved the quaking baron. Another lord of Beaurepaire, besieged
+in his castle, was shot dead on the ramparts by a cross-bowman who had
+secreted himself unobserved in this tree a little before the dawn.
+
+A young heir of Beaurepaire, climbing for a raven's nest to the top
+of this tree, lost his footing and fell, and died at its foot: and his
+mother in her anguish bade them cut down the tree that had killed her
+boy. But the baron her husband refused, and spake in this wise: "ytte ys
+eneugh that I lose mine sonne, I will nat alsoe lose mine Tre." In
+the male you see the sober sentiment of the proprietor outweighed the
+temporary irritation of the parent. Then the mother bought fifteen ells
+of black velvet, and stretched a pall from the knights' bough across the
+west side to another branch, and cursed the hand that should remove it,
+and she herself "wolde never passe the Tre neither going nor coming, but
+went still about." And when she died and should have been carried past
+the tree to the park, her dochter did cry from a window to the bearers,
+"Goe about! goe about!" and they went about, and all the company. And in
+time the velvet pall rotted, and was torn and driven away by the winds:
+and when the hand of Nature, and no human hand, had thus flouted and
+dispersed the trappings of the mother's grief, two pieces were picked up
+and preserved among the family relics: but the black velvet had turned a
+rusty red.
+
+So the baroness did nothing new in this family when she hung her chaplet
+on the knights' bough; and, in fact, on the west side, about
+eighteen feet from the ground, there still mouldered one corner of
+an Atchievement an heir of Beaurepaire had nailed there two centuries
+before, when his predecessor died: "For," said he, "the chateau is of
+yesterday, but the tree has seen us all come and go." The inside of the
+oak was hollow as a drum; and on its east side yawned a fissure as
+high as a man and as broad as a street-door. Dard used to wheel his
+wheelbarrow into the tree at a trot, and there leave it.
+
+Yet in spite of excavation and mutilation not life only but vigor
+dwelt in this wooden shell. The extreme ends of the longer boughs were
+firewood, touchwood, and the crown was gone this many a year: but narrow
+the circle a very little to where the indomitable trunk could still
+shoot sap from its cruse deep in earth, and there on every side burst
+the green foliage in its season countless as the sand. The leaves carved
+centuries ago from these very models, though cut in stone, were most of
+them mouldered, blunted, notched, deformed: but the delicate types came
+back with every summer, perfect and lovely as when the tree was but
+their elder brother: and greener than ever: for, from what cause nature
+only knows, the leaves were many shades richer than any other tree could
+show for a hundred miles round; a deep green, fiery, yet soft; and then
+their multitude--the staircases of foliage as you looked up the tree,
+and could scarce catch a glimpse of the sky. An inverted abyss of color,
+a mound, a dome, of flake emeralds that quivered in the golden air.
+
+And now the sun sets; the green leaves are black; the moon rises: her
+cold light shoots across one half that giant stem.
+
+How solemn and calm stands the great round tower of living wood, half
+ebony, half silver, with its mighty cloud above of flake jet leaves
+tipped with frosty fire!
+
+Now is the still hour to repeat in a whisper the words of the dame of
+Beaurepaire, "You were here before us: you will be here when we are
+gone."
+
+We leave the hoary king of trees standing in the moonlight, calmly
+defying time, and follow the creatures of a day; for, what they were, we
+are.
+
+
+A spacious saloon panelled; dead but showy white picked out sparingly
+with gold. Festoons of fruits and flowers finely carved in wood on some
+of the panels. These also not smothered in gilding, but as it were gold
+speckled here and there, like tongues of flame winding among insoluble
+snow. Ranged against the walls were sofas and chairs covered with rich
+stuffs well worn. And in one little distant corner of the long room
+a gray-haired gentleman and two young ladies sat round a small plain
+table, on which burned a solitary candle; and a little way apart in
+this candle's twilight an old lady sat in an easy-chair, thinking of
+the past, scarce daring to inquire the future. Josephine and Rose were
+working: not fancy-work but needle-work; Dr. Aubertin writing. Every
+now and then he put the one candle nearer the girls. They raised no
+objection: only a few minutes after a white hand would glide from one
+or other of them like a serpent, and smoothly convey the light nearer to
+the doctor's manuscript.
+
+"Is it not supper-time?" he inquired. "I have an inward monitor; and I
+think our dinner was more ethereal than usual."
+
+"Hush!" said Josephine, and looked uneasily towards her mother. "Wax is
+so dear."
+
+"Wax?--ah!--pardon me:" and the doctor returned hastily to his work.
+But Rose looked up and said, "I wonder Jacintha does not come; it is
+certainly past the hour;" and she pried into the room as if she
+expected to see Jacintha on the road. But she saw in fact very little of
+anything, for the spacious room was impenetrable to her eye; midway from
+the candle to the distant door its twilight deepened, and all became
+shapeless and sombre. The prospect ended sharp and black, as in those
+out-o'-door closets imagined and painted by a certain great painter,
+whose Nature comes to a full stop as soon as he has no further
+commercial need of her, instead of melting by fine expanse and exquisite
+gradation into genuine distance, as nature does in Claude and in nature.
+To reverse the picture, if you stood at the door you looked across forty
+feet of black, and the little corner seemed on fire, and the fair heads
+about the candle shone like the St. Cecilias and Madonnas in an antique
+stained-glass window.
+
+At last the door opened, and another candle fired Jacintha's comely
+peasant face in the doorway. She put down her candle outside the door,
+and started as crow flies for the other light. After glowing a moment in
+the doorway she dived into the shadow and emerged into light again
+close to the table with napkins on her arm. She removed the work-box
+reverentially, the doctor's manuscript unceremoniously, and proceeded to
+lay a cloth: in which operation she looked at Rose a point-blank glance
+of admiration: then she placed the napkins; and in this process she
+again cast a strange look of interest upon Rose. The young lady noticed
+it this time, and looked inquiringly at her in return, half expecting
+some communication; but Jacintha lowered her eyes and bustled about the
+table. Then Rose spoke to her with a sort of instinct of curiosity, on
+the chance of drawing her out.
+
+"Supper is late to-night, is it not, Jacintha?"
+
+"Yes, mademoiselle; I have had more cooking than usual," and with this
+she delivered another point-blank look as before, and dived into the
+palpable obscure, and came to light in the doorway.
+
+Her return was anxiously expected; for, if the truth must be told,
+they were very hungry. So rigorous was the economy in this decayed but
+honorable house that the wax candles burned to-day in the oratory had
+scrimped their dinner, unsubstantial as it was wont to be. Think of
+that, you in fustian jackets who grumble after meat. The door opened,
+Jacintha reappeared in the light of her candle a moment with a tray
+in both hands, and, approaching, was lost to view; but a strange and
+fragrant smell heralded her. All their eyes turned with curiosity
+towards the unwonted odor, and Jacintha dawned with three roast
+partridges on a dish.
+
+They were wonder-struck, and looked from the birds to her in mute
+surprise, that was not diminished by a certain cynical indifference
+she put on. She avoided their eyes, and forcibly excluded from her face
+everything that could imply she did not serve up partridges to this
+family every night of her life.
+
+"The supper is served, madame," said she, with a respectful courtesy
+and a mechanical tone, and, plunging into the night, swam out at her own
+candle, shut the door, and, unlocking her face that moment, burst out
+radiant, and so to the kitchen, and, with a tear in her eye, set-to and
+polished all the copper stewpans with a vigor and expedition unknown to
+the new-fangled domestic.
+
+"Partridges, mamma! What next?"
+
+"Pheasants, I hope," cried the doctor, gayly. "And after them hares; to
+conclude with royal venison. Permit me, ladies." And he set himself to
+carve with zeal.
+
+Now nature is nature, and two pair of violet eyes brightened and dwelt
+on the fragrant and delicate food with demure desire; for all that,
+when Aubertin offered Josephine a wing, she declined it. "No partridge?"
+cried the savant, in utter amazement.
+
+"Not to-day, dear friend; it is not a feast day to-day."
+
+"Ah! no; what was I thinking of?"
+
+"But you are not to be deprived," put in Josephine, anxiously. "We will
+not deny ourselves the pleasure of seeing you eat some."
+
+"What!" remonstrated Aubertin, "am I not one of you?"
+
+The baroness had attended to every word of this. She rose from her
+chair, and said quietly, "Both you and he and Rose will be so good as to
+let me see you eat."
+
+"But, mamma," remonstrated Josephine and Rose in one breath.
+
+"Je le veux," was the cold reply.
+
+These were words the baroness uttered so seldom that they were little
+likely to be disputed.
+
+The doctor carved and helped the young ladies and himself.
+
+When they had all eaten a little, a discussion was observed to be going
+on between Rose and her sister. At last Aubertin caught these words, "It
+will be in vain; even you have not influence enough for that, Rose."
+
+"We shall see," was the reply, and Rose put the wing of a partridge on a
+plate and rose calmly from her chair. She took the plate and put it on
+a little work-table by her mother's side. The others pretended to be all
+mouths, but they were all ears. The baroness looked in Rose's face
+with an air of wonder that was not very encouraging. Then, as Rose said
+nothing, she raised her aristocratic hand with a courteous but decided
+gesture of refusal.
+
+Undaunted Rose laid her palm softly on the baroness's shoulder, and said
+to her as firmly as the baroness herself had just spoken,--
+
+"Il le veut."
+
+The baroness was staggered. Then she looked with moist eyes at the fair
+young face, then she reflected. At last she said, with an exquisite
+mixture of politeness and affection, "It is his daughter who has told me
+'Il le veut.' I obey."
+
+Rose returning like a victorious knight from the lists, saucily
+exultant, and with only one wet eyelash, was solemnly kissed and petted
+by Josephine and the doctor.
+
+Thus they loved one another in this great, old, falling house. Their
+familiarity had no coarse side; a form, not of custom but affection, it
+went hand-in-hand with courtesy by day and night.
+
+The love of the daughters for their mother had all the tenderness,
+subtlety, and unselfishness of womanly natures, together with a certain
+characteristic of the female character. And whither that one defect
+led them, and by what gradations, it may be worth the reader's while to
+observe.
+
+The baroness retired to rest early; and she was no sooner gone than
+Josephine leaned over to Rose, and told her what their mother had
+said to the oak-tree. Rose heard this with anxiety; hitherto they had
+carefully concealed from their mother that the government claimed the
+right of selling the chateau to pay the creditors, etc.; and now both
+sisters feared the old lady had discovered it somehow, or why that
+strange thing she had said to the oak-tree? But Dr. Aubertin caught
+their remarks, and laid down his immortal MS. on French insects, to
+express his hope that they were putting a forced interpretation on the
+baroness's words.
+
+"I think," said he, "she merely meant how short-lived are we all
+compared with this ancient oak. I should be very sorry to adopt the
+other interpretation; for if she knows she can at any moment be expelled
+from Beaurepaire, it will be almost as bad for her as the calamity
+itself; THAT, I think, would kill her."
+
+"Why so?" said Rose, eagerly. "What is this house or that? Mamma will
+still have her daughters' love, go where she will."
+
+Aubertin replied, "It is idle to deceive ourselves; at her age men and
+women hang to life by their habits; take her away from her chateau, from
+the little oratory where she prays every day for the departed, from her
+place in the sun on the south terrace, and from all the memories that
+surround her here; she would soon pine, and die."
+
+Here the savant seeing a hobby-horse near, caught him and jumped on. He
+launched into a treatise upon the vitality of human beings, and proved
+that it is the mind which keeps the body of a man alive for so great a
+length of time as fourscore years; for that he had in the earlier part
+of his studies carefully dissected a multitude of animals,--frogs,
+rabbits, dogs, men, horses, sheep, squirrels, foxes, cats, etc.,--and
+discovered no peculiarity in man's organs to account for his singular
+longevity, except in the brain or organ of mind. Thence he went to
+the longevity of men with contented minds, and the rapid decay of the
+careworn. Finally he succeeded in convincing them the baroness was so
+constituted, physically and mentally, that she would never move from
+Beaurepaire except into her grave. However, having thus terrified them,
+he proceeded to console them. "You have a friend," said he, "a powerful
+friend; and here in my pocket--somewhere--is a letter that proves it."
+
+The letter was from Mr. Perrin the notary. It appeared by it that Dr.
+Aubertin had reminded the said Perrin of his obligations to the late
+baron, and entreated him to use all his influence to keep the estate in
+this ancient family.
+
+Perrin had replied at first in a few civil lines; but his present letter
+was a long and friendly one. It made both the daughters of Beaurepaire
+shudder at the peril they had so narrowly escaped. For by it they now
+learned for the first time that one Jaques Bonard, a small farmer,
+to whom they owed but five thousand francs, had gone to the mayor and
+insisted, as he had a perfect right, on the estate being put up to
+public auction. This had come to Perrin's ears just in time, and he had
+instantly bought Bonard's debt, and stopped the auction; not, however,
+before the very bills were printed; for which he, Perrin, had paid, and
+now forwarded the receipt. He concluded by saying that the government
+agent was personally inert, and would never move a step in the matter
+unless driven by a creditor.
+
+"But we have so many," said Rose in dismay. "We are not safe a day."
+
+Aubertin assured her the danger was only in appearance. "Your large
+creditors are men of property, and such men let their funds lie unless
+compelled to move them. The small mortgagee, the petty miser, who has,
+perhaps, no investment to watch but one small loan, about which he is
+as anxious and as noisy as a hen with one chicken, he is the clamorous
+creditor, the harsh little egoist, who for fear of risking a crown piece
+would bring the Garden of Eden to the hammer. Now we are rid of
+that little wretch, Bonard, and have Perrin on our side; so there is
+literally nothing to fear."
+
+The sisters thanked him warmly, and Rose shared his hopes; and said so;
+but Josephine was silent and thoughtful. Nothing more worth recording
+passed that night. But the next day was the first of May, Josephine's
+birthday.
+
+Now they always celebrated this day as well as they could; and used to
+plant a tree, for one thing. Dard, well spurred by Jacintha, had got
+a little acacia; and they were all out in the Pleasaunce to plant it.
+Unhappily, they were a preposterous time making up their feminine minds
+where to have it set; so Dard turned rusty and said the park was the
+best place for it. There it could do no harm, stick it where you would.
+
+"And who told you to put in your word?" inquired Jacintha. "You're here
+to dig the hole where mademoiselle chooses; not to argufy."
+
+Josephine whispered Rose, "I admire the energy of her character. Could
+she be induced to order once for all where the poor thing is to be
+planted?"
+
+"Then where WILL you have it, mademoiselle?" asked Dard, sulkily.
+
+"Here, I think, Dard," said Josephine sweetly.
+
+Dard grinned malignantly, and drove in his spade. "It will never be much
+bigger than a stinging nettle," thought he, "for the roots of the oak
+have sucked every atom of heart out of this." His black soul exulted
+secretly.
+
+Jacintha stood by Dard, inspecting his work; the sisters intertwined,
+a few feet from him. The baroness turned aside, and went to look for a
+moment at the chaplet she had placed yesterday on the oak-tree bough.
+Presently she uttered a slight ejaculation; and her daughters looked up
+directly.
+
+"Come here, children," said she. They glided to her in a moment; and
+found her eyes fixed upon an object that lay on the knights' bough.
+
+It was a sparkling purse.
+
+I dare say you have noticed that the bark on the boughs of these very
+ancient trees is as deeply furrowed as the very stem of an oak tree that
+boasts but a few centuries; and in one of these deep furrows lay a green
+silk purse with gold coins glittering through the glossy meshes.
+
+Josephine and Rose eyed it a moment like startled deer; then Rose
+pounced on it. "Oh, how heavy!" she cried. This brought up Dard and
+Jacintha, in time to see Rose pour ten shining gold pieces out of the
+purse into her pink-white palm, while her face flushed and her eyes
+glittered with excitement. Jacintha gave a scream of joy; "Our luck is
+turned," she cried, superstitiously. Meanwhile, Josephine had found a
+slip of paper close to the purse. She opened it with nimble fingers;
+it contained one line in a hand like that of a copying clerk: FROM A
+FRIEND: IN PART PAYMENT OF A GREAT DEBT.
+
+Keen, piquant curiosity now took the place of surprise. Who could it
+be? The baroness's suspicion fell at once on Dr. Aubertin. But Rose
+maintained he had not ten gold pieces in the world. The baroness
+appealed to Josephine. She only blushed in an extraordinary way, and
+said nothing. They puzzled, and puzzled, and were as much in the dark as
+ever, when lo! one of the suspected parties delivered himself into
+the hands of justice with ludicrous simplicity. It happened to be Dr.
+Aubertin's hour of out-a-door study; and he came mooning along, buried
+in a book, and walked slowly into the group--started, made a slight
+apology, and was mooning off, lost in his book again. Then the
+baroness, who had eyed him with grim suspicion all the time, said with
+well-affected nonchalance, "Doctor, you dropped your purse; we have just
+picked it up." And she handed it to him. "Thank you, madame," said he,
+and took it quietly without looking at it, put it in his pocket,
+and retired, with his soul in his book. They stared comically at one
+another, and at this cool hand. "It's no more his than it's mine," said
+Jacintha, bluntly. Rose darted after the absorbed student, and took
+him captive. "Now, doctor," she cried, "be pleased to come out of the
+clouds." And with the word she whipped the purse out of his coat pocket,
+and holding it right up before his eye, insisted on his telling her
+whether that was his purse or not, money and all. Thus adjured, he
+disowned the property mighty coolly, for a retired physician, who had
+just pocketed it.
+
+"No, my dear," said he; "and, now I think of it, I have not carried a
+purse this twenty years."
+
+The baroness, as a last resource, appealed to his honor whether he had
+not left a purse and paper on the knights' bough. The question had to be
+explained by Josephine, and then the doctor surprised them all by being
+rather affronted--for once in his life.
+
+"Baroness," said he, "I have been your friend and pensioner nearly
+twenty years; if by some strange chance money were to come into my
+hands, I should not play you a childish trick like this. What! have I
+not the right to come to you, and say, 'My old friend, here I bring you
+back a very small part of all I owe you?'"
+
+"What geese we are," remarked Rose. "Dear doctor, YOU tell us who it
+is."
+
+Dr. Aubertin reflected a single moment; then said he could make a shrewd
+guess.
+
+"Who? who? who?" cried the whole party.
+
+"Perrin the notary."
+
+It was the baroness's turn to be surprised; for there was nothing
+romantic about Perrin the notary. Aubertin, however, let her know that
+he was in private communication with the said Perrin, and this was not
+the first friendly act the good notary had done her in secret.
+
+While he was converting the baroness to his view, Josephine and Rose
+exchanged a signal, and slipped away round an angle of the chateau.
+
+"Who is it?" said Rose.
+
+"It is some one who has a delicate mind."
+
+"Clearly, and therefore not a notary."
+
+"Rose, dear, might it not be some person who has done us some wrong, and
+is perhaps penitent?"
+
+"Certainly; one of our tenants, or creditors, you mean; but then, the
+paper says 'a friend.' Stay, it says a debtor. Why a debtor? Down with
+enigmas!"
+
+"Rose, love," said Josephine, coaxingly, "think of some one that
+might--since it is not the doctor, nor Monsieur Perrin, might it not
+be--for after all, he would naturally be ashamed to appear before me."
+
+"Before you? Who do you mean?" asked Rose nervously, catching a glimpse
+now.
+
+"He who once pretended to love me."
+
+"Josephine, you love that man still."
+
+"No, no. Spare me!"
+
+"You love him just the same as ever. Oh, it is wonderful; it is
+terrible; the power he has over you; over your judgment as well as your
+heart."
+
+"No! for I believe he has forgotten my very name; don't you think so?"
+
+"Dear Josephine, can you doubt it? Come, you do doubt it."
+
+"Sometimes."
+
+"But why? for what reason?"
+
+"Because of what he said to me as we parted at that gate; the words and
+the voice seem still to ring like truth across the weary years. He said,
+'I am to join the army of the Pyrenees, so fatal to our troops; but say
+to me what you never yet have said, Camille, I love you: and I swear
+I will come back alive.' So then I said to him, 'I love you,'--and he
+never came back."
+
+"How could he come here? a deserter, a traitor!"
+
+"It is not true; it is not in his nature; inconstancy may be. Tell me
+that he never really loved me, and I will believe you; but not that he
+is a traitor. Let me weep over my past love, not blush for it."
+
+"Past? You love him to-day as you did three years ago."
+
+"No," said Josephine, "no; I love no one. I never shall love any one
+again."
+
+"But him. It is that love which turns your heart against others.
+Oh, yes, you love him, dearest, or why should you fancy our secret
+benefactor COULD be that Camille?"
+
+"Why? Because I was mad: because it is impossible; but I see my folly. I
+am going in."
+
+"What! don't you care to know who I think it was, perhaps?"
+
+"No," said Josephine sadly and doggedly; she added with cold
+nonchalance, "I dare say time will show." And she went slowly in, her
+hand to her head.
+
+"Her birthday!" sighed Rose.
+
+The donor, whoever he was, little knew the pain he was inflicting on
+this distressed but proud family, or the hard battle that ensued
+between their necessities and their delicacy. The ten gold pieces were
+a perpetual temptation: a daily conflict. The words that accompanied the
+donation offered a bait. Their pride and dignity declined it; but these
+bright bits of gold cost them many a sharp pang. You must know that
+Josephine and Rose had worn out their mourning by this time; and were
+obliged to have recourse to gayer materials that lay in their great
+wardrobes, and were older, but less worn. A few of these gold pieces
+would have enabled the poor girls to be neat, and yet to mourn their
+father openly. And it went through and through those tender, simple
+hearts, to think that they must be disunited, even in so small a thing
+as dress; that while their mother remained in her weeds, they must seem
+no longer to share her woe.
+
+The baroness knew their feeling, and felt its piety, and yet could not
+bow her dignity to say, "Take five of these bits of gold, and let us
+all look what we are--one." Yet in this, as in everything else, they
+supported each other. They resisted, they struggled, and with a wrench
+they conquered day by day. At last, by general consent, Josephine locked
+up the tempter, and they looked at it no more. But the little bit of
+paper met a kinder fate. Rose made a little frame for it, and it was
+kept in a drawer, in the salon: and often looked at and blessed. Just
+when they despaired of human friendship, this paper with the sacred
+word "friend" written on it, had fallen all in a moment on their aching
+hearts.
+
+They could not tell whence it came, this blessed word.
+
+But men dispute whence comes the dew?
+
+Then let us go with the poets, who say it comes from heaven.
+
+And even so that sweet word, friend, dropped like the dew from heaven on
+these afflicted ones.
+
+So they locked the potent gold away from themselves, and took the kind
+slip of paper to their hearts.
+
+The others left off guessing: Aubertin had it all his own way: he upheld
+Perrin as their silent benefactor, and bade them all observe that the
+worthy notary had never visited the chateau openly since the day the
+purse was left there. "Guilty conscience," said Aubertin dryly.
+
+One day in his walks he met a gaunt figure ambling on a fat pony: he
+stopped him, and, holding up his finger, said abruptly, "We have found
+you out, Maitre Perrin."
+
+The notary changed color.
+
+"Oh, never be ashamed," said Aubertin; "a good action done slyly is none
+the less a good action."
+
+The notary wore a puzzled air.
+
+Aubertin admired his histrionic powers in calling up this look.
+
+"Come, come, don't overdo it," said he. "Well, well; they cannot profit
+by your liberality; but you will be rewarded in a better world, take my
+word for that."
+
+The notary muttered indistinctly. He was a man of moderate desires;
+would have been quite content if there had been no other world in
+perspective. He had studied this one, and made it pay: did not desire a
+better; sometimes feared a worse.
+
+"Ah!" said Aubertin, "I see how it is; we do not like to hear ourselves
+praised, do we? When shall we see you at the chateau?"
+
+"I propose to call on the baroness the moment I have good news to
+bring," replied Perrin; and to avoid any more compliments spurred the
+dun pony suddenly; and he waddled away.
+
+Now this Perrin was at that moment on the way to dine with a character
+who plays a considerable part in the tale--Commandant Raynal. Perrin had
+made himself useful to the commandant, and had become his legal adviser.
+And, this very day after dinner, the commandant having done a good day's
+work permitted himself a little sentiment over the bottle, and to a man
+he thought his friend. He let out that he had a heap of money he did not
+know what to do with, and almost hated it now his mother was gone and
+could not share it.
+
+The man of law consoled him with oleaginous phrases: told him he very
+much underrated the power of money. His hoard, directed by a judicious
+adviser, would make him a landed proprietor, and the husband of some
+young lady, all beauty, virtue, and accomplishment, whose soothing
+influence would soon heal the sorrow caused by an excess of filial
+sentiment.
+
+"Halt!" shouted Raynal: "say that again in half the words."
+
+Perrin was nettled, for he prided himself on his colloquial style.
+
+"You can buy a fine estate and a chaste wife with the money," snapped
+this smooth personage, substituting curt brutality for honeyed
+prolixity.
+
+The soldier was struck by the propositions the moment they flew at him
+small and solid, like bullets.
+
+"I've no time," said he, "to be running after women. But the estate I'll
+certainly have, because you can get that for me without my troubling my
+head."
+
+"Is it a commission, then?" asked the other sharply.
+
+"Of course. Do you think I speak for the sake of talking?"
+
+And so Perrin received formal instructions to look out for a landed
+estate; and he was to receive a handsome commission as agent.
+
+Now to settle this affair, and pocket a handsome percentage for himself,
+he had only to say "Beaurepaire."
+
+Well, he didn't. Never mentioned the place; nor the fact that it was for
+sale.
+
+Such are all our agents, when rival speculators. Mind that. Still it
+is a terrible thing to be so completely in the power of any man of the
+world, as from this hour Beaurepaire was in the power of Perrin the
+notary.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+
+Edouard Riviere was unhappy. She never came out now. This alone made the
+days dark to him. And then he began to fear it was him she shunned. She
+must have seen him lie in wait for her; and so she would come out no
+more. He prowled about and contrived to fall in with Jacintha; he told
+her his grief. She assured him the simple fact was their mourning was
+worn out, and they were ashamed to go abroad in colors. This revelation
+made his heart yearn still more.
+
+"O Jacintha," said he, "if I could only make a beginning; but here we
+might live a century in the same parish, and not one chance for a poor
+wretch to make acquaintance."
+
+Jacintha admitted this, and said gentlefolks were to be pitied. "Why, if
+it was the likes of me, you and I should have made friends long before
+now."
+
+Jacintha herself was puzzled what to do; she would have told Rose if she
+had felt sure it would be well received; but she could not find out that
+the young lady had even noticed the existence of Edouard. But her brain
+worked, and lay in wait for an opportunity.
+
+One came sooner than she expected. One morning at about six o'clock, as
+she came home from milking the cow, she caught sight of young Riviere
+trying to open the iron gate. "What is up now?" thought she; suddenly
+the truth flashed upon her, clear as day. She put her pail down and
+stole upon him. "You want to leave us another purse," said she. He
+colored all over and panted.
+
+"How did you know? how could you know? you won't betray me? you won't be
+so cruel? you promised."
+
+"Me betray you," said Jacintha; "why, I'll help you; and then they will
+be able to buy mourning, you know, and then they will come out, and give
+you a chance. You can't open that gate, for it's locked. But you come
+round to the lane, and I'll get you the key; it is hanging up in the
+kitchen."
+
+The key was in her pocket. But the sly jade wanted him away from that
+gate; it commanded a view of the Pleasaunce. He was no sooner safe in
+the lane, than she tore up-stairs to her young ladies, and asked them
+with affected calm whether they would like to know who left the purse.
+
+"Oh, yes, yes!" screamed Rose.
+
+"Then come with me. You ARE dressed; never mind your bonnets, or you
+will be too late."
+
+Questions poured on her; but she waived all explanation, and did not
+give them time to think, or Josephine, for one, she knew would raise
+objections. She led the way to the Pleasaunce, and, when she got to the
+ancestral oak, she said hurriedly, "Now, mesdemoiselles, hide in there,
+and as still as mice. You'll soon know who leaves the purses."
+
+With this she scudded to the lane, and gave Edouard the key. "Look
+sharp," said she, "before they get up; it's almost their dressing time."
+
+"YOU'LL SOON KNOW WHO LEAVES THE PURSES!"
+
+Curiosity, delicious curiosity, thrilled our two daughters of Eve.
+
+This soon began to alternate with chill misgivings at the novelty of the
+situation.
+
+"She is not coming back," said Josephine ruefully.
+
+"No," said Rose, "and suppose when we pounce out on him, it should be a
+stranger."
+
+"Pounce on him? surely we are not to do that?"
+
+"Oh, y-yes; that is the p-p-programme," quavered Rose.
+
+A key grated, and the iron gate creaked on its hinges. They ran together
+and pinched one another for mutual support, but did not dare to speak.
+
+Presently a man's shadow came slap into the tree. They crouched and
+quivered, and expected to be caught instead of catching, and wished
+themselves safe back in bed, and all this a nightmare, and no worse.
+
+At last they recovered themselves enough to observe that this shadow,
+one half of which lay on the ground, while the head and shoulders went a
+little way up the wall of the tree, represented a man's profile, not his
+front face. The figure, in short, was standing between them and the sun,
+and was contemplating the chateau, not the tree.
+
+The shadow took off its hat to Josephine, in the tree. Then would she
+have screamed if she had not bitten her white hand instead, and made a
+red mark thereon.
+
+It wiped its brow with a handkerchief; it had walked fast, poor thing!
+The next moment it was away.
+
+They looked at one another and panted. They scarcely dared do it before.
+Then Rose, with one hand on her heaving bosom, shook her little white
+fist viciously at where the figure must be, and perhaps a comical
+desire of vengeance stimulated her curiosity. She now glided through the
+fissure like a cautious panther from her den; and noiseless and supple
+as a serpent began to wind slowly round the tree. She soon came to a
+great protuberance in the tree, and twining and peering round it with
+diamond eye, she saw a very young, very handsome gentleman, stealing on
+tiptoe to the nearest flower-bed. Then she saw him take a purse out of
+his bosom, and drop it on the bed. This done, he came slowly past the
+tree again, and was even heard to vent a little innocent chuckle of
+intense satisfaction: but of brief duration; for, when Rose saw the
+purse leave his hand, she made a rapid signal to Josephine to wheel
+round the other side of the tree, and, starting together with admirable
+concert, both the daughters of Beaurepaire glided into sight with a vast
+appearance of composure.
+
+Two women together are really braver than fifteen separate; but still,
+most of this tranquillity was merely put on, but so admirably that
+Edouard Riviere had no chance with them. He knew nothing about their
+tremors; all he saw or heard was, a rustle, then a flap on each side of
+him as of great wings, and two lovely women were upon him with angelic
+swiftness. "Ah!" he cried out with a start, and glanced from the
+first-comer, Rose, to the gate. But Josephine was on that side by this
+time, and put up her hand, as much as to say, "You can't pass here." In
+such situations, the mind works quicker than lightning. He took off his
+hat, and stammered an excuse--"Come to look at the oak." At this moment
+Rose pounced on the purse, and held it up to Josephine. He was caught.
+His only chance now was to bolt for the mark and run; but it was not
+the notary, it was a novice who lost his presence of mind, or perhaps
+thought it rude to run when a lady told him to stand still. All he did
+was to crush his face into his two hands, round which his cheeks and
+neck now blushed red as blood. Blush? they could both see the color rush
+like a wave to the very roots of his hair and the tips of his fingers.
+
+The moment our heroines, who, in that desperation which is one of
+the forms of cowardice, had hurled themselves on the foe, saw this,
+flash--the quick-witted poltroons exchanged purple lightning over
+Edouard's drooping head, and enacted lionesses in a moment.
+
+It was with the quiet composure of lofty and powerful natures that
+Josephine opened on him. "Compose yourself, sir; and be so good as
+to tell us who you are." Edouard must answer. Now he could not speak
+through his hands; and he could not face a brace of tranquil lionesses:
+so he took a middle course, removed one hand, and shading himself from
+Josephine with the other, he gasped out, "I am--my name is Riviere; and
+I--I--ladies!"
+
+"I am afraid we frighten you," said Josephine, demurely.
+
+"Don't be frightened," said Rose, majestically; "we are not VERY angry,
+only a LITTLE curious to know why you water our flowers with gold."
+
+At this point-blank thrust, and from her, Edouard was so confounded and
+distressed, they both began to pity him. He stammered out that he was
+so confused he did not know what to say. He couldn't think how ever he
+could have taken such a liberty; might he be permitted to retire? and
+with this he tried to slip away.
+
+"Let me detain you one instant," said Josephine, and made for the house.
+
+Left alone so suddenly with the culprit, the dignity, and majesty, and
+valor of Rose seemed to ooze gently out; and she stood blushing, and had
+not a word to say; no more had Edouard. But he hung his head, and she
+hung her head. And, somehow or other, whenever she raised her eyes
+to glance at him, he raised his to steal a look at her, and mutual
+discomfiture resulted.
+
+This awkward, embarrassing delirium was interrupted by Josephine's
+return. She now held another purse in her hand, and quietly poured the
+rest of the coin into it. She then, with a blush, requested him to take
+back the money.
+
+At that he found his tongue. "No, no," he cried, and put up his hands in
+supplication. "Ladies, do let me speak ONE word to you. Do not reject my
+friendship. You are alone in the world; your father is dead; your mother
+has but you to lean on. After all, I am your neighbor, and neighbors
+should be friends. And I am your debtor; I owe you more than you could
+ever owe me; for ever since I came into this neighborhood I have been
+happy. No man was ever so happy as I, ever since one day I was
+walking, and met for the first time an angel. I don't say it was you,
+Mademoiselle Rose. It might be Mademoiselle Josephine."
+
+"How pat he has got our names," said Rose, smiling.
+
+"A look from that angel has made me so good, so happy. I used to
+vegetate, but now I live. Live! I walk on wings, and tread on roses. Yet
+you insist on declining a few miserable louis d'or from him who owes you
+so much. Well, don't be angry; I'll take them back, and throw them into
+the nearest pond, for they are really no use to me. But then you will
+be generous in your turn. You will accept my devotion, my services.
+You have no brother, you know; well, I have no sisters; let me be your
+brother, and your servant forever."
+
+At all this, delivered in as many little earnest pants as there were
+sentences, the water stood in the fair eyes he was looking into so
+piteously.
+
+Josephine was firm, but angelical. "We thank you, Monsieur Riviere,"
+said she, softly, "for showing us that the world is still embellished
+with hearts like yours. Here is the money;" and she held it out in her
+creamy hand.
+
+"But we are very grateful," put in Rose, softly and earnestly.
+
+"That we are," said Josephine, "and we beg to keep the purse as a
+souvenir of one who tried to do us a kindness without mortifying us. And
+now, Monsieur Riviere, you will permit us to bid you adieu."
+
+Edouard was obliged to take the hint. "It is I who am the intruder,"
+said he. "Mesdemoiselles, conceive, if you can, my pride and my
+disappointment." He then bowed low; they courtesied low to him in
+return; and he retired slowly in a state of mixed feeling indescribable.
+
+With all their sweetness and graciousness, he felt overpowered by their
+high breeding, their reserve, and their composure, in a situation that
+had set his heart beating itself nearly out of his bosom. He acted the
+scene over again, only much more adroitly, and concocted speeches for
+past use, and was very hot and very cold by turns.
+
+I wish he could have heard what passed between the sisters as soon as
+ever he was out of earshot. It would have opened his eyes, and given him
+a little peep into what certain writers call "the sex."
+
+"Poor boy," murmured Josephine, "he has gone away unhappy."
+
+"Oh, I dare say he hasn't gone far," replied Rose, gayly. "I shouldn't
+if I was a boy."
+
+Josephine held up her finger like an elder sister; then went on to say
+she really hardly knew why she had dismissed him.
+
+"Well, dear," said Rose, dryly, "since you admit so much, I must say I
+couldn't help thinking--while you were doing it--we were letting 'the
+poor boy' off ridiculously cheap."
+
+"At least I did my duty?" suggested Josephine, inquiringly.
+
+"Magnificently; you overawed even me. So now to business, as the
+gentlemen say. Which of us two takes him?"
+
+"Takes whom?" inquired Josephine, opening her lovely eyes.
+
+"Edouard," murmured Rose, lowering hers.
+
+Josephine glared on the lovely minx with wonder and comical horror.
+
+"Oh! you shall have him," said Rose, "if you like. You are the eldest,
+you know."
+
+"Fie!"
+
+"Do now; TO OBLIGE ME."
+
+"For shame! Rose. Is this you? talking like that!"
+
+"Oh! there's no compulsion, dear; I never force young ladies'
+inclinations. So you decline him?"
+
+"Of course I decline him."
+
+"Then, oh, you dear, darling Josephine, this is the prettiest present
+you ever made me," and she kissed her vehemently.
+
+Josephine was frightened now. She held Rose out at arm's length with
+both hands, and looked earnestly into her, and implored her not to play
+with fire. "Take warning by me."
+
+Rose recommended her to keep her pity for Monsieur Riviere, "who had
+fallen into nice hands," she said. That no doubt might remain on that
+head, she whispered mysteriously, but with much gravity and conviction,
+"I am an Imp;" and aimed at Josephine with her forefinger to point the
+remark. For one second she stood and watched this important statement
+sink into her sister's mind, then set-to and gambolled elfishly round
+her as she moved stately and thoughtful across the grass to the chateau.
+
+Two days after this a large tree was blown down in Beaurepaire park,
+and made quite a gap in the prospect. You never know what a big thing a
+leafy tree is till it comes down. And this ill wind blew Edouard good;
+for it laid bare the chateau to his inquiring telescope. He had not
+gazed above half an hour, when a female figure emerged from the chateau.
+His heart beat. It was only Jacintha. He saw her look this way and that,
+and presently Dard appeared, and she sent him with his axe to the fallen
+tree. Edouard watched him hacking away at it. Presently his heart gave a
+violent leap; for why? two ladies emerged from the Pleasaunce and walked
+across the park. They came up to Dard, and stood looking at the tree and
+Dard hacking it, and Edouard watched them greedily. You know we all love
+to magnify her we love. And this was a delightful way of doing it. It
+is "a system of espionage" that prevails under every form of government.
+How he gazed, and gazed, on his now polar star; studied every turn,
+every gesture, with eager delight, and tried to gather what she said, or
+at least the nature of it.
+
+But by and by they left Dard and strolled towards the other end of the
+park. Then did our astronomer fling down his tube, and come running out
+in hopes of intercepting them, and seeming to meet them by some strange
+fortuity. Hope whispered he should be blessed with a smile; perhaps
+a word even. So another minute and he was running up the road to
+Beaurepaire. But his good heart was doomed to be diverted to a much
+humbler object than his idol; as he came near the fallen tree he heard
+loud cries for help, followed by groans of pain. He bounded over the
+hedge, and there was Dard hanging over his axe, moaning. "What is the
+matter? what is the matter?" cried Edouard, running to him.
+
+"Oh! oh! cut my foot. Oh!"
+
+Edouard looked, and turned sick, for there was a gash right through
+Dard's shoe, and the blood welling up through it. But, recovering
+himself by an effort of the will, he cried out, "Courage, my lad!
+don't give in. Thank Heaven there's no artery there. Oh, dear, it is
+a terrible cut! Let us get you home, that is the first thing. Can you
+walk?"
+
+"Lord bless you, no! nor stand neither without help."
+
+Edouard flew to the wheelbarrow, and, reversing it, spun a lot of billet
+out. "Ye must not do that," said Dard with all the energy he was capable
+of in his present condition. "Why, that is Jacintha's wood."--"To the
+devil with Jacintha and her wood too!" cried Edouard, "a man is worth
+more than a fagot. Come, I shall wheel you home: it is only just across
+the park."
+
+With some difficulty he lifted him into the barrow. Luckily he had his
+shooting-jacket on with a brandy-flask in it: he administered it with
+excellent effect.
+
+The ladies, as they walked, saw a man wheeling a barrow across the park,
+and took no particular notice; but, as Riviere was making for the same
+point they were, though at another angle, presently the barrow came near
+enough for them to see Dard's head and arms in it. Rose was the first to
+notice this. "Look! look! if he is not wheeling Dard in the barrow now."
+
+"Who?"
+
+"Can you ask? Who provides all our excitement?"
+
+Josephine instantly divined there was something amiss. "Consider," said
+she, "Monsieur Riviere would not wheel Dard all across the park for
+amusement."
+
+Rose assented; and in another minute, by a strange caprice of fate,
+those Edouard had come to intercept, quickened their pace to intercept
+him. As soon as he saw their intention he thrilled all over, but did not
+slacken his pace. He told Dard to take his coat and throw it over his
+foot, for here were the young ladies coming.
+
+"What for?" said Dard sulkily. "No! let them see what they have done
+with their little odd jobs: this is my last for one while. I sha'n't go
+on two legs again this year."
+
+The ladies came up with them.
+
+"O monsieur!" said Josephine, "what is the matter?"
+
+"We have met with a little accident, mademoiselle, that is all. Dard has
+hurt his foot; nothing to speak of, but I thought he would be best at
+home."
+
+Rose raised the coat which Riviere, in spite of Dard, had flung over his
+foot.
+
+"He is bleeding! Dard is bleeding! Oh, my poor Dard. Oh! oh!"
+
+"Hush, Rose!"
+
+"No, don't put him out of heart, mademoiselle. Take another pull at the
+flask, Dard. If you please, ladies, I must have him home without delay."
+
+"Oh yes, but I want him to have a surgeon," cried Josephine. "And we
+have no horses nor people to send off as we used to have."
+
+"But you have me, mademoiselle," said Edouard tenderly. "Me, who would
+go to the world's end for you." He said this to Josephine, but his eye
+sought Rose. "I'm a famous runner," he added, a little bumptiously;
+"I'll be at the town in half an hour, and send a surgeon up full
+gallop."
+
+"You have a good heart," said Rose simply.
+
+He bowed his blushing, delighted face, and wheeled Dard to his cottage
+hard by with almost more than mortal vigor. How softly, how nobly, that
+frolicsome girl could speak! Those sweet words rang in his ears and ran
+warm round and round his heart, as he straightened his arms and his back
+to the work. When they had gone about a hundred yards, a single snivel
+went off in the wheelbarrow. Five minutes after, Dard was at home in
+charge of his grandmother, his shoe off, his foot in a wet linen cloth;
+and Edouard, his coat tied round the neck, squared his shoulders, and
+ran the two short leagues out. He ran them in forty minutes, found the
+surgeon at home, told the case, pooh-poohed that worthy's promise to
+go to the patient presently, darted into his stable, saddled the horse,
+brought him round, saw the surgeon into the saddle, started him, dined
+at the restaurateur's, strolled back, and was in time to get a good look
+at the chateau of Beaurepaire just as the sun set on it.
+
+Jacintha came into Dard's cottage that evening.
+
+"So you have been at it, my man," cried she cheerfully and rather
+roughly, then sat down and rocked herself, with her apron over her head.
+She explained this anomalous proceeding to his grandmother privately. "I
+thought I would keep his heart up anyway, but you see I was not fit."
+
+Next morning, as Riviere sat writing, he received an unexpected visit
+from Jacintha. She came in with her finger to her lips, and said, "You
+prowl about Dard's cottage. They are sure to go and see him every day,
+and him wounded in their service."
+
+"Oh, you good girl! you dear girl!" cried Edouard.
+
+She did not reply in words, but, after going to the door, returned and
+gave him a great kiss without ceremony. "Dare say you know what that's
+for," said she, and went off with a clear conscience and reddish cheeks.
+
+Dard's grandmother had a little house, a little land, a little money,
+and a little cow. She could just maintain Dard and herself, and her
+resources enabled Dard to do so many little odd jobs for love, yet keep
+his main organ tolerably filled.
+
+"Go to bed, my little son, since you have got hashed," said she.--"Bed
+be hanged," cried he. "What good is bed? That's a silly old custom wants
+doing away with. It weakens you: it turns you into train oil: it is the
+doctor's friend, and the sick man's bane. Many a one dies through taking
+to bed, that could have kept his life if he had kept his feet like a
+man. If I had cut myself in two I would not go to bed,--till I go to the
+bed with a spade in it. No! sit up like Julius Caesar; and die as you
+lived, in your clothes: don't strip yourself: let the old women strip
+you; that is their delight laying out a chap; that is the time they
+brighten up, the old sorceresses." He concluded this amiable rhapsody,
+the latter part of which was levelled at a lugubrious weakness of his
+grandmother's for the superfluous embellishment of the dead, by telling
+her it was bad enough to be tied by the foot like an ass, without
+settling down on his back like a cast sheep. "Give me the armchair. I'll
+sit in it, and, if I have any friends, they will show it now: they will
+come and tell me what is going on in the village, for I can't get out to
+see it and hear it, they must know that."
+
+Seated in state in his granny's easy-chair, the loss of which after
+thirty years' use made her miserable, she couldn't tell why, le Sieur
+Dard awaited his friends.
+
+They did not come.
+
+The rain did, and poured all the afternoon. Night succeeded, and
+solitude. Dard boiled over with bitterness. "They are a lot of pigs
+then, all those fellows I have drunk with at Bigot's and Simmet's. Down
+with all fair-weather friends."
+
+The next day the sun shone, the air was clear, and the sky blue. "Ah!
+let us see now," cried Dard.
+
+Alas! no fellow-drinkers, no fellow-smokers, came to console their hurt
+fellow. And Dard, who had boiled with anger yesterday, was now sad and
+despondent. "Down with egotists," he groaned.
+
+About three in the afternoon came a tap at the door.
+
+"Ah! at last," cried Dard: "come in!"
+
+The door was slowly opened, and two lovely faces appeared at the
+threshold. The demoiselles De Beaurepaire wore a tender look of
+interest and pity when they caught sight of Dard, and on the old woman
+courtesying to them they courtesied to her and Dard. The next moment
+they were close to him, one a little to his right, the other to his
+left, and two pair of sapphire eyes with the mild lustre of sympathy
+playing down incessantly upon him. How was he? How had he slept? Was he
+in pain? Was he in much pain? tell the truth now. Was there anything to
+eat or drink he could fancy? Jacintha should make it and bring it, if
+it was within their means. A prince could not have had more solicitous
+attendants, nor a fairy king lovelier and less earthly ones.
+
+He looked in heavy amazement from one to the other. Rose bent, and was
+by some supple process on one knee, taking the measure of the wounded
+foot. When she first approached it he winced: but the next moment he
+smiled. He had never been touched like this--it was contact and no
+contact--she treated his foot as the zephyr the violets--she handled
+it as if it had been some sacred thing. By the help of his eye he
+could just know she was touching him. Presently she informed him he
+was measured for a list shoe: and she would run home for the materials.
+During her absence came a timid tap to the door; and Edouard Riviere
+entered. He was delighted to see Josephine, and made sure Rose was not
+far off. It was Dard who let out that she was gone to Beaurepaire for
+some cloth to make him a shoe. This information set Edouard fidgeting
+on his chair. He saw such a chance as was not likely to occur again. He
+rose with feigned nonchalance, and saying, "I leave you in good hands;
+angel visitors are best enjoyed alone," slowly retired, with a deep
+obeisance. Once outside the door, dignity vanished in alacrity; he flew
+off into the park, and ran as hard as he could towards the chateau.
+He was within fifty yards of the little gate, when sure enough Rose
+emerged. They met; his heart beat violently. "Mademoiselle," he
+faltered.
+
+"Ah! it is Monsieur Riviere, I declare," said Rose, coolly; all over
+blushes though.
+
+"Yes, mademoiselle, and I am so out of breath. Mademoiselle Josephine
+awaits you at Dard's house."
+
+"She sent you for me?" inquired Rose, demurely.
+
+"Not positively. But I could see I should please her by coming for you;
+there is, I believe, a bull or so about."
+
+"A bull or two! don't talk in that reckless way about such things. She
+has done well to send you; let us make haste."
+
+"But I am a little out of breath."
+
+"Oh, never mind that! I abhor bulls."
+
+"But, mademoiselle, we are not come to them yet, and the faster we go
+now the sooner we shall."
+
+"Yes; but I always like to get a disagreeable thing over as soon as
+possible," said Rose, slyly.
+
+"Ah," replied Edouard, mournfully, "in that case let us make haste."
+
+After a little spurt, mademoiselle relaxed the pace of her own accord,
+and even went slower than before. There was an awkward silence. Edouard
+eyed the park boundary, and thought, "Now what I have to say I must say
+before we get to you;" and being thus impressed with the necessity of
+immediate action, he turned to lead.
+
+Rose eyed him and the ground, alternately, from under her long lashes.
+
+At last he began to color and flutter. She saw something was coming, and
+all the woman donned defensive armor.
+
+"Mademoiselle."
+
+"Monsieur."
+
+"Is it quite decided that your family refuse my acquaintance, my
+services, which I still--forgive me--press on you? Ah! Mademoiselle
+Rose, am I never to have the happiness of--of--even speaking to you?"
+
+"It seems so," said Rose, ironically.
+
+"Have you then decided against me too?"
+
+"I?" asked Rose. "What have I to do with questions of etiquette? I am
+only a child: so considered at least."
+
+"You a child--an angel like you?"
+
+"Ask any of them, they will tell you I am a child; and it is to that I
+owe this conversation, no doubt; if you did not look on me as a child,
+you would not take this liberty with me," said the young cat, scratching
+without a moment's notice.
+
+"Mademoiselle, do not be angry. I was wrong."
+
+"Oh! never mind. Children are little creatures without reserve, and
+treated accordingly, and to notice them is to honor them."
+
+"Adieu then, mademoiselle. Try to believe no one respects you more than
+I do."
+
+"Yes, let us part, for there is Dard's house; and I begin to suspect
+that Josephine never sent you."
+
+"I confess it."
+
+"There, he confesses it. I thought so all along; WHAT A DUPE I HAVE
+BEEN!"
+
+"I will offend no more," said poor silly Edouard. "Adieu, mademoiselle.
+May you find friends as sincere as I am, and more to your taste!"
+
+"Heaven hear your prayers!" replied the malicious thing, casting up her
+eyes with a mock tragic air.
+
+Edouard sighed; a chill conviction that she was both heartless and empty
+fell on him. He turned away without another word. She called to him
+with a sudden airy cheerfulness that made him start. "Stay, monsieur, I
+forgot--I have a favor to ask you."
+
+"I wish I could believe that:" and his eyes brightened.
+
+Rose stopped, and began to play with her parasol. "You seem," said
+she softly, "to be pretty generous in bestowing your acquaintance on
+strangers. I should be glad if I might secure you for a dear friend of
+mine, Dr. Aubertin. He will not discredit my recommendation; and he will
+not make so many difficulties as we do; shall I tell you why? Because
+he is really worth knowing. In short, believe me, it will be a valuable
+acquaintance for you--and for him," added she with all the grace of the
+De Beaurepaires.
+
+Many a man, inferior in a general way to Edouard Riviere, would have
+made a sensible reply to this. Such as, "Oh, any friend of yours,
+mademoiselle, must be welcome to me," or the like. But the proposal
+caught Edouard on his foible, his vanity, to wit; and our foibles are
+our manias. He was mortified to the heart's core. "She refuses to know
+me herself," thought he, "but she will use my love to make me amuse that
+old man." His heart swelled against her injustice and ingratitude,
+and his crushed vanity turned to strychnine. "Mademoiselle," said he,
+bitterly and doggedly, but sadly, "were I so happy as to have your
+esteem, my heart would overflow, not only on the doctor but on every
+honest person around. But if I must not have the acquaintance I value
+more than life, suffer me to be alone in the world, and never to say a
+word either to Dr. Aubertin, or to any human creature if I can help it."
+
+The imperious young beauty drew herself up directly. "So be it,
+monsieur; you teach me how a child should be answered that forgets
+herself, and asks a favor of a stranger--a perfect stranger," added she,
+maliciously.
+
+Could one of the dog-days change to mid-winter in a second, it would
+hardly seem so cold and cross as Rose de Beaurepaire turned from the
+smiling, saucy fairy of the moment before. Edouard felt as it were a
+portcullis of ice come down between her and him. She courtesied and
+glided away. He bowed and stood frozen to the spot.
+
+He felt so lonely and so bitter, he must go to Jacintha for comfort.
+
+He took advantage of the ladies being with Dard, and marched boldly into
+the kitchen of Beaurepaire.
+
+"Well, I never," cried Jacintha. "But, after all, why not?"
+
+He hurled himself on the kitchen table (clean as china), and told her it
+was all over. "She hates me now; but it is not my fault," and so poured
+forth his tale, and feeling sure of sympathy, asked Jacintha whether it
+was not bitterly unjust of Rose to refuse him her own acquaintance, yet
+ask him to amuse that old fogy.
+
+Jacintha stood with her great arms akimbo, taking it all in, and looking
+at him with a droll expression of satirical wonder.
+
+"Now you listen to a parable," said she. "Once there was a little boy
+madly in love with raspberry jam."
+
+"A thing I hate."
+
+"Don't tell me! Who hates raspberry jam? He came to the store closet,
+where he knew there were jars of it, and--oh! misery--the door was
+locked. He kicked the door, and wept bitterly. His mamma came and said,
+'Here is the key,' and gave him the key. And what did he do? Why,
+he fell to crying and roaring, and kicking the door. 'I don't
+wa-wa-wa-wa-nt the key-ey-ey. I wa-a-ant the jam--oh! oh! oh! oh!'"
+and Jacintha mimicked, after her fashion, the mingled grief and ire of
+infancy debarred its jam. Edouard wore a puzzled air, but it was only
+for a moment; the next he hid his face in his hands, and cried, "Fool!"
+
+"I shall not contradict you," said his Mentor.
+
+"She was my best friend. Once acquainted with the doctor, I could visit
+at Beaurepaire."
+
+"Parbleu!"
+
+"She had thought of a way to reconcile my wishes with this terrible
+etiquette that reigns here."
+
+"She thinks to more purpose than you do; that is clear."
+
+"Nothing is left now but to ask her pardon, and to consent; I am off."
+
+"No, you are not," and Jacintha laid a grasp of iron on him. "Will you
+be quiet?--is not one blunder a day enough? If you go near her now, she
+will affront you, and order the doctor not to speak to you."
+
+"O Jacintha! your sex then are fiends of malice?"
+
+"While it lasts. Luckily with us nothing lasts very long. Now you don't
+go near her till you have taken advantage of her hint, and made the
+doctor's acquaintance; that is easy done. He walks two hours on the east
+road every day, with his feet in the puddles and his head in the clouds.
+Them's HIS two tastes."
+
+"But how am I to get him out of the clouds and the puddles?" inquired
+Riviere half peevishly.
+
+"How?" asked Jacintha, with a dash of that contempt uneducated persons
+generally have for any one who does not know some little thing they
+happen to know themselves. "How? Why, with the nearest blackbeetle, to
+be sure."
+
+"A blackbeetle?"
+
+"Black or brown; it matters little. Have her ready for use in your
+handkerchief: pull a long face: and says you--'Excuse me, sir, I have
+THE MISFORTUNE not to know the Greek name of this merchandise here.' Say
+that, and behold him launched. He will christen you the beast in Hebrew
+and Latin as well as Greek, and tell you her history down from the
+flood: next he will beg her of you, and out will come a cork and a pin,
+and behold the creature impaled. For that is how men love beetles. He
+has a thousand pinned down at home--beetles, butterflies, and so forth.
+When I go near the rubbish with my duster he trembles like an aspen.
+I pretend to be going to clean them, but it is only to see the face he
+makes, for even a domestic must laugh now and then--or die. But I never
+do clean them, for after all he is more stupid than wicked, poor man: I
+have not therefore the sad courage to make him wretched."
+
+"Let us return to our beetle--what will his tirades about its antiquity
+advance me?"
+
+"Oh! one begins about a beetle, but one ends Heaven knows where."
+
+Riviere profited by this advice. He even improved on it. In due
+course he threw himself into Aubertin's way. He stopped the doctor
+reverentially, and said he had heard he was an entomologist. WOULD he
+be kind enough to tell him what was this enormous chrysalis he had just
+found?
+
+"The death's head moth!" cried Aubertin with enthusiasm--"the death's
+head moth! a great rarity in this district. Where found you this?"
+Riviere undertook to show him the place.
+
+It was half a league distant. Coming and going he had time to make
+friends with Aubertin, and this was the easier that the old gentleman,
+who was a physiognomist as well as ologist, had seen goodness and
+sensibility in Edouard's face. At the end of the walk he begged the
+doctor to accept the chrysalis. The doctor coquetted. "That would be a
+robbery. You take an interest in these things yourself--at least I hope
+so."
+
+The young rogue confessed modestly to the sentiment of entomology, but
+"the government worked him so hard as to leave him no hopes of shining
+in so high a science," said he sorrowfully.
+
+The doctor pitied him. "A young man of your attainments and tastes to
+be debarred from the everlasting secrets of nature, by the fleeting
+politics of the day."
+
+Riviere shrugged his shoulders. "Somebody must do the dirty work," said
+he, chuckling inwardly.
+
+The chrysalis went to Beaurepaire in the pocket of a grateful man,
+who that same evening told the whole party his conversation with
+young Riviere, on whom he pronounced high encomiums. Rose's saucy eyes
+sparkled with fun: you might have lighted a candle at one and exploded a
+mine at the other; but not a syllable did she utter.
+
+The doctor proved a key, and opened the enchanted castle. One fine
+day he presented his friend in the Pleasaunce to the baroness and her
+daughters.
+
+They received him with perfect politeness. Thus introduced, and as he
+was not one to let the grass grow under his feet, he soon obtained a
+footing as friend of the family, which, being now advised by Josephine,
+he took care not to compromise by making love to Rose before the
+baroness. However, he insisted on placing his financial talent at their
+service. He surveyed and valued their lands, and soon discovered that
+all their farms were grossly underlet. Luckily most of the leases were
+run out. He prepared a new rent roll, and showed it Aubertin, now his
+fast friend. Aubertin at his request obtained a list of the mortgages,
+and Edouard drew a balance-sheet founded on sure data, and proved to the
+baroness that in able hands the said estate was now solvent.
+
+This was a great comfort to the old lady: and she said to Aubertin,
+"Heaven has sent us a champion, a little republican--with the face of an
+angel."
+
+Descending to practice, Edouard actually put three of the farms into
+the market, and let them at an advance of twenty per cent on the expired
+leases. He brought these leases signed; and the baroness had scarcely
+done thanking him, when her other secret friend, Monsieur Perrin, was
+announced. Edouard exchanged civilities with him, and then retired to
+the Pleasaunce. There he found both sisters, who were all tenderness and
+gratitude to him. By this time he had learned to value Josephine: she
+was so lovely and so good, and such a true womanly friend to him. Even
+Rose could not resist her influence, and was obliged to be kind to him,
+when Josephine was by. But let Josephine go, and instead of her being
+more tender, as any other girl would, left alone with her lover,
+sauciness resumed its empire till sweet Josephine returned. Whereof
+cometh an example; for the said Josephine was summoned to a final
+conference with the baroness and Monsieur Perrin.
+
+"Don't be long," said Rose, as Josephine glided away, and (taking the
+precaution to wait till she was quite out of hearing), "I shall be so
+dull, dear, till you come back."
+
+"I shall not though," said Edouard.
+
+"I am not so sure of that. Now then."
+
+"Now then, what?"
+
+"Begin."
+
+"Begin what?"
+
+"Amusing me." And she made herself look sullen and unamusable all over.
+
+"I will try," said Riviere. "I'll tell you what they say of you: that
+you are too young to love."
+
+"So I am, much."
+
+"No, no, no! I made a mistake. I mean too young to be loved."
+
+"Oh, I am not too young for that, not a bit."
+
+This point settled, she suggested that, if he could not amuse her, he
+had better do THE NEXT BEST THING, and that was, talk sense.
+
+"I think I had better not talk at all," said he, "for I am no match
+for such a nimble tongue. And then you are so remorseless. I'll hold my
+tongue, and make a sketch of this magnificent oak."
+
+"Ay, do: draw it as it appeared on a late occasion: with two ladies
+flying out of it, and you rooted with dismay."
+
+"There is no need; that scene is engraved."
+
+"Where? in all the shops?"
+
+"No; on all our memories."
+
+"Not on mine; not on mine. How terrified you were--ha, ha! and how
+terrified we should have been if you had not. Listen: once upon a
+time--don't be alarmed: it was long after Noah--a frightened hare ran by
+a pond; the frogs splashed in the water, smit with awe. Then she said,
+'Ah ha! there are people in the world I frighten in my turn; I am the
+thunderbolt of war.' Excuse my quoting La Fontaine: I am not in 'Charles
+the Twelfth of Sweden' yet. I am but a child."
+
+"And it's a great mercy, for when you grow up, you will be too much
+for me, that is evident. Come, then, Mademoiselle the Quizzer, come and
+adorn my sketch."
+
+"Monsieur, shall I make you a confession? You will not be angry: I could
+not support your displeasure. I have a strange inclination to walk
+up and down this terrace while you go and draw that tree in the
+Pleasaunce."
+
+"Resist that inclination; perhaps it will fly from you."
+
+"No; you fly from me, and draw. I will rejoin you in a few minutes."
+
+"Thank you, I'm not so stupid. You will step indoors directly."
+
+"Do you doubt my word, sir?" asked she haughtily.
+
+He had learned to obey all her caprices; so he went and placed himself
+on the west side of the oak and took out his sketch-book, and worked
+zealously and rapidly. He had done the outlines of the tree and was
+finishing in detail a part of the huge trunk, when his eyes were
+suddenly dazzled: in the middle of the rugged bark, deformed here and
+there with great wart-like bosses, and wrinkled, seamed, and ploughed
+all over with age, burst a bit of variegated color; bright as a poppy on
+a dungeon wall, it glowed and glittered out through a large hole in the
+brown bark; it was Rose's face peeping. To our young lover's eye how
+divine it shone! None of the half tints of common flesh were there,
+but a thing all rose, lily, sapphire, and soul. His pencil dropped, his
+mouth opened, he was downright dazzled by the glowing, bewitching face,
+sparkling with fun, in the gaunt tree. Tell me, ladies, did she know,
+even at that age, the value of that sombre frame to her brightness? The
+moment she found herself detected, the gaunt old tree rang musical with
+a crystal laugh, and out came the arch-dryad. "I have been there all the
+time. How solemn you looked! Now for the result of such profound study."
+He showed her his work; she altered her tone. "Oh, how clever!" she
+cried, "and how rapid! What a facility you have! Monsieur is an artist,"
+said she gravely; "I will be more respectful," and she dropped him a low
+courtesy. "Mind you promised it me," she added sharply.
+
+"You will accept it, then?"
+
+"That I will, now it is worth having: dear me, I never reckoned on that.
+Finish it directly," cried this peremptory young person.
+
+"First I must trouble you to stand out there near the tree."
+
+"Me? what for?"
+
+"Because art loves contrasts. The tree is a picture of age and gradual
+decay; by its side then I must place a personification of youth and
+growing loveliness."
+
+She did not answer, but made a sort of defiant pirouette, and went where
+she was bid, and stood there with her back to the artist. "That will
+never do," said he; "you really must be so good as to turn round."
+
+"Oh, very well." And when she came round, behold her color had risen
+mightily. Flattery is sweet.
+
+This child of nature was delighted, and ashamed it should be seen that
+she was.
+
+And so he drew her, and kept looking off the paper at her, and had a
+right in his character of artist to look her full in the face; and he
+did so with long lingering glances. To be sure, they all began severe
+and businesslike with half-closed eyes, and the peculiar hostile
+expression art puts on; but then they always ended open-eyed, and so
+full and tender, that she, poor girl, who was all real gold, though sham
+brass, blushed and blushed, and did not know which way to look not to
+be scorched up by his eye like a tender flower, or blandly absorbed like
+the pearly dew. Ah, happy hour! ah, happy days of youth and innocence
+and first love!
+
+Trouble loves to intrude on these halcyon days.
+
+The usually quiet Josephine came flying from the house, pale and
+agitated, and clung despairingly to Rose, and then fell to sobbing and
+lamenting piteously.
+
+I shall take leave to relate in my own words what had just occurred
+to agitate her so. When she entered her mother's room, she found the
+baroness and Perrin the notary seated watching for her. She sat down
+after the usual civilities, and Perrin entered upon the subject that had
+brought him.
+
+He began by confessing to them that he had not overcome the refractory
+creditor without much trouble; and that he had since learned there was
+another, a larger creditor, likely to press for payment or for sale of
+the estate. The baroness was greatly troubled by this communication: the
+notary remained cool as a cucumber, and keenly observant. After a pause
+he went on to say all this had caused him grave reflections. "It seems,"
+said he with cool candor, "a sad pity the estate should pass from a
+family that has held it since the days of Charlemagne."
+
+"Now God forbid!" cried the baroness, lifting her eyes and her quivering
+hands to heaven.
+
+The notary held the republican creed in all its branches. "Providence,
+madame, does not interfere--in matters of business," said he. "Nothing
+but money can save the estate. Let us then be practical. Has any means
+occurred to you of raising money to pay off these incumbrances?"
+
+"No. What means can there be? The estate is mortgaged to its full value:
+so they say, at least."
+
+"And they say true," put in the notary quickly. "But do not distress
+yourself, madame: confide in me."
+
+"Ah, my good friend, may Heaven reward you."
+
+"Madame, up to the present time I have no complaint to make of Heaven.
+I am on the rise: here, mademoiselle, is a gimcrack they have given me;"
+and he unbuttoned his overcoat, and showed them a piece of tricolored
+ribbon and a clasp. "As for me, I look to 'the solid;' I care little for
+these things," said he, swelling visibly, "but the world is dazzled by
+them. However, I can show you something better." He took out a letter.
+"This is from the Minister of the Interior to a client of mine: a
+promise I shall be the next prefect; and the present prefect--I am happy
+to say--is on his death-bed. Thus, madame, your humble servant in a few
+short months will be notary no longer, but prefect; I shall then sell my
+office of notary: and I flatter myself when I am a prefect you will not
+blush to own me."
+
+"Then, as now, monsieur," said the baroness politely, "we shall
+recognize your merit. But"--
+
+"I understand, madame: like me you look to 'the solid.' Thus then it is;
+I have money."
+
+"Ah! all the better for you."
+
+"I have a good deal of money. But it is dispersed in a great many small
+but profitable investments: to call it in suddenly would entail some
+loss. Nevertheless, if you and my young lady there have ever so little
+of that friendly feeling towards me of which I have so much towards you,
+all my investments shall be called in, and two-thirds of your creditors
+shall be paid off at once. A single client of mine, no less a man than
+the Commandant Raynal, will, I am sure, advance me the remaining third
+at an hour's notice; and so Beaurepaire chateau, park, estate, and
+grounds, down to the old oak-tree, shall be saved; and no power shall
+alienate them from you, mademoiselle, and from the heirs of your body."
+
+The baroness clasped her hands in ecstasy.
+
+"But what are we to do for this?" inquired Josephine calmly, "for it
+seems to me that it can only be effected by a sacrifice on your part."
+
+"I thank you, mademoiselle, for your penetration in seeing that I must
+make sacrifices. I would never have told you, but you have seen it;
+and I do not regret that you have seen it. Madame--mademoiselle--those
+sacrifices appear little to me; will seem nothing; will never be
+mentioned, or even alluded to after this day, if you, on your part, will
+lay me under a far heavier obligation, if in short"--here the contemner
+of things unsubstantial reopened his coat, and brought his ribbon to
+light again--"if you, madame, will accept me for your son-in-law--if
+you, mademoiselle, will take me for your husband."
+
+The baroness and her daughter looked at one another in silence.
+
+"Is it a jest?" inquired the former of the latter.
+
+"Can you think so? Answer Monsieur Perrin. He has just done us a kind
+office, mother."
+
+"I shall remember it. Monsieur, permit me to regret that having lately
+won our gratitude and esteem, you have taken this way of modifying those
+feelings. But after all," she added with gentle courtesy, "we may well
+put your good deeds against this--this error in judgment. The balance is
+in your favor still, provided you never return to this topic. Come,
+is it agreed?" The baroness's manner was full of tact, and the latter
+sentences were said with an open kindliness of manner. There was nothing
+to prevent Perrin from dropping the subject, and remaining good friends.
+A gentleman or a lover would have so done. Monsieur Perrin was neither.
+He said bitterly, "You refuse me, then."
+
+The tone and the words were each singly too much for the baroness's
+pride. She answered coldly but civilly,--
+
+"I do not refuse you. I do not take an affront into consideration."
+
+"Be calm, mamma; no affront whatever was intended."
+
+"Ah! here is one that is more reasonable," cried Perrin.
+
+"There are men," continued Josephine without noticing him, "who look
+to but one thing--interest. It was an offer made politely in the way of
+business: decline it in the same spirit; that is what you have to do."
+
+"Monsieur, you hear what mademoiselle says? She carries politeness
+a long way. After all it is a good fault. Well, monsieur, I need not
+answer you, since Mademoiselle de Beaurepaire has answered you; but I
+detain you no longer."
+
+Strictly a weasel has no business with the temper of a tiger, but this
+one had, and the long vindictiveness of a Corsican. "Ah! my little lady,
+you turn me out of the house, do you?" cried he, grinding his teeth.
+
+"Turn him out of the house? what a phrase! where has this man lived?"
+
+"A man!" snarled Perrin, "whom none ever yet insulted without repenting
+it, and repenting in vain. You are under obligations to me, and you
+think to turn me out! You are at my mercy, and you think I will let you
+turn me to your door! In less than a mouth I will stand here, and say to
+you, Beaurepaire is mine. Begone from it!"
+
+When he uttered these terrible words, each of which was like a
+sword-stroke to the baroness, the old lady, whose courage was not
+equal to her strength, shrank over the side of her arm-chair, and cried
+piteously--"He threatens me! he threatens me! I am frightened;" and put
+up her trembling hands, for the notary's eloquence, being accompanied
+with abundance of gesture, bordered upon physical violence. His
+brutality received an unexpected check. Imagine that a sparrow-hawk had
+seized a trembling pigeon, and that a royal falcon swooped, and with one
+lightning-like stroke of body and wing, buffeted him away, and sent him
+gaping and glaring and grasping at pigeonless air with his claws. So
+swift and majestic, Josephine de Beaurepaire came from her chair with
+one gesture of her body between her mother and the notary, who was
+advancing with arms folded in a brutal, menacing way--not the Josephine
+we have seen her, the calm languid beauty, but the demoiselle de
+Beaurepaire--her great heart on fire--her blood up--not her own only,
+but all the blood of all the De Beaurepaires--pale as ashes with great
+wrath, her purple eyes on fire, and her whole panther-like body full
+of spring. "Wretch! you dare to insult her, and before me! Arriere
+miserable! or I soil my hand with your face." And her hand was up with
+the word, up, up, higher it seemed than ever a hand was raised before.
+And if he had hesitated one moment, I really believe it would have come
+down; not heavily, perhaps--the lightning is not heavy. But there was
+no need. The towering threat and the flaming eye and the swift rush
+buffeted the caitiff away: he recoiled. She followed him as he went,
+strong, FOR A MOMENT OR TWO, as Hercules, beautiful and terrible as
+Michael driving Satan. He dared not, or could not stand before her: he
+writhed and cowered and recoiled all down the room, while she marched
+upon him. But the driven serpent hissed horribly as it wriggled away.
+
+"You shall both be turned out of Beaurepaire by me, and forever; I swear
+it, parole de Perrin."
+
+He had not been gone a minute when Josephine's courage oozed away,
+and she ran, or rather tottered, into the Pleasaunce, and clung like a
+drowning thing to Rose, and, when Edouard took her hand, she clung to
+him. They had to gather what had happened how they could: the account
+was constantly interrupted with her sobs and self-reproaches. She said
+she had ruined all she loved: ruined her sister, ruined her mother,
+ruined the house of Beaurepaire. Why was she ever born? Why had she
+not died three years ago? (Query, what was the date at which Camille's
+letters suddenly stopped?) "That coward," said she, "has the heart of a
+fiend. He told us he never forgave an affront; and he holds our fate
+in his hands. He will drive our mother from her home, and she will die:
+murdered by her own daughter. After all, why did I refuse him? What
+should I have sacrificed by marrying him? Rose, write to him, and
+say--say--I was taken by surprise, I--I"--a violent flood of tears
+interrupted the sentence.
+
+Rose flung her arms round her neck. "My beautiful Josephine marry that
+creature? Let house and lands go a thousand times sooner. I love my
+sister a thousand times better than the walls of this or any other
+house."
+
+"Come, come," cried Edouard, "you are forgetting ME all this time. Do
+you really think I am the sort of man to stand by with my hands in
+my pockets, and let her marry that cur, or you be driven out of
+Beaurepaire? Neither, while I live."
+
+"Alas! dear boy," sighed Josephine, "what can you do?"
+
+"I'll soon show you. From this hour forth it is a duel between that
+Perrin and me. Now, Josephine--Rose--don't you cry and fret like that:
+but just look quietly on, and enjoy the fight, both of you."
+
+Josephine shook her head with a sad smile: but Rose delivered herself
+thus, after a sob, "La, yes; I forgot: we have got a gentleman now;
+that's one comfort."
+
+Edouard rose to the situation: he saw that Perrin would lose no time;
+and that every day, or even hour, might be precious. He told them that
+the first thing he must do for them was to leave the company he loved
+best on earth, and run down to the town to consult Picard the rival
+notary: he would be back by supper-time, when he hoped they would do
+him the honor, in a matter of such importance, to admit him to a family
+council.
+
+Josephine assented with perfect simplicity; Rose with a deep blush, for
+she was too quick not to see all the consequences of admitting so brisk
+a wooer into a family council.
+
+
+It was a wet evening, and a sad and silent party sat round a wood fire
+in the great dining-hall. The baroness was almost prostrated by the
+scene with Perrin; and a sombre melancholy and foreboding weighed on
+all their spirits, when presently Edouard Riviere entered briskly, and
+saluted them all profoundly, and opened the proceedings with a little
+favorite pomposity. "Madame the baroness, and you Monsieur Aubertin, who
+honor me with your esteem, and you Mademoiselle de Beaurepaire, whom I
+adore, and you Mademoiselle Rose, whom I hoped to be permitted--you have
+this day done me the honor to admit me as your adviser. I am here to
+lay my plans before you. I believe, madame, I have already convinced
+you that your farms are under-let, and your property lowered in value by
+general mismanagement; this was doubtless known to Perrin, and set him
+scheming. Well, I rely on the same circumstance to defeat him. I have
+consulted Picard and shown him the rent-roll and balance-sheet I had
+already shown you. He has confessed that the estate is worth more
+than its debts, so capitalists can safely advance the money. To-morrow
+morning, then, I ride to Commandant Raynal for a week's leave of
+absence; then, armed with Picard's certificate, shall proceed to my
+uncle and ask him to lend the money. His estate is very small compared
+with Beaurepaire, but he has always farmed it himself. 'I'll have no
+go-between,' says he, 'to impoverish both self and soil.' He is also a
+bit of a misanthrope, and has made me one. I have a very poor opinion of
+my fellow-creatures, very."
+
+"Well, but," said Rose, "if he is all that, he will not sympathize with
+us, who have so mismanaged Beaurepaire. Will he not despise us?"
+
+Edouard was a little staggered, but Aubertin came to his aid.
+
+"Permit me, Josephine," said he. "Natural history steps in here, and
+teaches by me, its mouth-piece. A misanthrope hates all mankind, but is
+kind to every individual, generally too kind. A philanthrope loves the
+whole human race, but dislikes his wife, his mother, his brother, and
+his friends and acquaintances. Misanthrope is the potato: rough and
+repulsive outside, but good to the core. Philanthrope is a peach: his
+manner all velvet and bloom, his words sweet juice, his heart of hearts
+a stone. Let me read Philanthrope's book, and fall into the hands of
+Misanthrope."
+
+Edouard admitted the shrewdness of this remark.
+
+"And so," said he, "my misanthrope will say plenty of biting
+words,--which, by-the-by, will not hurt you, who will not hear them,
+only me,--and then he'll lend us the money, and Beaurepaire will be
+free, and I shall have had a hand in it. Hurrah!"
+
+Then came a delicious hour to Edouard Riviere. Young and old poured out
+their glowing thanks and praises upon him till his checks burned like
+fire.
+
+The baroness was especially grateful, and expressed a gentle regret that
+she could see no way of showing her gratitude except in words. "What can
+we do for this little angel?" said she, turning to Josephine.
+
+"Leave that to me, mamma," replied Josephine, turning her lovely eyes
+full on Edouard, with a look the baroness misunderstood directly.
+
+She sat and watched Josephine and Edouard with comical severity all the
+rest of the time she was there; and, when she retired, she kissed Rose
+affectionately, but whispered her eldest daughter, "I hope you are not
+serious. A mere boy compared with you."
+
+"But such a sweet one," suggested Josephine, apologetically.
+
+"What will the world come to?" said the baroness out loud, and retreated
+with a sour glance at all of them--except Rose.
+
+She had not been gone five minutes when a letter came by messenger to
+Edouard. It was from Picard. He read it out.
+
+
+"Perrin has been with me, to raise money. He wants it in forty-eight
+hours. Promises good legal security. I have agreed to try and arrange
+the matter for him."
+
+
+They were all astonished at this.
+
+"The double-faced traitor!" cried Edouard. "Stay; wait a minute. Let us
+read it to an end."
+
+
+"This promise is, of course, merely to prevent his going elsewhere. At
+the end of the forty-eight hours I shall begin to make difficulties.
+Meantime, as Perrin is no fool, you had better profit to the full by
+this temporary delay."
+
+
+"Well done, Picard!" shouted Edouard. "Notary cut notary. I won't
+lose an hour. I'll start at five; Commandant Raynal is an early riser
+himself."
+
+Accordingly, at five he was on the road; Raynal's quarters lay in the
+direct line to his uncle's place. He found the commandant at home, and
+was well received. Raynal had observed his zeal, and liked his manners.
+He gave him the week's leave, and kept him to breakfast, and had his
+horse well fed. At eight o'clock Edouard rode out of the premises in
+high spirits. At the very gate he met a gaunt figure riding in on a
+squab pony. It was Perrin the notary coming in hot haste to his friend
+and employer, Commandant Raynal.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+
+After Edouard's departure, Josephine de Beaurepaire was sad, and weighed
+down with presentiments. She felt as soldiers sometimes feel who know
+the enemy is undermining them; no danger on the surface; nothing that
+can be seen, met, baffled, attacked, or evaded; in daily peril, all the
+more horrible that it imitates perfect serenity, they await the fatal
+match. She imparted her misgivings to Aubertin; but he assured her she
+exaggerated the danger.
+
+"We have a friend still more zealous and active than our enemy; believe
+me, your depression is really caused by his absence; we all miss the
+contact of that young heroic spirit; we are a body, and he its soul."
+
+Josephine was silent, for she said to herself, "Why should I dash their
+spirits? they are so happy and confident."
+
+Edouard had animated Rose and Aubertin with his own courage, and had
+even revived the baroness.
+
+It had been agreed between him and Picard that the latter should
+communicate with Dr. Aubertin direct, should anything fresh occur. And
+on the third day after Edouard's departure, Picard sent up a private
+message: "Perrin has just sent me a line to say he will not trouble us,
+as he is offered the money in another quarter."
+
+This was a heavy blow, and sent them all to bed more or less despondent.
+
+The next day brought a long letter from Edouard to Rose, telling her he
+had found his uncle crusty at first; but at last with a little patience,
+and the co-operation of Martha, his uncle's old servant, and his nurse,
+the old boy had come round. They might look on the affair as all but
+settled.
+
+The contents of this letter were conveyed to the baroness. The house
+brightened under it: the more so that there was some hope of their
+successful champion returning in person next day. Meantime Perrin had
+applied to Raynal for the immediate loan of a large sum of money on
+excellent security. Raynal refused plump. Perrin rode away disconsolate.
+
+But the next day he returned to the charge with another proposal: and
+the nature of this second proposal we shall learn from events.
+
+The day Edouard was expected opened deliciously. It was a balmy morning,
+and tempted the sisters out before breakfast. They strolled on the
+south terrace with their arms round each other's waists, talking about
+Edouard, and wondering whether they should really see him before night.
+Rose owned she had missed him, and confessed for the first time she was
+a proud and happy girl.
+
+"May I tell him so?" asked Josephine.
+
+"Not for all the world. Would you dare?"
+
+Further discussion of that nice point was stopped by the baroness coming
+out, leaning on Dr. Aubertin.
+
+Then--how we young people of an unceremonious age should have
+stared--the demoiselles de Beaurepaire, inasmuch as this was their
+mother's first appearance, lowered their fair heads at the same time
+like young poplars bowing to the wind, and so waited reverently till she
+had slightly lifted her hands, and said, "God bless you, my children!"
+
+It was done in a moment on both sides, but full of grace and piety, and
+the charm of ancient manners.
+
+"How did our dear mother sleep?" inquired Josephine. Aubertin interposed
+with a theory that she slept very well indeed if she took what he gave
+her.
+
+"Ay, IF," suggested Rose, saucily.
+
+"I slept," said the baroness, "and I wish I had not for I dreamed an
+ugly dream." They all gathered round her, and she told her dream.
+
+"I thought I was with you all in this garden. I was admiring the flowers
+and the trees, and the birds were singing with all their might. Suddenly
+a dark cloud came; it cleared almost directly; but flowers, trees, sky,
+and birds were gone now, and I could see the chateau itself no more. It
+means that I was dead. An ugly dream, my children, an ugly dream."
+
+"But only a dream, dear mother," said Rose: then with a sweet, consoling
+smile, "See, here is your terrace and your chateau."
+
+"And here are your daughters," said Josephine; and they both came
+and kissed her to put their existence out of doubt. "And here is your
+Aesculapius," said Aubertin. "And here is your Jacintha."
+
+"Breakfast, madame," said Jacintha. "Breakfast, mesdemoiselles.
+Breakfast, monsieur:" dropping each a distinct courtesy in turn.
+
+"She has turned the conversation very agreeably," said the baroness, and
+went in leaning on her old friend.
+
+But the sisters lagged behind and took several turns in silence. Rose
+was the first to speak. "How superstitious of you!"
+
+"I said nothing."
+
+"No; but you looked volumes at me while mamma was telling her dream. For
+my part I feel sure love is stronger than hate; and we shall stay all
+our days in this sweet place: and O Josey! am I not a happy girl that
+it's all owing to HIM!"
+
+At this moment Jacintha came running towards them. They took it for a
+summons to breakfast, and moved to meet her. But they soon saw she was
+almost as white as her apron, and she came open-mouthed and wringing her
+hands. "What shall I do? what shall I do? Oh, don't let my poor mistress
+know!"
+
+They soon got from her that Dard had just come from the town, and
+learned the chateau was sold, and the proprietor coming to take
+possession this very day. The poor girls were stupefied by the blow.
+
+If anything, Josephine felt it worst. "It is my doing," she gasped, and
+tottered fainting. Rose supported her: she shook it off by a violent
+effort. "This is no time for weakness," she cried, wildly; "come to the
+Pleasaunce; there is water there. I love my mother. What will I not do
+for her? I love my mother."
+
+Muttering thus wildly she made for the pond in the Pleasaunce. She had
+no sooner turned the angle of the chateau than she started back with
+a convulsive cry, and her momentary feebleness left her directly; she
+crouched against the wall and griped the ancient corner-stone with her
+tender hand till it powdered, and she spied with dilating eye into the
+Pleasaunce, Rose and Jacintha panting behind her. Two men stood with
+their backs turned to her looking at the oak-tree; one an officer in
+full uniform, the other the human snake Perrin. Though the soldier's
+back was turned, his off-handed, peremptory manner told her he was
+inspecting the place as its master.
+
+"The baroness! the baroness!" cried Jacintha, with horror. They looked
+round, and the baroness was at their very backs.
+
+"What is it?" cried she, gayly.
+
+"Nothing, mamma."
+
+"Let me see this nothing."
+
+They glanced at one another, and, idle as the attempt was, the habit
+of sparing her prevailed, and they flung themselves between her and the
+blow.
+
+"Josephine is not well," said Rose. "She wants to go in." Both girls
+faced the baroness.
+
+"Jacintha," said the baroness, "fetch Dr. Aubertin. There, I have sent
+her away. So now tell me, why do you drive me back so? Something has
+happened," and she looked keenly from one to the other.
+
+"O mamma! do not go that way: there are strangers in the Pleasaunce."
+
+"Let me see. So there are. Call Jacintha back that I may order these
+people out of my premises." Josephine implored her to be calm.
+
+"Be calm when impertinent intruders come into my garden?"
+
+"Mother, they are not intruders."
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+"They have a right to be in our Pleasaunce. They have bought the
+chateau."
+
+"It is impossible. HE was to buy it for us--there is some mistake--what
+man would kill a poor old woman like me? I will speak to this gentleman:
+he wears a sword. Soldiers do not trample on women. Ah! that man."
+
+The notary, attracted by her voice, was coming towards her, a paper in
+his hand.
+
+Raynal coolly inspected the tree, and tapped it with his scabbard, and
+left Perrin to do the dirty work. The notary took off his hat, and, with
+a malignant affectation of respect, presented the baroness with a paper.
+
+The poor old thing took it with a courtesy, the effect of habit, and
+read it to her daughters as well as her emotion permitted, and the
+language, which was as new to her as the dialect of Cat Island to
+Columbus.
+
+"Jean Raynal, domiciled by right, and lodging in fact at the Chateau
+of Beaurepaire, acting by the pursuit and diligence of Master Perrin,
+notary; I, Guillaume Le Gras, bailiff, give notice to Josephine Aglae
+St. Croix de Beaurepaire, commonly called the Baroness de Beaurepaire,
+having no known place of abode"--
+
+"Oh!"
+
+"But lodging wrongfully at the said Chateau of Beaurepaire, that she is
+warned to decamp within twenty-four hours"--
+
+"To decamp!"
+
+"Failing which that she will be thereto enforced in the manner for that
+case made and provided with the aid of all the officers and agents of
+the public force."
+
+"Ah! no, messieurs, pray do not use force. I am frightened enough
+already. I did not know I was doing anything wrong. I have been here
+thirty years. But, since Beaurepaire is sold, I comprehend perfectly
+that I must go. It is just. As you say, I am not in my own house. I will
+go, gentlemen, I will go. Whither shall I go, my children? The house
+where you were born to me is ours no longer. Excuse me, gentlemen--this
+is nothing to you. Ah! sir, you have revenged yourself on two weak
+women--may Heaven forgive you!"
+
+The notary turned on his heel. The poor baroness, all whose pride the
+iron law, with its iron gripe, had crushed into dismay and terror,
+appealed to him. "O sir! send me from the house, but not from the soil
+where my Henri is laid! is there not in all this domain a corner where
+she who was its mistress may lie down and die? Where is the NEW BARON,
+that I may ask this favor of him on my knees?"
+
+She turned towards Raynal and seemed to be going towards him with
+outstretched arms. But Rose checked her with fervor. "Mamma! do not
+lower yourself. Ask nothing of these wretches. Let us lose all, but not
+forget ourselves."
+
+The baroness had not her daughter's spirit. Her very person tottered
+under this blow. Josephine supported her, and the next moment Aubertin
+came out and hastened to her side. Her head fell back; what little
+strength she had failed her; she was half lifted, half led, into the
+house.
+
+Commandant Raynal was amazed at all this, and asked what the deuce was
+the matter.
+
+"Oh!" said the notary, "we are used to these little scenes in our
+business."
+
+"But I am not," replied the soldier. "You never told me there was to be
+all this fuss."
+
+He then dismissed his friend rather abruptly and strode up and down the
+Pleasaunce. He twisted his mustaches, muttered, and "pested," and
+was ill at ease. Accustomed to march gayly into a town, and see the
+regiment, that was there before, marching gayly out, or vice versa, and
+to strike tents twice a quarter at least, he was little prepared for
+such a scene as this. True, he did not hear all the baroness's words,
+but more than one tone of sharp distress reached him where he stood, and
+the action of the whole scene was so expressive, there was little need
+of words. He saw the notice given; the dismay it caused, and the old
+lady turn imploringly towards him with a speaking gesture, and above all
+he saw her carried away, half fainting, her hands clasped, her
+reverend face pale. He was not a man of quick sensibilities. He did not
+thoroughly take the scene in at first: it grew upon him afterwards.
+
+"Confound it," thought he, "I am the proprietor. They all say so.
+Instead of which I feel like a thief. Fancy her getting so fond of a
+PLACE as all this."
+
+Presently it occurred to him that the shortness of the notice might
+have much to do with her distress. "These notaries," said he to himself,
+"understand nothing save law: women have piles of baggage, and can't
+strike tents directly the order comes, as we can. Perhaps if I were to
+give them twenty-four days instead of hours?--hum!"
+
+With this the commandant fell into a brown study. Now each of us has his
+attitude of brown study. One runs about the room like hyena in his den;
+another stands stately with folded arms (this one seldom thinks to the
+purpose); another sits cross-legged, brows lowered: another must put
+his head into his hand, and so keep it up to thinking mark: another must
+twiddle a bit of string, or a key; grant him this, he can hatch an epic.
+This commandant must draw himself up very straight, and walk six paces
+and back very slowly, till the problem was solved: I suspect he had done
+a good bit of sentinel work in his time.
+
+Now whilst he was guarding the old oak-tree, for all the world as if
+it had been the gate of the Tuileries or the barracks, Josephine de
+Beaurepaire came suddenly out from the house and crossed the Pleasaunce:
+her hair was in disorder, her manner wild: she passed swiftly into the
+park.
+
+Raynal recognized her as one of the family; and after a moment's
+reflection followed her into the park with the good-natured intention of
+offering her a month to clear out instead of a day.
+
+But it was not so easy to catch her: she flew. He had to take his
+scabbard in his left hand and fairly run after her. Before he could
+catch her, she entered the little chapel. He came up and had his foot on
+the very step to go in, when he was arrested by that he heard within.
+
+Josephine had thrown herself on her knees and was praying aloud: praying
+to the Virgin with sighs and sobs and all her soul: wrestling so in
+prayer with a dead saint as by a strange perversity men cannot or will
+not wrestle with Him, who alone can hear a million prayers at once from
+a million different places,--can realize and be touched with a sense
+of all man's infirmities in a way no single saint with his partial
+experience of them can realize and be touched by them; who unasked
+suspended the laws of nature that had taken a stranger's only son, and
+she a widow; and wept at another great human sorrow, while the eyes of
+all the great saints that stood around it and Him were dry.
+
+Well, the soldier stood, his right foot on the step and his sword in
+his left hand, transfixed: listening gravely to the agony of prayer the
+innocent young creature poured forth within:--
+
+"O Madonna! hear me: it is for my mother's life. She will die--she will
+die. You know she cannot live if she is taken away from her house and
+from this holy place where she prays to you this many years. O Queen
+of Heaven! put out your hand to us unfortunates! Virgin, hear a virgin:
+mother, listen to a child who prays for her mother's life! The doctor
+says she will not live away from here. She is too old to wander over the
+world. Let them drive us forth: we are young, but not her, mother, oh,
+not her! Forgive the cruel men that do this thing!--they are like those
+who crucified your Son--they know not what they are doing. But you,
+Queen of Heaven, you know all; and, sweet mother, if you have kind
+sentiments towards me, poor Josephine, ah! show them now: for you know
+that it was I who insulted that wicked notary, and it is out of hatred
+to me he has sold our beloved house to a hard stranger. Look down on me,
+a child who loves her mother, yet will destroy her unless you pity me
+and help me. Oh! what shall I say?--what shall I do? mercy! mercy! for
+my poor mother, for me!"
+
+Here her utterance was broken by sobs.
+
+The soldier withdrew his foot quietly. Her words had knocked against
+his very breast-bone. He marched slowly to and fro before the chapel,
+upright as a dart, and stiff as a ramrod, and actually pale: for even
+our nerves have their habits; a woman's passionate grief shook him as a
+cannon fired over his head could not.
+
+Josephine little thought who was her sentinel. She came to the door
+at last, and there he was marching backwards and forwards, upright and
+stiff. She gave a faint scream and drew back with a shudder at the sight
+of their persecutor. She even felt faintish at him, as women will in
+such cases.
+
+Not being very quick at interpreting emotion, Raynal noticed her alarm,
+but not her repugnance; he saluted her with military precision by
+touching his cap as only a soldier can, and said rather gently for him,
+"A word with you, mademoiselle."
+
+She replied only by trembling.
+
+"Don't be frightened," said Raynal, in a tone not very reassuring. "I
+propose an armistice."
+
+"I am at your disposal, sir," said Josephine, now assuming a calmness
+that was belied by the long swell of her heaving bosom.
+
+"Of course you look on me as an enemy."
+
+"How can I do otherwise, sir? yet perhaps I ought not. You did not know
+us. You just wanted an estate, I suppose--and--oh!"
+
+"Well, don't cry; and let us come to the point, since I am a man of few
+words."
+
+"If you please, sir. My mother may miss me."
+
+"Well, I was in position on your flank when the notary delivered his
+fire. And I saw the old woman's distress."
+
+"Ah, sir!"
+
+"When you came flying out I followed to say a good word to you. I could
+not catch you. I listened while you prayed to the Virgin. That was not a
+soldier-like trick, you will say. I confess it."
+
+"It matters little, sir, and you heard nothing I blush for."
+
+"No! by St. Denis; quite the contrary. Well, to the point. Young lady,
+you love your mother."
+
+"What has she on earth now but her children's love?"
+
+"Now look here, young lady, I had a mother; I loved her in my humdrum
+way very dearly. She promised me faithfully not to die till I should be
+a colonel; and she went and died before I was a commandant, even; just
+before, too."
+
+"Then I pity you," murmured Josephine; and her soft purple eye began to
+dwell on him with less repugnance.
+
+"Thank you for that word, my good young lady," said Raynal. "Now, I
+declare, you are the first that has said that word to me about my losing
+the true friend, that nursed me on her knee, and pinched and pinched to
+make a man of me. I should like to tell you about her and me."
+
+"I shall feel honored," said Josephine, politely, but with considerable
+restraint.
+
+Then he told her all about how he had vexed her when he was a boy, and
+gone for a soldier, though she was all for trade, and how he had
+been the more anxious to see her enjoy his honors and success. "And,
+mademoiselle," said he, appealingly, "the day this epaulet was put on my
+shoulder in Italy, she died in Paris. Ah! how could you have the heart
+to do that, my old woman?"
+
+The soldier's mustache quivered, and he turned away brusquely, and
+took several steps. Then he came back to Josephine, and to his infinite
+surprise saw that her purple eyes were thick with tears. "What? you are
+within an inch of crying for my mother, you who have your own trouble at
+this hour."
+
+"Monsieur, our situations are so alike, I may well spare some little
+sympathy for your misfortune."
+
+"Thank you, my good young lady. Well, then, to business; while you were
+praying to the Virgin, I was saying a word or two for my part to her who
+is no more."
+
+"Sir!"
+
+"Oh! it was nothing beautiful like the things you said to the other.
+Can I turn phrases? I saw her behind her little counter in the Rue
+Quincampoix; for she is a woman of the people, is my mother. I saw
+myself come to the other side of the counter, and I said, 'Look here,
+mother, here is the devil to pay about this new house. The old woman
+talks of dying if we take her from her home, and the young one weeps
+and prays to all the saints in paradise; what shall we do, eh?' Then
+I thought my old woman said to me, 'Jean, you are a soldier, a sort of
+vagabond; what do you want with a house in France? you who are always in
+a tent in Italy or Austria, or who knows where. Have you the courage to
+give honest folk so much pain for a caprice? Come now,' says she, 'the
+lady is of my age, say you, and I can't keep your fine house, because
+God has willed it otherwise; so give her my place; so then you can fancy
+it is me you have set down at your hearth: that will warm your heart up
+a bit, you little scamp,' said my old woman in her rough way. She was
+not well-bred like you, mademoiselle. A woman of the people, nothing
+more."
+
+"She was a woman of God's own making, if she was like that," cried
+Josephine, the tears now running down her cheeks.
+
+"Ah, that she was, she was. So between her and me it is settled--what
+are you crying for NOW? why, you have won the day; the field is yours;
+your mother and you remain; I decamp." He whipped his scabbard up with
+his left hand, and was going off without another word, if Josephine had
+not stopped him.
+
+"But, sir, what am I to think? what am I to hope? it is impossible that
+in this short interview--and we must not forget what is due to you. You
+have bought the estate."
+
+"True; well, we will talk over that, to-morrow; but being turned out of
+the house, that was the bayonet thrust to the old lady. So you run in
+and put her heart at rest about it. Tell her that she may live and die
+in this house for Jean Raynal; and tell her about the old woman in the
+Rue Quincampoix."
+
+"God bless you, Jean Raynal!" cried Josephine, clasping her hands.
+
+"Are you going?" said he, peremptorily.
+
+"Oh, yes!" and she darted towards the chateau.
+
+But when she had taken three steps she paused, and seemed irresolute.
+She turned, and in a moment she had glided to Raynal again and had taken
+his hand before he could hinder her, and pressed two velvet lips on it,
+and was away again, her cheeks scarlet at what she had done, and her wet
+eyes beaming with joy. She skimmed the grass like a lapwing; you would
+have taken her at this minute for Rose, or for Virgil's Camilla; at the
+gate she turned an instant and clasped her hands together, with such a
+look, to show Raynal she blessed him again, then darted into the house.
+
+"Aha, my lady," said he, as he watched her fly, "behold you changed a
+little since you came out." He was soon on the high road marching
+down to the town at a great rate, his sword clanking, and thus ran his
+thoughts: "This does one good; you are right, my old woman. Your son's
+bosom feels as warm as toast. Long live the five-franc pieces! And they
+pretend money cannot make a fellow happy. They lie; it is because they
+do not know how to spend it."
+
+Meantime at the chateau, as still befalls in emergencies and trials,
+the master spirit came out and took its real place. Rose was now the
+mistress of Beaurepaire; she set Jacintha, and Dard, and the doctor,
+to pack up everything of value in the house. "Do it this moment!" she
+cried; "once that notary gets possession of the house, it may be too
+late. Enough of folly and helplessness. We have fooled away house and
+lands; our movables shall not follow them."
+
+The moment she had set the others to work, she wrote a single line to
+Riviere to tell him the chateau and lands were sold, and would he come
+to Beaurepaire at once? She ran with it herself to Bigot's auberge, the
+nearest post-office, and then back to comfort her mother.
+
+The baroness was seated in her arm-chair, moaning and wringing her
+hands, and Rose was nursing and soothing her, and bathing her temples
+with her last drop of eau de Cologne, and trying in vain to put some of
+her own courage into her, when in came Josephine radiant with happiness,
+crying "Joy! joy! joy!" and told her strange tale, with this difference,
+that she related her own share in it briefly and coldly, and was more
+eloquent than I about the strange soldier's goodness, and the interest
+her mother had awakened in his heart. And she told about the old woman
+in the Rue Quincampoix, her rugged phrases, and her noble, tender heart.
+The baroness, deaf to Rose's consolations, brightened up directly at
+Josephine's news, and at her glowing face, as she knelt pouring the good
+news, and hope, and comfort, point blank into her. But Rose chilled them
+both.
+
+"It is a generous offer," said, she, "but one we cannot accept. We
+cannot live under so great an obligation. Is all the generosity to be on
+the side of this Bonapartist? Are we noble in name only? What would our
+father have said to such a proposal?"
+
+Josephine hung her head. The baroness groaned.
+
+"No, mother," continued Rose; "let house and land go, but honor and true
+nobility remain."
+
+"What shall I do? you are cruel to me, Rose."
+
+"Mamma," cried the enthusiastic girl, "we need depend on no one.
+Josephine and I have youth and spirit."
+
+"But no money."
+
+"We have plenty of jewels, and pictures, and movables. We can take a
+farm."
+
+"A farm!" shrieked the baroness.
+
+"Why, his uncle has a farm, and we have had recourse to him for help:
+better a farmhouse than an almshouse, though that almshouse were a
+palace instead of a chateau."
+
+Josephine winced and held up her hand deprecatingly. The baroness paled:
+it was a terrible stroke of language to come from her daughter. She said
+sternly, "There is no answer to that. We were born nobles, let us die
+farmers: only permit me to die first."
+
+"Forgive me, mother," said Rose, kneeling. "I was wrong; it is for me
+to obey you, not to dictate. I speak no more." And, after kissing her
+mother and Josephine, she crept away, but she left her words sticking in
+both their consciences.
+
+"HIS uncle," said the shrewd old lady. "She is no longer a child; and
+she says his uncle. This makes me half suspect it is her that dear
+boy--Josephine, tell me the truth, which of you is it?"
+
+"Dear mother, who should it be? they are nearly of an age: and what man
+would not love our sweet Rose, that had eyes or a heart?"
+
+The baroness sighed deeply; and was silent. After awhile she said, "The
+moment they have a lover, he detaches their hearts from their poor old
+mother. She is no longer what my Josephine is to me."
+
+"Mamma, she is my superior. I see it more and more every day. She is
+proud: she is just; she looks at both sides. As for me, I am too apt to
+see only what will please those I love."
+
+"And that is the daughter for me," cried the poor baroness, opening her
+arms wide to her.
+
+The next morning when they were at breakfast, in came Jacintha to say
+the officer was in the dining-room and wanted to speak with the young
+lady he talked to yesterday. Josephine rose and went to him. "Well,
+mademoiselle," said he gayly, "the old woman was right. Here I have just
+got my orders to march: to leave France in a month. A pretty business
+it would have been if I had turned your mother out. So you see there is
+nothing to hinder you from living here."
+
+"In your house, sir?"
+
+"Why not, pray?"
+
+"Forgive us. But we feel that would be unjust to you, humiliating to us:
+the poor are sometimes proud."
+
+"Of course they are," said Raynal: "and I don't want to offend your
+pride. Confound the house: why did I go and buy it? It is no use to
+me except to give pain to worthy people." He then, after a moment's
+reflection, asked her if the matter could not be arranged by some third
+party, a mutual friend. "Then again," said he, "I don't know any friend
+of yours."
+
+"Yes, sir," said Josephine; "we have one friend, who knows you, and
+esteems you highly."
+
+She wanted to name Edouard; but she hesitated, and asked her conscience
+if it was fair to name him: and while she blushed and hesitated, lo and
+behold a rival referee hove in sight. Raynal saw him, suddenly opened a
+window, and shouted, "Hallo come in here: you are wanted."
+
+Perrin had ridden up to complete the exodus of the De Beaurepaires, and
+was strolling about inspecting the premises he had expelled them from.
+
+Here was a pretty referee!
+
+Josephine almost screamed--"What are you doing? that is our enemy, our
+bitterest enemy. He has only sold you the estate to spite us, not for
+the love of you. I had--we had--we mortified his vanity. It was not our
+fault: he is a viper. Sir, pray, pray, pray be on your guard against his
+counsels."
+
+These words spoken with rare fire and earnestness carried conviction:
+but it was too late to recall the invitation. The notary entered the
+room, and was going to bow obsequiously to Raynal, when he caught sight
+of Josephine, and almost started. Raynal, after Josephine's warning, was
+a little at a loss how to make him available; and even that short delay
+gave the notary's one foible time to lead him into temptation. "Our
+foibles are our manias."
+
+"So," said he, "you have taken possession, commandant. These military
+men are prompt, are they not, mademoiselle?"
+
+"Do not address yourself to me, sir, I beg," said Josephine quietly.
+
+Perrin kept his self-command. "It is only as Commandant Raynal's agent
+I presume to address so distinguished a lady: in that character I must
+inform you that whatever movables you have removed are yours: those we
+find in the house on entering we keep."
+
+"Come, come, not so fast," cried Raynal; "bother the chairs and tables!
+that is not the point."
+
+"Commandant," said the notary with dignity, "have I done anything to
+merit this? have I served your interests so ill that you withdraw your
+confidence from me?"
+
+"No, no, my good fellow; but you exceed your powers. Just now I want you
+to take orders, not give them."
+
+"That is only just," said Perrin, "and I recall my hasty remark: excuse
+the susceptibility of a professional man, who is honored with the esteem
+of his clients; and favor me with your wishes."
+
+"All right," said Raynal heartily. "Well, then--I want mademoiselle
+and her family to stay here while I go to Egypt with the First Consul.
+Mademoiselle makes difficulties; it offends her delicacy."
+
+"Comedy!" said the notary contemptuously.
+
+"Though her mother's life depends on her staying here."
+
+"Comedy!" said Perrin. Raynal frowned.
+
+"Her pride (begging her pardon) is greater than her affection."
+
+"Farce!"
+
+"I have pitched upon you to reconcile the two."
+
+"Then you have pitched upon the wrong man," said Perrin bluntly. He
+added obsequiously, "I am too much your friend. She has been talking you
+over, no doubt; but you have a friend, an Ulysses, who is deaf to the
+siren's voice. I will be no party to such a transaction. I will not
+co-operate to humbug my friend and rob him of his rights."
+
+If Josephine was inferior to the notary in petty sharpness, she was
+his superior in the higher kinds of sagacity; and particularly in
+instinctive perception of character. Her eye flashed with delight at the
+line Perrin was now taking with Raynal. The latter speedily justified
+her expectations: he just told Perrin to be off, and send him a more
+accommodating notary.
+
+"A more accommodating notary!" screamed Perrin, stung to madness by
+this reproach. "There is not a more accommodating notary in Europe.
+Ungrateful man! is this the return for all my zeal, my integrity, my
+unselfishness? Is there another agent in the world who would have let
+such a bargain as Beaurepaire fall into your hands? It serves me right
+for deviating from the rules of business. Send me another agent--oh!"
+
+The honest soldier was confused. The lawyer's eloquence overpowered
+him. He felt guilty. Josephine saw his simplicity, and made a cut with
+a woman's two-edged sword. "Sir," said she coolly, "do you not see it is
+an affair of money? This is his way of saying, Pay me handsomely for so
+unusual a commission."
+
+"And I'll pay him double," cried Raynal, catching the idea; "don't be
+alarmed, I'll pay you for it."
+
+"And my zeal, my devotion?"
+
+"Put 'em in figures."
+
+"And my prob--?"
+
+"Add it up."
+
+"And my integ--?"
+
+"Add them together: and don't bother me."
+
+"I see! I see! my poor soldier. You are no match for a woman's tongue."
+
+"Nor, for a notary's. Go to h---, and send in your bill!" roared the
+soldier in a fury. "Well, will you go?" and he marched at him.
+
+The notary scuttled out, with something between a snarl and a squeak.
+
+Josephine hid her face in her hands.
+
+"What is the matter with you?" inquired Raynal. "Not crying again,
+surely!"
+
+"Me! I never cry--hardly. I hid my face because I could not help
+laughing. You frightened me, sir," said she: then very demurely, "I was
+afraid you were going to beat him."
+
+"No, no; a good soldier never leathers a civilian if he can possibly
+help it; it looks so bad; and before a lady!"
+
+"Oh, I would have forgiven you, monsieur," said Josephine benignly, and
+something like a little sun danced in her eye.
+
+"Now, mademoiselle, since my referee has proved a pig, it is your turn.
+Choose you a mutual friend."
+
+Josephine hesitated. "Ours is so young. You know him very well. You
+are doubtless the commandant of whom I once heard him speak with such
+admiration: his name is Riviere, Edouard Riviere."
+
+"Know him? he is my best officer, out and out." And without a moment's
+hesitation he took Edouard's present address, and accepted that youthful
+Daniel as their referee; then looked at his watch and marched off to his
+public duties with sabre clanking at his heels.
+
+The notary went home gnashing his teeth. His sweet revenge was turned to
+wormwood this day. Raynal's parting commissions rang in his ear; in his
+bitter mood the want of logical sequence in the two orders disgusted
+him.
+
+So he inverted them.
+
+He sent in a thundering bill the very next morning, but postponed the
+other commission till his dying day.
+
+As for Josephine, she came into the drawing-room beaming with love
+and happiness, and after kissing both her mother and Rose with gentle
+violence, she let them know the strange turn things had taken.
+
+And she whispered to Rose, "Only think, YOUR Edouard to be OUR referee!"
+
+Rose blushed and bent over her work; and wondered how Edouard would
+discharge so grave an office.
+
+The matter approached a climax; for, as the reader is aware, Edouard was
+hourly expected at Beaurepaire.
+
+He did not come; but it was not his fault. On receiving Rose's letter he
+declined to stay another hour at his uncle's.
+
+He flung himself on his horse; and, before he was well settled on the
+stirrups, the animal shied violently at a wheelbarrow some fool had left
+there; and threw Edouard on the stones of the courtyard. He jumped up in
+a moment and laughed at Marthe's terror; meantime a farm-servant caught
+the nag and brought him back to his work.
+
+But when Edouard went to put his hand on the saddle, he found it would
+not obey him. "Wait a minute," said he; "my arm is benumbed."
+
+"Let me see!" said the farmer, and examined the limb himself; "benumbed?
+yes; and no wonder. Jacques, get on the brute and ride for the surgeon."
+
+"Are you mad, uncle?" cried Edouard. "I can't spare my horse, and I want
+no surgeon; it will be well directly."
+
+"It will be worse before it is better."
+
+"I don't know what you mean, uncle; it is only numbed, ah! it hurts when
+I rub it."
+
+"It is worse than numbed, boy; it is broken."
+
+"Broken? nonsense:" and he looked at it in piteous bewilderment: "how
+can it be broken? it does not hurt except when I touch it."
+
+"It WILL hurt: I know all about it. I broke mine fifteen years ago: fell
+off a haystack."
+
+"Oh, how unfortunate I am!" cried Edouard, piteously. "But I will go to
+Beaurepaire all the same. I can have the thing mended there, as well as
+here."
+
+"You will go to bed," said the old man, quietly; "that is where YOU'LL
+go."
+
+"I'll go to blazes sooner," yelled the young one.
+
+The old man made a signal to his myrmidons, whom Marthe's cries had
+brought around, and four stout fellows took hold of Edouard by the legs
+and the left shoulder and carried him up-stairs raging and kicking; and
+deposited him on a bed.
+
+Presently he began to feel faint, and so more reasonable. They cut his
+coat off, and put him in a loose wrapper, and after considerable delay
+the surgeon came, and set his arm skilfully, and behold this ardent
+spirit caged. He chafed and fretted sadly. Fortitude was not his forte.
+
+It was two days after his accident. He was lying on his back, environed
+by slops and cursing his evil fate, and fretting his soul out of its
+fleshly prison, when suddenly he heard a cheerful trombone saying three
+words to Marthe, then came a clink-clank, and Marthe ushered into the
+sickroom the Commandant Raynal. The sick man raised himself in bed, with
+great surprise and joy.
+
+"O commandant! this is kind to come and see your poor officer in
+purgatory."
+
+"Ah," cried Raynal, "you see I know what it is. I have been chained down
+by the arm, and the leg, and all: it is deadly tiresome."
+
+"Tiresome! it is--it is--oh, dear commandant, Heaven bless you for
+coming!"
+
+"Ta! ta! ta! I am come on my own business."
+
+"All the better. I have nothing to do; that is what kills me. I'm eating
+my own heart."
+
+"Cannibal! Well, my lad, since you are in that humor, cheer up, for I
+bring you a job, and a tough one; it has puzzled me."
+
+"What is it, commandant? What is it?"
+
+"Well, do you know a house and a family called Beaurepaire?"
+
+"Do I know Beaurepaire?"
+
+And the pale youth turned very red; and stared with awe at this wizard
+of a commandant. He thought he was going to be called over the coals for
+frequenting a disaffected family. "Well," said Raynal, "I have been and
+bought this Beaurepaire."
+
+Edouard uttered a loud exclamation. "It was YOU bought it! she never
+told me that."
+
+"Yes," said Raynal, "I am the culprit; and we have fixed on you to undo
+my work without hurting their pride too much, poor souls; but let us
+begin with the facts."
+
+Then Raynal told him my story after his fashion. Of course I shall not
+go and print his version; you might like his concise way better than my
+verbose; and I'm not here to hold up any man's coat-tails. Short as he
+made it, Edouard's eyes were moist more than once; and at the end he
+caught Raynal's hand and kissed it. Then he asked time to reflect;
+"for," said he, "I must try and be just."
+
+"I'll give you an hour," said Raynal, with an air of grand munificence.
+The only treasure he valued was time.
+
+In less than an hour Edouard had solved the knot, to his entire
+satisfaction; he even gave the commandant particular instructions for
+carrying out his sovereign decree. Raynal received these orders from
+his subordinate with that simplicity which formed part of his amazing
+character, and rode home relieved of all responsibility in the matter.
+
+
+COMMANDANT RAYNAL TO MADEMOISELLE DE BEAUREPAIRE.
+
+Mademoiselle,--Before I could find time to write to our referee, news
+came in that he had just broken his arm;--
+
+"Oh! oh, dear! our poor Edouard!"
+
+And if poor Edouard had seen the pale faces, and heard the faltering
+accents, it would have reconciled him to his broken arm almost. This
+hand-grenade the commandant had dropped so coolly among them, it was a
+long while ere they could recover from it enough to read the rest of the
+letter,--
+
+So I rode over to him, and found him on his back, fretting for want of
+something to do. I told him the whole story. He undertook the business.
+I have received his instructions, and next week shall be at his quarters
+to clear off his arrears of business, and make acquaintance with all
+your family, if they permit.
+
+RAYNAL.
+
+
+As the latter part of this letter seemed to require a reply, the
+baroness wrote a polite note, and Jacintha sent Dard to leave it for the
+commandant at Riviere's lodgings. But first they all sat down and wrote
+kind and pitying and soothing letters to Edouard. Need I say these
+letters fell upon him like balm?
+
+They all inquired carelessly in their postscripts what he had decided
+as their referee. He replied mysteriously that they would know that in
+a week or two. Meantime, all he thought it prudent to tell them was that
+he had endeavored to be just to both parties.
+
+"Little solemn puppy," said Rose, and was racked with curiosity.
+
+Next week Raynal called on the baroness. She received him alone. They
+talked about Madame Raynal. The next day he dined with the whole party,
+and the commandant's manners were the opposite of what the baroness
+had inculcated. But she had a strong prejudice in his favor. Had her
+feelings been the other way his brusquerie would have shocked her. It
+amused her. If people's hearts are with you, THAT for their heads!
+
+He came every day for a week, chatted with the baroness, walked with the
+young ladies; and when after work he came over in the evening, Rose
+used to cross-examine him, and out came such descriptions of battles and
+sieges, such heroism and such simplicity mixed, as made the evening pass
+delightfully. On these occasions the young ladies fixed their glowing
+eyes on him, and drank in his character as well as his narrative, in
+which were fewer "I's" than in anything of the sort you ever read or
+heard.
+
+At length Rose contrived to draw him aside, and, hiding her curiosity
+under feigned nonchalance, asked him what the referee had decided. He
+told her that was a secret for the present.
+
+"Well, but," said Rose, "not from me. Edouard and I have no secrets."
+
+"Come, that's good," said Raynal. "Why, you are the very one he warned
+me against the most; said you were as curious as Mother Eve, and as
+sharp as her needle."
+
+"Then he is a little scurrilous traitor," cried Rose, turning very red.
+"So that is how he talks of me behind my back, and calls me an angel to
+my face; I'll pay him for this. Do tell me, commandant; never mind what
+HE says."
+
+"What! disobey orders?"
+
+"Orders? to you from that boy!"
+
+"Oh!" said Raynal, "for that matter, we soldiers are used to command one
+moment, and obey the next."
+
+In a word, this military pedant was impracticable, and Rose gave him up
+in disgust, and began to call up a sulky look when the other two sang
+his praises. For the old lady pronounced him charming, and Josephine
+said he was a man of crystal; never said a word he did not mean, and
+she wished she was like him. But the baroness thought this was going a
+little too far.
+
+"No, thank you," said she hastily; "he is a man, a thorough man. He
+would make an intolerable woman. A fine life if one had a parcel of
+women about, all blurting out their real minds every moment, and never
+smoothing matters."
+
+"Mamma, what a horrid picture!" chuckled Rose.
+
+She then proposed that at his next visit they should all three make an
+earnest appeal to him to let them know what Edouard had decided.
+
+But Josephine begged to be excused, feared it would be hardly delicate;
+and said languidly that for her part she felt they were in good hands,
+and prescribed patience. The baroness acquiesced, and poor Rose and her
+curiosity were baffled on every side.
+
+At last, one fine day, her torments were relieved without any further
+exertion on her part. Jacintha bounced into the drawing-room with a
+notice that the commandant wanted to speak to Josephine a minute out in
+the Pleasaunce.
+
+"How droll he is," said Rose; "fancy sending in for a young lady like
+that. Don't go, Josephine; how, he would stare."
+
+"My dear, I no more dare disobey him than if I was one of his soldiers."
+And she laid down her work, and rose quietly to do what she was bid.
+
+"Well," said Rose, superciliously, "go to your commanding officer. And,
+O Josephine, if you are worth anything at all, do get out of him what
+that Edouard has settled."
+
+Josephine kissed her, and promised to try. After the first salutation,
+there was a certain hesitation about Raynal which Josephine had never
+seen a trace of in him before; so, to put him at his ease, and at the
+same time keep her promise to Rose, she asked timidly if their mutual
+friend had been able to suggest anything.
+
+"What! don't you know that I have been acting all along upon his
+instructions?" answered Raynal.
+
+"No, indeed! and you have not told us what he advised."
+
+"Told you? why, of course not; they were secret instructions. I
+have obeyed one set, and now I come to the other; and there is the
+difficulty, being a kind of warfare I know nothing about."
+
+"It must be savage warfare, then," suggested the lady politely.
+
+"Not a bit of it. Now, who would have thought I was such a coward?"
+
+Josephine was mystified; however, she made a shrewd guess. "Do you
+fear a repulse from any one of us? Then, I suppose, you meditate some
+extravagant act of generosity."
+
+"Not I."
+
+"Of delicacy, then."
+
+"Just the reverse. Confound the young dog! why is he not here to help
+me?"
+
+"But, after all," suggested Josephine, "you have only to carry out his
+instructions."
+
+"That is true! that is true! but when a fellow is a coward, a poltroon,
+and all that sort of thing."
+
+This repeated assertion of cowardice on the part of the living Damascus
+blade that stood bolt-upright before her, struck Josephine as so funny
+that she laughed merrily, and bade him fancy it was only a fort he
+was attacking instead of the terrible Josephine; whom none but heroes
+feared, she assured him.
+
+This encouragement, uttered in jest, was taken in earnest. The soldier
+thanked her, and rallied visibly at the comparison. "All right," said
+he, "as you say, it is only a fort--so--mademoiselle!"
+
+"Monsieur!"
+
+"Hum! will you lend me your hand for a moment?"
+
+"My hand! what for? there," and she put it out an inch a minute. He took
+it, and inspected it closely.
+
+"A charming hand; the hand of a virtuous woman?"
+
+"Yes," said Josephine as cool as a cucumber, too sublimely and absurdly
+innocent even to blush.
+
+"Is it your own?"
+
+"Sir!" She blushed at that, I can tell you.
+
+"Because if it was, I would ask you to give it me. (I've fired the first
+shot anyway.)"
+
+Josephine whipped her hand off his palm, where it lay like cream spilt
+on a trencher.
+
+"Ah! I see; you are not free: you have a lover."
+
+"No, no!" cried Josephine in distress; "I love nobody but my mother and
+sister: I never shall."
+
+"Your mother," cried Raynal; "that reminds me; he told me to ask her;
+by Jove, I think he told me to ask her first;" and Raynal up with his
+scabbard and was making off.
+
+Josephine begged him to do nothing of the kind.
+
+"I can save you the trouble," said she.
+
+"Ah, but my instructions! my instructions!" cried the military pedant,
+and ran off into the house, and left Josephine "planted there," as they
+say in France.
+
+Raynal demanded a private interview of the baroness so significantly
+and unceremoniously that Rose had no alternative but to retire, but not
+without a glance of defiance at the bear. She ran straight, without her
+bonnet, into the Pleasaunce to slake her curiosity at Josephine. That
+young lady was walking pensively, but turned at sight of Rose, and the
+sisters came together with a clash of tongues.
+
+"O Rose! he has"--
+
+"Oh!"
+
+So nimbly does the female mind run on its little beaten tracks, that it
+took no more than those syllables for even these innocent young women to
+communicate that Raynal had popped.
+
+Josephine apologized for this weakness in a hero. "It wasn't his fault,"
+said she. "It is your Edouard who set him to do it."
+
+"My Edouard? Don't talk in that horrid way: I have no Edouard. You said
+'no' of course."
+
+"Something of the kind."
+
+"What, did you not say 'no' plump?"
+
+"I did not say it brutally, dear."
+
+"Josephine, you frighten me. I know you can't say 'no' to any one; and
+if you don't say 'no' plump to such a man as this, you might as well say
+'yes.'"
+
+"Well, love," said Josephine, "you know our mother will relieve me of
+this; what a comfort to have a mother!"
+
+They waited for Raynal's departure, to go to the baroness. They had
+to wait a long time. Moreover, when he did leave the chateau he came
+straight into the Pleasaunce. At sight of him Rose seized Josephine
+tight and bade her hold her tongue, as she could not say "no" plump
+to any one. Josephine was far from raising any objection to the
+arrangement.
+
+"Monsieur," said Rose, before he could get a word out, "even if she had
+not declined, I could not consent."
+
+Raynal tapped his forehead reflectively, and drew forth from memory that
+he had no instructions whatever to ask HER consent.
+
+She colored high, but returned to the charge.
+
+"Is her own consent to be dispensed with too? She declined the honor,
+did she not?"
+
+"Of course she did; but this was anticipated in my instructions. I am to
+be sure and not take the first two or three refusals."
+
+"O Josephine, look at that insolent boy: he has found you out."
+
+"Insolent boy!" cried Raynal; "why, it is the referee of your own
+choosing, and as well behaved a lad as ever I saw, and a zealous
+officer."
+
+"My kind friends," put in Josephine with a sweet languor, "I cannot let
+you quarrel about a straw."
+
+"It is not about a straw," said Raynal, "it is about you."
+
+"The distinction involves a compliment, sir," said Josephine; then she
+turned to Rose, "Is it possible you do not see Monsieur Raynal's strange
+proposal in its true light? and you so shrewd in general. He has no
+personal feeling whatever in this eccentric proceeding: he wants to make
+us all happy, especially my mother, without seeming to lay us under too
+great an obligation. Surely good-nature was never carried so far before;
+ha, ha! Monsieur, I will encumber you with my friendship forever, if you
+permit me, but farther than that I will not abuse your generosity."
+
+"Now look here, mademoiselle," began Raynal bluntly, "I did start with
+a good motive at first, that there's no denying. But, since I have been
+every day in your company, and seen how good and kind you are to all
+about you, I have turned selfish; and I say to myself, what a comfort
+such a wife as you would be to a soldier! Why, only to have you to
+write letters home to, would be worth half a fellow's pay. Do you know
+sometimes when I see the fellows writing their letters it gives me a
+knock here to think I have no one at all to write to."
+
+Josephine sighed.
+
+"So you see I am not so mighty disinterested. Now, mademoiselle, you
+speak so charmingly, I can't tell what you mean: can't tell whether
+you say 'no' because you could never like me, or whether it is out of
+delicacy, and you only want pressing. So I say no more at present: it is
+a standing offer. Take a day to consider. Take two if you like. I must
+go to the barracks; good-day."
+
+"Oh! this must be put an end to at once," said Rose.
+
+"With all my heart," replied Josephine; "but how?"
+
+"Come to our mother, and settle that," said the impetuous sister, and
+nearly dragged the languid one into the drawing-room.
+
+To their surprise they found the baroness walking up and down the room
+with unusual alacrity for a person of her years. She no sooner caught
+sight of Josephine than she threw her arms open to her with joyful
+vivacity, and kissed her warmly. "My love, you have saved us. I am a
+happy old woman. If I had all France to pick from I could not have found
+a man so worthy of my Josephine. He is brave, he is handsome, he is
+young, he is a rising man, he is a good son, and good sons make good
+husbands--and--I shall die at Beaurepaire, shall I not, Madame the
+Commandante?"
+
+Josephine held her mother round the neck, but never spoke. After a
+silence she held her tighter, and cried a little.
+
+"What is it?" asked the baroness confidentially of Rose, but without
+showing any very profound concern.
+
+"Mamma! mamma! she does not love him."
+
+"Love him? She would be no daughter of mine if she loved a man at sight.
+A modest woman loves her husband only."
+
+"But she scarcely knows Monsieur Raynal."
+
+"She knows more of him than I knew of your father when I married him.
+She knows his virtues and appreciates them. I have heard her, have
+I not, love? Esteem soon ripens into love when they are once fairly
+married."
+
+"Mother, does her silence then tell you nothing? Her tears--are they
+nothing to you?"
+
+"Silly child! These are tears that do not scald. The sweet soul weeps
+because she now for the first time sees she will have to leave her
+mother. Alas! my eldest, it is inevitable. Mothers are not immortal.
+While they are here it is their duty to choose good husbands for their
+daughters. My youngest, I believe, has chosen for herself--like the
+nation. But for my eldest I choose. We shall see which chooses the best.
+Meantime we stay at Beaurepaire, thanks to my treasure here."
+
+"Josephine! Josephine! you don't say one word," cried Rose in dismay.
+
+"What CAN I say? I love my mother and I love you. You draw me different
+ways. I want you to be both happy."
+
+"Then if you will not speak out I must. Mother, do not deceive yourself:
+it is duty alone that keeps her silent: this match is odious to her."
+
+"Then we are ruined. Josephine, is this match odious to you?"
+
+"Not exactly odious: but I am very, very indifferent."
+
+"There!" cried Rose triumphantly.
+
+"There!" cried the baroness in the same breath, triumphantly. "She
+esteems his character; but his person is indifferent to her: in other
+words, she is a modest girl, and my daughter; and let me tell you, Rose,
+that but for the misfortunes of our house, both my daughters would be
+married as I was, without knowing half as much of their husbands as
+Josephine knows of this brave, honest, generous, filial gentleman."
+
+"Well, then, since she will not speak out, I will. Pity me: I love her
+so. If this stranger, whom she does not love, takes her away from us, he
+will kill me. I shall die; oh!"
+
+Josephine left her mother and went to console Rose.
+
+The baroness lost her temper at this last stroke of opposition. "Now
+the truth comes out, Rose; this is selfishness. Do not deceive
+YOURself--selfishness!"
+
+"Mamma!"
+
+"You are only waiting to leave me yourself. Yet your eldest sister,
+forsooth, must be kept here for you,--till then." She added more gently,
+"Let me advise you to retire to your own room, and examine your heart
+fairly. You will find there is a strong dash of egoism in all this."
+
+"If I do"--
+
+"You will retract your opposition."
+
+"My heart won't let me; but I will despise myself, and be silent."
+
+And the young lady, who had dried her eyes the moment she was accused
+of selfishness, walked, head erect, from the room. Josephine cast a
+deprecating glance at her mother. "Yes, my angel!" said the latter, "I
+was harsh. But we are no longer of one mind, and I suppose never shall
+be again."
+
+"Oh, yes, we shall. Be patient! Mother--you shall not leave
+Beaurepaire."
+
+The baroness colored faintly at these four last words of her daughter,
+and hung her head.
+
+Josephine saw that, and darted to her and covered her with kisses.
+
+That day the doctor scolded them both. "You have put your mother into
+a high fever," said he; "here's a pulse; I do wish you would be more
+considerate."
+
+The commandant did not come to dinner as usual. The evening passed
+heavily; their hearts were full of uncertainty.
+
+"We miss our merry, spirited companion," said the baroness with a grim
+look at Rose. Both young ladies assented with ludicrous eagerness.
+
+That night Rose came and slept with Josephine, and more than once she
+awoke with a start and seized Josephine convulsively and held her tight.
+
+Accused of egoism! at first her whole nature rose in arms against the
+charge: but, after a while, coming as it did from so revered a person,
+it forced her to serious self-examination. The poor girl said to
+herself, "Mamma is a shrewd woman. Am I after all deceiving myself?
+Would she be happy, and am I standing in the way?" In the morning she
+begged her sister to walk with her in the park, so that they might be
+safe from interruption.
+
+There, she said sadly, she could not understand her own sister. "Why are
+you so calm and cold, while am I in tortures of anxiety? Have you made
+some resolve and not confided it to your Rose?"
+
+"No, love," was the reply; "I am scarce capable of a resolution; I am a
+mere thing that drifts."
+
+"Let me put it in other words, then. How will this end?"
+
+"I hardly know."
+
+"Do you mean to marry Monsieur Raynal, then? answer me that."
+
+"No; but I should not wonder if he were to marry ME."
+
+"But you said 'no.'"
+
+"Yes, I said 'no' once."
+
+"And don't you mean to say it again, and again, and again, till kingdom
+come?"
+
+"What is the use? you heard him say he would not desist any the
+more, and I care too little about the matter to go on persisting, and
+persisting, and persisting."
+
+"Why not, if he goes on pestering, and pestering, and pestering?"
+
+"Ah, he is like you, all energy, at all hours; but I have so little
+where my heart is unconcerned: he seems, too, to have a wish! I have
+none either way, and my conscience says 'marry him!'"
+
+"Your conscience say marry one man when you love another?"
+
+"Heaven forbid! Rose, I love no one: I HAVE loved; but now my heart is
+dead and silent; only my conscience says, 'You are the cause of all your
+mother's trouble; you are the cause that Beaurepaire was sold. Now you
+can repair that mischief, and at the same time make a brave man happy,
+our benefactor happy.' It is a great temptation: I hardly know why I
+said 'no' at all; surprise, perhaps--or to please you, pretty one."
+
+Rose groaned: "Are you then worth so little that you would throw
+yourself away on a man who does not love you, nor want you, and is quite
+as happy single?"
+
+"No; not happy; he is only stout-hearted and good, and therefore
+content; and he is a character that it would be easy--in short, I feel
+my power here: I could make that man happy; he has nobody to write to
+even, when he is away--poor fellow!"
+
+"I shall lose all patience," cried Rose; "you are at your old trick,
+thinking of everybody but yourself: I let you do it in trifles, but I
+love you too well to permit it when the happiness of your whole life is
+at stake. I must be satisfied on one point, or else this marriage shall
+never take place: just answer me this; if Camille Dujardin stood on one
+side, and Monsieur Raynal on the other, and both asked your hand, which
+would you take?"
+
+"That will never be. Whose? Not his whom I despise. Esteem might ripen
+into love, but what must contempt end in?"
+
+This reply gave Rose great satisfaction. To exhaust all awkward
+contingencies, she said, "One question more, and I have done. Suppose
+Camille should turn out--be not quite--what shall I say--inexcusable?"
+
+At this unlucky gush, Josephine turned pale, then red, then pale again,
+and cried eagerly, "Then all the world should not part us. Why torture
+me with such a question? Ah! you have heard something." And in a moment
+the lava of passion burst wildly through its thin sheet of ice. "I was
+blind. This is why you would save me from this unnatural marriage.
+You are breaking the good news to me by degrees. There is no need.
+Quick--quick--let me have it. I have waited three years; I am sick of
+waiting. Why don't you speak? Why don't you tell me? Then I will tell
+YOU. He is alive--he is well--he is coming. It was not he those soldiers
+saw; they were so far off. How could they tell? They saw a uniform but
+not a face. Perhaps he has been a prisoner, and so could not write;
+could not come: but he is coming now. Why do you groan? why do you turn
+pale? ah! I see; I have once more deceived myself. I was mad. He I love
+is still a traitor to France and me, and I am wretched forever. Oh! that
+I were dead! oh! that I were dead! No; don't speak to me: never mind me;
+this madness will pass as it has before, and leave me a dead thing
+among the living. Ah! sister, why did you wake me from my dream? I was
+drifting so calmly, so peacefully, so dead, and painless, drifting over
+the dead sea of the heart towards the living waters of gratitude and
+duty. I was going to make more than one worthy soul happy; and seeing
+them happy, I should have been content and useful--what am I now?--and
+comforted other hearts, and died joyful--and young. For God is good; he
+releases the meek and patient from their burdens."
+
+With this came a flood of tears; and she leaned against a bough with her
+forehead on her arm, bowed like a wounded lily.
+
+"Accursed be that man's name, and MY tongue if ever I utter it again in
+your hearing!" cried Rose, weeping bitterly. "You are wiser than I, and
+every way better. O my darling, dry your tears! Here he comes: look!
+riding across the park."
+
+"Rose," cried Josephine, hastily, "I leave all to you. Receive Monsieur
+Raynal, and decline his offer if you think proper. It is you who love me
+best. My mother would give me up for a house; for an estate, poor dear."
+
+"I would not give you for all the world."
+
+"I know it. I trust all to you."
+
+"Well, but don't go; stay and hear what I shall say."
+
+"Oh, no; that poor man is intolerable to me NOW. Let me avoid his sight,
+and think of his virtues."
+
+Rose was left alone, mistress of her sister's fate. She put her head
+into her hands and filled with anxiety and sudden doubt.
+
+Like a good many more of us, she had been positive so long as the
+decision did not rest with her. But with power comes responsibility,
+with responsibility comes doubt. Easy to be an advocate in re incerta;
+hard to be the judge. And she had but a few seconds to think in; for
+Raynal was at hand. The last thing in her mind before he joined her was
+the terrible power of that base Camille over her sister. She despaired
+of curing Josephine, but a husband might. There's such divinity doth
+hedge a husband in innocent girls' minds.
+
+"Well, little lady," began Raynal, "and how are you, and how is my
+mother-in-law that is to be--or is not to be, as your sister pleases;
+and how is SHE? have I frightened her away? There were two petticoats,
+and now there is but one."
+
+"She left me to answer you."
+
+"All the worse for me: I am not to your taste."
+
+"Do not say that," said Rose, almost hysterically.
+
+"Oh! it is no sacrilege. Not one in fifty likes me."
+
+"But I do like you, sir."
+
+"Then why won't you let me have your sister?"
+
+"I have not quite decided that you shall not have her," faltered poor
+Rose. She murmured on, "I dare say you think me very unkind, very
+selfish; but put yourself in my place. I love my sister as no man can
+ever love her, I know: my heart has been one flesh and one soul with
+hers all my life. A stranger comes and takes her away from me as if she
+was I don't know what; his portmanteau; takes her to Egypt, oh! oh! oh!"
+
+Raynal comforted her.
+
+"What, do you think I am such a brute as to take that delicate creature
+about fighting with me? why, the hot sand would choke her, to begin.
+No. You don't take my manoeuvre. I have no family; I try for a wife that
+will throw me in a mother and sister. You will live all together the
+same as before, of course; only you must let me make one of you when I
+am at home. And how often will that be? Besides, I am as likely to
+be knocked on the head in Egypt as not; you are worrying yourself for
+nothing, little lady."
+
+He uttered the last topic of consolation in a broad, hearty, hilarious
+tone, like a trombone impregnated with cheerful views of fate.
+
+"Heaven forbid!" cried Rose: "and I will, for even I shall pray for you
+now. What you will leave her at home? forgive me for not seeing all your
+worth: of course I knew you were an angel, but I had no idea you were a
+duck. You are just the man for my sister. She likes to obey: you are all
+for commanding. So you see. Then she never thinks of herself; any other
+man but you would impose on her good-nature; but you are too generous
+to do that. So you see. Then she esteems you so highly. And one whom I
+esteem (between you and me) has chosen you for her."
+
+"Then say yes, and have done with it," suggested the straightforward
+soldier.
+
+"Why should I say 'no?' you will make one another happy some day: you
+are both so good. Any other man but you would tear her from me; but you
+are too just, too kind. Heaven will reward you. No! I will. I will give
+you Josephine: ah, my dear brother-in-law, it is the most precious thing
+I have to give in the world."
+
+"Thank you, then. So that is settled. Hum! no, it is not quite; I
+forgot; I have something for you to read; an anonymous letter. I got it
+this morning; it says your sister has a lover."
+
+The letter ran to this tune: a friend who had observed the commandant's
+frequent visits at Beaurepaire wrote to warn him against traps. Both
+the young ladies of Beaurepaire were doubtless at the new proprietor's
+service to pick and choose from. But for all that each of them had a
+lover, and though these lovers had their orders to keep out of the way
+till monsieur should be hooked, he might be sure that if he married
+either, the man of her heart would come on the scene soon after, perhaps
+be present at the wedding.
+
+In short, it was one of those poisoned arrows a coarse vindictive coward
+can shoot.
+
+It was the first anonymous letter Rose had ever seen. It almost drove
+her mad on the spot. Raynal was sorry he had let her see it.
+
+She turned red and white by turns, and gasped for breath.
+
+"Why am I not a man?--why don't I wear a sword? I would pass it through
+this caitiff's heart. The cowardly slave!--the fiend! for who but a
+fiend could slander an angel like my Josephine? Hooked? Oh! she will
+never marry you if she sees this."
+
+"Then don't let her see it: and why take it to heart like that? I don't
+trust to the word of a man who owns that his story is a thing he dares
+not sign his name to; at all events, I shall not put his word against
+yours. But it is best to understand one another in time. I am a plain
+man, but not a soft one. I should not be an easygoing husband like some
+I see about: I'd have no wasps round my honey; if my wife took a lover I
+would not lecture THE WOMAN--what is the use?--I'd kill THE MAN then and
+there, in-doors or out, as I would kill a snake. If she took another,
+I'd send him after the first, and so on till one killed me."
+
+"And serve the wretches right."
+
+"Yes; but for my own sake I don't choose to marry a woman that loves any
+other man. So tell me the plain truth; come."
+
+Rose turned chill in her inside. "I have no lover," she stammered. "I
+have a young fool that comes and teases me: but it is no secret. He is
+away, but why? he is on a sickbed, poor little fellow!"
+
+"But your sister? She could not have a lover unknown to you."
+
+"I defy her. No, sir; I have not seen her speak three words to any young
+man except Monsieur Riviere this three years past."
+
+"That is enough;" and he tore the letter quietly to atoms.
+
+Then Rose saw she could afford a little more candor. "Understand me; I
+can't speak of what happened when I was a child. But if ever she had a
+girlish attachment, he has not followed it up, or surely I should have
+seen something of him all these years."
+
+"Of course. Oh! as for flirtations, let them pass: a lovely girl does
+not grow up without one or two whispering some nonsense into her ear.
+Why, I myself should have flirted no doubt; but I never had the time.
+Bonaparte gives you time to eat and drink, but not to sleep or
+flirt, and that reminds me I have fifty miles to ride, so good-by,
+sister-in-law, eh?"
+
+"Adieu, brother-in-law."
+
+Left alone, Rose had some misgivings. She had equivocated with one whose
+upright, candid nature ought to have protected him: but an enemy had
+accused Josephine; and it came so natural to shield her. "Did he really
+think I would expose my own sister?" said she to herself, angrily. Was
+not this anger secret self-discontent?
+
+
+"Well, love," said Josephine, demurely, "have you dismissed him?"
+
+"No."
+
+Josephine smiled feebly. "It is easy to say 'say no;' but it is not so
+easy to say 'no,' especially when you feel you ought to say 'yes,' and
+have no wish either way except to give pleasure to others."
+
+"But I am not such skim milk as all that," replied Rose: "I have always
+a strong wish where you are concerned, and your happiness. I hesitated
+whilst I was in doubt, but I doubt no longer: I have had a long talk
+with him. He has shown me his whole heart: he is the best, the noblest
+of creatures: he has no littleness or meanness. And then he is a
+thorough man; I know that by his being the very opposite of a woman in
+his ways. Now you are a thorough woman, and so you will suit one another
+to a T. I have decided: so no more doubts, love; no more tears; no more
+disputes. We are all of one mind, and I do think I have secured your
+happiness. It will not come in a day, perhaps, but it will come. So then
+in one little fortnight you marry Monsieur Raynal."
+
+"What!" said Josephine, "you have actually settled that?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"But are you sure I can make him as happy as he deserves?"
+
+"Positive."
+
+"I think so too; still"--
+
+"It is settled, dear," said Rose soothingly.
+
+"Oh, the comfort of that! you relieve me of a weight; you give me peace.
+I shall have duties; I shall do some good in the world. They were all
+for it but you before, were they not?"
+
+"Yes, and now I am strongest for it of them all. Josephine, it is
+settled."
+
+Josephine looked at her for a moment in silence, then said eagerly,
+"Bless you, dear Rose; you have saved your sister;" then, after a
+moment, in a very different voice, "O Camille! Camille! why have you
+deserted me?"
+
+And with this she fell to sobbing terribly. Rose wept on her neck,
+but said nothing. She too was a woman, and felt that this was the last
+despairing cry of love giving up a hopeless struggle.
+
+They sat twined together in silence till Jacintha came to tell them it
+was close upon dinner-time; so then they hastened to dry their tears and
+wash their red eyes, for fear their mother should see what they had been
+at, and worry herself.
+
+
+"Well, mademoiselle, these two consent; but what do you say? for after
+all, it is you I am courting, and not them. Have you the courage to
+venture on a rough soldier like me?"
+
+This delicate question was put point-blank before the three ladies.
+
+"Sir," replied Josephine timidly, "I will be as frank, as
+straightforward as you are. I thank you for the honor you do me."
+
+Raynal looked perplexed.
+
+"And does that mean 'yes' or 'no'?"
+
+"Which you please," said Josephine, hanging her sweet head.
+
+The wedding was fixed for that day fortnight. The next morning wardrobes
+were ransacked. The silk, muslin, and lace of their prosperous days were
+looked out: grave discussions were held over each work of art. Rose was
+active, busy, fussy. The baroness threw in the weight of her judgment
+and experience.
+
+Josephine managed to smile whenever either Rose or the baroness looked
+at all fixedly at her.
+
+So glided the peaceful days. So Josephine drifted towards the haven of
+wedlock.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+
+At Bayonne, a garrison town on the south frontier of France, two
+sentinels walked lethargically, crossing and recrossing before the
+governor's house. Suddenly their official drowsiness burst into energy;
+for a pale, grisly man, in rusty, defaced, dirty, and torn regimentals,
+was walking into the courtyard as if it belonged to him. The sentinels
+lowered their muskets, and crossed them with a clash before the gateway.
+
+The scarecrow did not start back. He stopped and looked down with a
+smile at the steel barrier the soldiers had improvised for him, then
+drew himself a little up, carried his hand carelessly to his cap, which
+was nearly in two, and gave the name of an officer in the French army.
+
+If you or I, dressed like a beggar who years ago had stolen regimentals
+and worn them down to civil garments, had addressed these soldiers with
+these very same words, the bayonets would have kissed closer, or perhaps
+the points been turned against our sacred and rusty person: but there is
+a freemasonry of the sword. The light, imperious hand that touched that
+battered cap, and the quiet clear tone of command told. The sentinels
+slowly recovered their pieces, but still looked uneasy and doubtful in
+their minds. The battered one saw this, and gave a sort of lofty smile;
+he turned up his cuffs and showed his wrists, and drew himself still
+higher.
+
+The sentinels shouldered their pieces sharp, then dropped them
+simultaneously with a clatter and ring upon the pavement.
+
+"Pass, captain."
+
+The rusty figure rang the governor's bell. A servant came and eyed
+him with horror and contempt. He gave his name, and begged to see the
+governor. The servant left him in the hall, and went up-stairs to tell
+his master. At the name the governor reflected, then frowned, then bade
+his servant reach him down a certain book. He inspected it. "I thought
+so: any one with him?"
+
+"No, your excellency."
+
+"Load my pistols, put them on the table, show him in, and then order a
+guard to the door."
+
+The governor was a stern veteran with a powerful brow, a shaggy eyebrow,
+and a piercing eye. He never rose, but leaned his chin on his hand, and
+his elbow on a table that stood between them, and eyed his visitor very
+fixedly and strangely. "We did not expect to see you on this side the
+Pyrenees," said he gravely.
+
+"Nor I myself, governor."
+
+"What do you come for?"
+
+"A suit of regimentals, and money to take me to Paris."
+
+"And suppose, instead of that, I turn out a corporal's guard, and bid
+them shoot you in the courtyard?"
+
+"It would be the drollest thing you ever did, all things considered,"
+said the other coolly, but bitterly.
+
+The governor looked for the book he had lately consulted, found the
+page, handed it to the rusty officer, and watched him keenly: the blood
+rushed all over his face, and his lip trembled; but his eye dwelt stern
+yet sorrowful on the governor.
+
+"I have read your book, now read mine." He drew off his coat and showed
+his wrists and arms, blue and waled. "Can you read that, sir?"
+
+"No."
+
+"All the better for you: Spanish fetters, general." He showed a white
+scar on his shoulder. "Can you read that? This is what I cut out of it,"
+and he handed the governor a little round stone as big and almost as
+regular as a musket-ball.
+
+"Humph! that could hardly have been fired from a French musket."
+
+"Can you read this?" and he showed him a long cicatrix on his other arm.
+
+"Knife I think," said the governor.
+
+"You are right, sir: Spanish knife. Can you read this?" and opening his
+bosom he showed a raw wound on his breast.
+
+"Oh, the devil!" cried the governor.
+
+The wounded man put his rusty coat on again, and stood erect, and
+haughty, and silent.
+
+The general eyed him, and saw his great spirit shining through this man.
+The more he looked the less could the scarecrow veil the hero from his
+practised eye. He said there must be some mistake, or else he was in
+his dotage; after a moment's hesitation, he added, "Be seated, if you
+please, and tell me what you have been doing all these years."
+
+"Suffering."
+
+"Not all the time, I suppose."
+
+"Without intermission."
+
+"But what? suffering what?"
+
+"Cold, hunger, darkness, wounds, solitude, sickness, despair, prison,
+all that man can suffer."
+
+"Impossible! a man would be dead at that rate before this."
+
+"I should have died a dozen deaths but for one thing; I had promised her
+to live."
+
+There was a pause. Then the old soldier said gravely, but more kindly,
+to the young one, "Tell me the facts, captain" (the first time he had
+acknowledged his visitor's military rank).
+
+An hour had scarce elapsed since the rusty figure was stopped by the
+sentinels at the gate, when two glittering officers passed out under
+the same archway, followed by a servant carrying a furred cloak. The
+sentinels presented arms. The elder of these officers was the governor:
+the younger was the late scarecrow, in a brand-new uniform belonging to
+the governor's son. He shone out now in his true light; the beau ideal
+of a patrician soldier; one would have said he had been born with a
+sword by his side and drilled by nature, so straight and smart, yet easy
+he was in every movement. He was like a falcon, eye and all, only, as
+it were, down at the bottom of the hawk's eye lay a dove's eye. That
+compound and varying eye seemed to say, I can love, I can fight: I can
+fight, I can love, as few of you can do either.
+
+The old man was trying to persuade him to stay at Bayonne, until his
+wound should be cured.
+
+"No, general, I have other wounds to cure of longer standing than this
+one."
+
+"Well, promise me to lay up at Paris."
+
+"General, I shall stay an hour at Paris."
+
+"An hour in Paris! Well, at least call at the War Office and present
+this letter."
+
+That same afternoon, wrapped in the governor's furred cloak, the young
+officer lay at his full length in the coupe of the diligence, the whole
+of which the governor had peremptorily demanded for him, and rolled day
+and night towards Paris.
+
+He reached it worn with fatigue and fevered by his wound, but his spirit
+as indomitable as ever. He went to the War Office with the governor's
+letter. It seemed to create some little sensation; one functionary came
+and said a polite word to him, then another. At last to his infinite
+surprise the minister himself sent down word he wished to see him; the
+minister put several questions to him, and seemed interested in him and
+touched by his relation.
+
+"I think, captain, I shall have to send to you: where do you stay in
+Paris?"
+
+"Nowhere, monsieur; I leave Paris as soon as I can find an easy-going
+horse."
+
+"But General Bretaux tells me you are wounded."
+
+"Not dangerously."
+
+"Pardon me, captain, but is this prudent? is it just to yourself and
+your friends?"
+
+"Yes, I owe it to those who perhaps think me dead."
+
+"You can write to them."
+
+"I grudge so great, so sacred a joy to a letter. No! after all I have
+suffered I claim to be the one to tell her I have kept my word: I
+promised to live, and I live."
+
+"HER? then I say no more, only tell me what road you take."
+
+"The road to Brittany."
+
+As the young officer was walking his horse by the roadside about a
+league and a half from Paris, he heard a clatter behind him, and up
+galloped an aide-de-camp and drew up alongside, bringing his horse
+nearly on his haunches.
+
+He handed him a large packet sealed with the arms of France. The other
+tore it open; and there was his brevet as colonel. His cheek flushed
+and his eye glittered with joy. The aide-de-camp next gave him a parcel:
+"Your epaulets, colonel! We hear you are going into the wilds where
+epaulets don't grow. You are to join the army of the Rhine as soon as
+your wound is well."
+
+"Wherever my country calls me."
+
+"Your address, then, colonel, that we may know where to put our finger
+on a tried soldier when we want one."
+
+"I am going to Beaurepaire."
+
+"Beaurepaire? I never heard of it."
+
+"You never heard of Beaurepaire? it is in Brittany, forty-five leagues
+from Paris, forty-three leagues and a half from here."
+
+"Good! Health and honor to you, colonel."
+
+"The same to you, lieutenant; or a soldier's death."
+
+The new colonel read the precious document across his horse's mane, and
+then he was going to put one of the epaulets on his right shoulder, bare
+at present: but he reflected.
+
+"No; she should make him a colonel with her own dear hand. He put them
+in his pocket. He would not even look at them till she had seen them.
+Oh, how happy he was not only to come back to her alive, but to come
+back to her honored."
+
+His wound smarted, his limbs ached, but no pain past or present could
+lay hold of his mind. In his great joy he remembered past suffering
+and felt present pain--yet smiled. Only every now and then he pined for
+wings to shorten the weary road.
+
+He was walking his horse quietly, drooping a little over his saddle,
+when another officer well mounted came after him and passed him at a
+hand gallop with one hasty glance at his uniform, and went tearing on
+like one riding for his life.
+
+"Don't I know that face?" said Dujardin.
+
+He cudgelled his memory, and at last he remembered it was the face of
+an old comrade. At least it strongly reminded him of one Jean Raynal who
+had saved his life in the Arno, when they were lieutenants together.
+
+Yes, it was certainly Raynal, only bronzed by service in some hot
+country.
+
+"Ah!" thought Camille; "I suppose I am more changed than he is; for he
+certainly did not recognize me at all. Now I wonder what that fellow has
+been doing all this time. What a hurry he was in! a moment more and
+I should have hailed him. Perhaps I may fall in with him at the next
+town."
+
+He touched his horse with the spur, and cantered gently on, for trotting
+shook him more than he could bear. Even when he cantered he had to press
+his hand against his bosom, and often with the motion a bitterer pang
+than usual came and forced the water from his eyes; and then he smiled.
+His great love and his high courage made this reply to the body's
+anguish. And still his eyes looked straight forward as at some object
+in the distant horizon, while he came gently on, his hand pressed to his
+bosom, his head drooping now and then, smiling patiently, upon the road
+to Beaurepaire.
+
+Oh! if anybody had told him that in five days his Josephine was to be
+married; and that the bronzed comrade, who had just galloped past him,
+was to marry her!
+
+
+At Beaurepaire they were making and altering wedding-dresses. Rose was
+excited, and even Josephine took a calm interest. Dress never goes for
+nothing with her sex. The chairs and tables were covered, and the floor
+was littered. The baroness was presiding over the rites of vanity, and
+telling them what she wore at her wedding, under Louis XV., with strict
+accuracy, and what we men should consider a wonderful effort of memory,
+when the Commandant Raynal came in like a cannon-ball, without
+any warning, and stood among them in a stiff, military attitude.
+Exclamations from all the party, and then a kind greeting, especially
+from the baroness.
+
+"We have been so dull without you, Jean."
+
+"And I have missed you once or twice, mother-in-law, I can tell you.
+Well, I have got bad news; but you must consider we live in a busy time.
+To-morrow I start for Egypt."
+
+Loud ejaculations from the baroness and Rose. Josephine put down her
+work quietly.
+
+The baroness sighed deeply, and the tears came into her eyes. "Oh,
+you must not be down-hearted, old lady," shouted Raynal. "Why, I am as
+likely to come back from Egypt as not. It is an even chance, to say the
+least."
+
+This piece of consolation completed the baroness's unhappiness. She
+really had conceived a great affection for Raynal, and her heart had
+been set on the wedding.
+
+"Take away all that finery, girls," said she bitterly; "we shall not
+want it for years. I shall not be alive when he comes home from Egypt.
+I never had a son--only daughters--the best any woman ever had; but a
+mother is not complete without a son, and I shall never live to have one
+now."
+
+"I hate General Bonaparte," said Rose viciously.
+
+"Hate my general?" groaned Raynal, looking down with a sort of
+superstitious awe and wonder at the lovely vixen. "Hate the best soldier
+the world ever saw?"
+
+"What do I care for his soldiership? He has put off our wedding. For how
+many years did you say?"
+
+"No; he has put it on."
+
+In answer to the astonished looks this excited, he explained that the
+wedding was to have been in a week, but now it must be to-morrow at ten
+o'clock.
+
+The three ladies set up their throats together. "Tomorrow?"
+
+"To-morrow. Why, what do you suppose I left Paris for yesterday? left my
+duties even."
+
+"What, monsieur?" asked Josephine, timidly, "did you ride all that
+way, and leave your duties MERELY TO MARRY ME?" and she looked a little
+pleased.
+
+"You are worth a great deal more trouble than that," said Raynal simply.
+"Besides, I had passed my word, and I always keep my word."
+
+"So do I," said Josephine, a little proudly. "I will not go from it now,
+if you insist; but I confess to you, that such a proposal staggers me;
+so sudden--no preliminaries--no time to reflect; in short, there are so
+many difficulties that I must request you to reconsider the matter."
+
+"Difficulties," shouted Raynal with merry disdain; "there are none,
+unless you sit down and make them; we do more difficult things than
+this every day of our lives: we passed the bridge of Arcola in thirteen
+minutes; and we had not the consent of the enemy, as we have yours--have
+we not?"
+
+Her only reply was a look at her mother, to which the baroness replied
+by a nod; then turning to Raynal, "This empressement is very flattering;
+but I see no possibility: there is an etiquette we cannot altogether
+defy: there are preliminaries before a daughter of Beaurepaire can
+become a wife."
+
+"There used to be all that, madam," laughed Raynal, putting her down
+good-humoredly; "but it was in the days when armies came out and touched
+their caps to one another, and went back into winter quarters. Then the
+struggle was who could go slowest; now the fight is who can go fastest.
+Time and Bonaparte wait for nobody; and ladies and other strong
+places are taken by storm, not undermined a foot a month as under Noah
+Quartorze: let me cut this short, as time is short."
+
+He then drew a little plan of a wedding campaign. "The carriages will be
+here at 9 A.M.," said he; "they will whisk us down to the mayor's
+house by a quarter to ten: Picard, the notary, meets us there with the
+marriage contract, to save time; the contract signed, the mayor will do
+the marriage at quick step out of respect for me--half an hour--quarter
+past ten; breakfast in the same house an hour and a quarter:--we mustn't
+hurry a wedding breakfast--then ten minutes or so for the old fogies to
+waste in making speeches about our virtues--my watch will come out--my
+charger will come round--I rise from the table--embrace my dear old
+mother--kiss my wife's hand--into the saddle--canter to Paris--roll to
+Toulon--sail to Egypt. But I shall leave a wife and a mother behind
+me: they will both send me a kind word now and then; and I will write
+letters to you all from Egypt, and when I come home, my wife and I will
+make acquaintance, and we will all be happy together: and if I am killed
+out there, don't you go and fret your poor little hearts about it; it
+is a soldier's lot sooner or later. Besides, you will find I have taken
+care of you; nobody shall come and turn you out of your quarters,
+even though Jean Raynal should be dead; I have got to meet Picard at
+Riviere's on that very business--I am off."
+
+He was gone as brusquely as he came.
+
+"Mother! sister!" cried Josephine, "help me to love this man."
+
+"You need no help," cried the baroness, with enthusiasm, "not love him,
+we should all be monsters."
+
+Raynal came to supper looking bright and cheerful. "No more work to-day.
+I have nothing to do but talk; fancy that."
+
+This evening Josephine de Beaurepaire, who had been silent and
+thoughtful, took a quiet opportunity, and purred in his ear, "Monsieur!"
+
+"Mademoiselle!" rang the trombone.
+
+"Am I not to go to Egypt?"
+
+"No."
+
+Josephine drew back at this brusque reply like a sensitive plant. But
+she returned to the attack.
+
+"But is it not a wife's duty to be by her husband's side to look after
+his comfort--to console him when others vex him--to soothe him when he
+is harassed?"
+
+"Her first duty is to obey him."
+
+"Certainly."
+
+"Well, when I am your husband, I shall bid you stay with your mother and
+sister while I go to Egypt."
+
+"I shall obey you."
+
+He told her bluntly he thought none the worse of her for making the
+offer; but should not accept it.
+
+
+Camille Dujardin slept that night at a roadside inn about twelve miles
+from Beaurepaire, and not more than six from the town where the wedding
+was to take place next day.
+
+It was a close race.
+
+And the racers all unconscious of each other, yet spurred impartially by
+events that were now hurrying to a climax.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+
+The next day at sharp nine two carriages were at the door.
+
+But the ladies were not ready. Thus early in the campaign did they throw
+all into disorder. For so nicely had Raynal timed the several events
+that this threw him all into confusion. He stamped backwards and
+forwards, and twisted his mustaches, and swore. This enforced
+unpunctuality was a new torture to him. Jacintha told them he was angry,
+and that made them nervous and flurried, and their fingers strayed
+wildly among hooks and eyes, and all sorts of fastenings; they were not
+ready till half-past nine. Conscious they deserved a scolding, they sent
+Josephine down first to mollify. She dawned upon the honest soldier so
+radiant, so dazzling in her snowy dress, with her coronet of pearls (an
+heirloom), and her bridal veil parted, and the flush of conscious beauty
+on her cheek, that instead of scolding her, he actually blurted out,
+"Well! by St. Denis it was worth waiting half an hour for."
+
+He recovered a quarter of an hour by making the driver gallop. Then
+occasional shrieks issued from the carriage that held the baroness. That
+ancient lady feared annihilation: she had not come down from a galloping
+age.
+
+They drove into the town, drew up at the mayor's house, were received
+with great ceremony by that functionary and Picard, and entered the
+house.
+
+When their carriages rattled into the street from the north side,
+Colonel Dujardin had already entered it from the south, and was riding
+at a foot's pace along the principal street. The motion of his horse now
+shook him past endurance. He dismounted at an inn a few doors from the
+mayor's house, and determined to do the rest of the short journey on
+foot. The landlord bustled about him obsequiously. "You are faint,
+colonel; you have travelled too far. Let me order you an excellent
+breakfast."
+
+"No. I want a carriage; have you one?"
+
+"I have two; but, unluckily, they are both engaged for the day, and by
+people of distinction. Commandant Raynal is married to-day."
+
+"Ah! I wish him joy," said Camille, heartily. He then asked the landlord
+to open the window, as he felt rather faint. The landlord insisted on
+breakfast, and Camille sat down to an omelet and a bottle of red wine.
+Then he lay awhile near the window, revived by the air, and watched
+the dear little street he had not seen for years. He felt languid, but
+happy, celestially happy.
+
+She was a few doors from him, and neither knew it.
+
+A pen was put into her white hand, and in another moment she had signed
+a marriage contract.
+
+"Now to the church," cried the baroness, gayly. To get to the church,
+they must pass by the window Camille reclined at.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+
+"Oh! there's no time for that," said Raynal. And as the baroness looked
+horrified and amazed, Picard explained: "The state marries its citizens
+now, with reason: since marriage is a civil contract."
+
+"Marriage a civil contract!" repeated the baroness. "What, is it then no
+longer one of the holy sacraments? What horrible impiety shall we come
+to next? Unhappy France! Such a contract would never be a marriage in my
+eyes: and what would become of an union the Church had not blessed?"
+
+"Madame," said Picard, "the Church can bless it still; but it is only
+the mayor here that can DO it."
+
+All this time Josephine was blushing scarlet, and looking this way
+and that, with a sort of instinctive desire to fly and hide, no matter
+where, for a week or so.
+
+"Haw! haw! haw!" roared Raynal; "here is a pretty mother. Wants her
+daughter to be unlawfully married in a church, instead of lawfully in a
+house. Give me the will!"
+
+"Look here, mother-in-law: I have left Beaurepaire to my lawful wife."
+
+"Otherwise," put in Picard, "in case of death, it would pass to his
+heir-at-law."
+
+"And HE would turn you all out, and that does not suit me. Now there
+stands the only man who can make mademoiselle my LAWFUL wife. So quick
+march, monsieur the mayor, for time and Bonaparte wait for no man."
+
+"Stay a minute, young people," said the mayor. "We should soothe
+respectable prejudices, not crush them. Madam, I am at least as old as
+you, and have seen many changes. I perfectly understand your feelings."
+
+"Ah, monsieur! oh!"
+
+"Calm yourself, dear madam; the case is not so bad as you think. It is
+perfectly true that in republican France the civil magistrate alone can
+bind French citizens in lawful wedlock. But this does not annihilate the
+religious ceremony. You can ask the Church's blessing on my work; and be
+assured you are not the only one who retains that natural prejudice. Out
+of every ten couples that I marry, four or five go to church afterwards
+and perform the ancient ceremonies. And they do well. For there before
+the altar the priest tells them what it is not my business to dilate
+upon--the grave moral and religious duties they have undertaken along
+with this civil contract. The state binds, but the Church still blesses,
+and piously assents to that"--
+
+"From which she has no power to dissent."
+
+"Monsieur Picard, do you consider it polite to interrupt the chief
+magistrate of the place while he is explaining the law to a citizen?"
+
+(This closed Picard.)
+
+"I married a daughter last year," continued the worthy mayor.
+
+"What, after this fashion?"
+
+"I married her myself, as I will marry yours, if you will trust me with
+her. And after I have made them one, there is nothing to prevent them
+adjourning to the church."
+
+"I beg your pardon," cried Raynal, "there are two things to prevent it:
+a couple that wait for no man: Time and Bonaparte. Come, sir; marry us,
+and have done with it."
+
+The mayor assented. He invited Josephine to stand before him. She
+trembled and wept a little: Rose clung to her and wept, and the good
+mayor married the parties off hand.
+
+"Is that all?" asked the baroness; "it is terribly soon done."
+
+"It is done effectively, madam," said the mayor, with a smile. "Permit
+me to tell you that his Holiness the Pope cannot undo my work."
+
+Picard grinned slyly, and whispered something into Raynal's ear.
+
+"Oh! indeed," said Raynal aloud and carelessly. "Come, Madame Raynal, to
+breakfast: follow us, the rest of you."
+
+They paired, and followed the bride and bridegroom into the
+breakfast-room.
+
+
+The light words Picard whispered were five in number.
+
+Now if the mayor had not snubbed Picard just before, he would have
+uttered those jocose but true words aloud. There was no particular
+reason why he should not. And if he had,--The threads of the web of
+life, how subtle they are! The finest cotton of Manchester, the finer
+meshes of the spider, seem three-inch cables by comparison with those
+moral gossamers which vulgar eyes cannot see at all, the "somethings,
+nothings," on which great fates have hung.
+
+It was a cheerful breakfast, thanks to Raynal, who would be in high
+spirits, and would not allow a word of regret from any one. Madame
+Raynal sat by his side, looking up at him every now and then with
+innocent admiration. A merry wedding breakfast.
+
+But if men and women could see through the walls of houses!
+
+Two doors off sat the wounded colonel alone, recruiting the small
+remnant of his sore tried strength, that he might struggle on to
+Beaurepaire, and lose in one moment years of separation, pain, prison,
+anguish, martyrdom, in one great gush of joy without compare.
+
+
+The wedding breakfast was ended. The time was drawing near to part.
+There was a silence. It was broken by Madame Raynal. She asked Raynal
+very timidly if he had reflected. "On what?" said he.
+
+"About taking me to Egypt."
+
+"No: I have not given it a thought since I said 'no.'"
+
+"Yet permit me to say that it is my duty to be by your side, my
+husband." And she colored at this word, being the first time she had
+ever used it. Raynal was silent. She murmured on, "I would not be an
+encumbrance to you, sir: I should not be useless. Gentlemen, I could add
+more to his comfort than he gives me credit for."
+
+Warm assent of the mayor and notary to this hint.
+
+"I give you credit for being an angel," said Raynal warmly.
+
+He hesitated. Rose was trembling, her fork shaking in her poor little
+hand.
+
+She cast a piteous glance at him. He saw it.
+
+"You shall go with me next time," said he. "Let us speak of it no more."
+
+Josephine bowed her head. "At least give me something to do for you
+while you are away. Tell me what I can do for my absent friend to show
+my gratitude, my regard, my esteem."
+
+"Well, let me think. I saw a plain gray dress at Beaurepaire."
+
+"Yes, monsieur. My gray silk, Rose."
+
+"I like that dress."
+
+"Do you? Then the moment I reach home after losing you I shall put it
+on, and it shall be my constant wear. I see; you are right; gray becomes
+a wife whose husband is not dead, but is absent, and alas! in hourly
+danger."
+
+"Now look at that!" cried Raynal to the company. "That is her all
+over: she can see six meanings where another would see but one. I never
+thought of that, I swear. I like modest colors, that is all. My mother
+used to be all for modest wives wearing modest colors."
+
+"I am of her mind, sir. Is there nothing more difficult you will be so
+good as give me to do?"
+
+"No; there is only one order more, and that will be easier still to such
+a woman as you. I commit to your care the name of Raynal. It is not
+so high a name as yours, but it is as honest. I am proud of it: I am
+jealous of it. I shall guard it for you in Egypt: you guard it in France
+for me."
+
+"With my life," cried Josephine, lifting her eyes and her hand to
+heaven.
+
+Soon after this Raynal ordered his charger.
+
+The baroness began to cry. "The young people may hope to see you again,"
+said she; "but there are two chances against your poor old mother."
+
+"Courage, mother!" cried the stout soldier. "No, no; you won't play me
+such a trick: once is enough for that game."
+
+"Brother!" cried Rose, "do not go without kissing your little sister,
+who loves you and thanks you." He kissed her. "Bravo, generous soul!"
+she cried, with her arms round his neck. "God protect you, and send you
+back safe to us!"
+
+"Amen!" cried all present by one impulse, even the cold notary.
+
+Raynal's mustache quivered. He kissed Josephine hastily on the brow, the
+baroness on both cheeks; shook the men's hands warmly but hastily, and
+strode out without looking behind him. He was moved for once.
+
+They all followed him to the door of the house. He was tightening his
+horse's girths. He flung himself with all the resolution of his steel
+nature into the saddle, and, with one grand wave of his cocked hat to
+the tearful group, he spurred away for Egypt.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+
+The baroness took the doctor a-shopping; she must buy Rose a gray silk.
+In doing this she saw many other tempting things. I say no more.
+
+But the young ladies went up to Beaurepaire in the other carriage, for
+Josephine wished to avoid the gaze of the town, and get home and be
+quiet. The driver went very fast. He had drunk the bride's health at the
+mayor's, item the bridegroom's, the bridesmaid's, the mayor's, etc.,
+and "a spur in the head is worth two in the heel," says the proverb.
+The sisters leaned back on the soft cushions, and enjoyed the smooth and
+rapid motion once so familiar to them, so rare of late.
+
+Then Rose took her sister gently to task for having offered to go to
+Egypt. She had forgotten her poor sister.
+
+"No, love," replied Josephine, "did you not see I dared not look towards
+you? I love you better than all the world; but this was my duty. I
+was his wife: I had no longer a feeble inclination and a feeble
+disinclination to decide between, but right on one side, wrong on the
+other."
+
+"Oh! I know where your ladyship's strength lies: my force is--in--my
+inclinations."
+
+"Yes, Rose," continued Josephine thoughtfully, "duty is a great comfort:
+it is so tangible; it is something to lay hold of for life or death; a
+strong tower for the weak but well disposed."
+
+Rose assented, and they were silent a minute; and when she spoke again
+it was to own she loved a carriage. "How fast we glide! Now lean back
+with me, and take my hand, and as we glide shut your eyes and think:
+whisper me all your feelings, every one of them."
+
+"Well, then," said Josephine, half closing her eyes, "in the first
+place I feel a great calm, a heavenly calm. My fate is decided. No more
+suspense. My duties are clear. I have a husband I am proud of. There is
+no perfidy with him, no deceit, no disingenuousness, no shade. He is a
+human sun. He will make me a better, truer woman, and I him a happier
+man. Yes, is it not nice to think that great and strong as he is I can
+teach him a happiness he knows not as yet?" And she smiled with the
+sense of her delicate power, but said no more; for she was not the one
+to talk much about herself. But Rose pressed her. "Yes, go on, dear,"
+she said, "I seem to see your pretty little thoughts rising out of your
+heart like a bubbling fountain: go on."
+
+Thus encouraged, Josephine thought on aloud, "And then, gratitude!" said
+she. "I have heard it said, or read it somewhere, that gratitude is a
+burden: I cannot understand that sentiment; why, to me gratitude is a
+delight, gratitude is a passion. It is the warmest of all the tender
+feelings I have for dear Monsieur Raynal. I feel it glow here, in my
+bosom. I think I shall love him as I ought long before he comes back."
+
+"BEFORE?"
+
+"Yes," murmured Josephine, her eyes still half closed. "His virtues
+will always be present to me. His little faults of manner will not be
+in sight. Good Raynal! The image of those great qualities I revere so,
+perhaps because I fail in them myself, will be before my mind; and ere
+he comes home I shall love him dearly. I'll tell you one reason why I
+wished to go home at once was--no--you must guess."
+
+"Guess?" said Rose, contemptuously. "As if I did not see it was to put
+on your gray silk."
+
+Josephine smiled assent, and said almost with fervor, "Good Raynal! I
+feel prouder of his honest name than of our noble one. And I am so calm,
+dear, thanks to you, so tranquil; so pleased that my mother's mind is at
+rest, so convinced all is for the best, so contented with my own lot; so
+hap--py."
+
+A gentle tear stole from beneath her long lashes. Rose looked at her
+wistfully: then laid her cheek to hers. They leaned back hand in hand,
+placid and silent.
+
+The carriage glided fast. Beaurepaire was almost in sight.
+
+Suddenly Josephine's hand tightened on Rose's, and she sat up in the
+carriage like a person awakened from a strange dream.
+
+"What is it?" asked Rose.
+
+"Some one in uniform."
+
+"Oh, is that all? Ah! you thought it was a message from Raynal."
+
+"Oh! no! on foot--walking very slowly. Coming this way, too. Coming
+this way!" and she became singularly restless, and looked round in the
+carriage. It was one of those old chariots with no side windows, but
+a peep hole at the back. This aperture, however, had a flap over it.
+Josephine undid the flap with nimble though agitated fingers; and
+saw--nothing. The road had taken a turn. "Oh," said Rose, carelessly,
+"for that matter the roads are full of soldiers just now."
+
+"Ay, but not of officers on foot."
+
+Rose gave her such a look, and for the first time this many a day spoke
+sternly to her, and asked her what on earth she had to do with uniforms
+or officers except one, the noblest in the world, her husband.
+
+A month ago that word was almost indifferent to Josephine, or rather she
+uttered it with a sort of mild complacency. Now she started at it, and
+it struck chill upon her. She did not reply, however, and the carriage
+rolled on.
+
+"He seemed to be dragging himself along." This was the first word
+Josephine had spoken for some time. "Oh, did he?" replied Rose
+carelessly; "well, let him. Here we are, at home."
+
+"I am glad of it," said Josephine, "very glad."
+
+On reaching Beaurepaire she wanted to go up-stairs at once and put on
+her gray gown. But the day was so delightful that Rose begged her to
+stroll in the Pleasaunce for half an hour and watch for their mother's
+return. She consented in an absent way, and presently began to walk very
+fast, unconscious of her companion. Rose laid a hand upon her playfully
+to moderate her, and found her skin burning.
+
+"Why, what is the matter?" said she, anxiously.
+
+"Nothing, nothing," was the sharp reply.
+
+"There's a fretful tone; and how excited you look, and feel too. Well, I
+thought you were unnaturally calm after such an event."
+
+"I only saw his back," said Josephine. "Did not you see him?"
+
+"See who? Oh, that tiresome officer. Why, how much more are we to hear
+about him? I don't believe there WAS one."
+
+At this moment a cocked hat came in sight, bobbing up and down above
+the palings that divided the park from the road. Josephine pointed to it
+without a word.
+
+Rose got a little cross at being practically confuted, and said coldly,
+"Come, let us go in; the only cocked hat we can see is on the way to
+Paris."
+
+Josephine assented eagerly. But she had not taken two steps towards the
+house ere she altered her mind, and said she felt faint, she wanted air;
+no, she should stay out a little longer. "Look, Rose," said she, in a
+strangely excited way, "what a shame! They put all manner of rubbish
+into this dear old tree: I will have it all turned out." And she looked
+with feigned interest into the tree: but her eyes seemed turned inward.
+
+Rose gave a cry of surprise. "He is waving his hat to me! What on earth
+does that mean?"
+
+"Perhaps he takes you for me," said Josephine.
+
+"Who is it? What do you mean?"
+
+"IT IS HE! I knew his figure at a glance." And she blushed and trembled
+with joy; she darted behind the tree and peered round at him unseen:
+turning round a moment she found Rose at her back pale and stern. She
+looked at her, and said with terrible simplicity, "Ah, Rose, I forgot."
+
+"Are you mad, Josephine? Into the house this moment; if it IS he, I will
+receive him and send him about his business."
+
+But Josephine stood fascinated, and pale as ashes; for now the cocked
+hat stopped, and a pale face with eyes whose eager fire shone even at
+that distance, rose above the palings. Josephine crouched behind Rose,
+and gasped out, "Something terrible is coming, terrible! terrible!"
+
+"Say something hateful," said Rose, trembling in her turn, but only with
+anger. "The heartless selfish traitor! He never notices you till you are
+married to the noblest of mankind; and then he comes here directly to
+ruin your peace. No; I have altered my mind. He shall not see you, of
+course; but YOU shall hear HIM. I'll soon make you know the wretch and
+loathe him as I do. There, now he has turned the corner; hide in the
+oak while he is out of sight. Hide, quick, quick." Josephine obeyed
+mechanically; and presently, through that very aperture whence her
+sister had smiled on her lover she hissed out, in a tone of which one
+would not have thought her capable, "Be wise, be shrewd; find out who is
+the woman that has seduced him from me, and has brought two wretches to
+this. I tell you it is some wicked woman's doing. He loved me once."
+
+"Not so loud!--one word: you are a wife. Swear to me you will not let
+him see you, come what may."
+
+"Oh! never! never!" cried Josephine with terror. "I would rather die.
+When you have heard what he has to say, then tell him I am dead. No,
+tell him I adore my husband, and went to Egypt this day with him. Ah!
+would to God I had!"
+
+"Sh! sh!"
+
+"Sh!"
+
+Camille was at the little gate.
+
+Rose stood still, and nerved herself in silence. Josephine panted in her
+hiding-place.
+
+Rose's only thought now was to expose the traitor to her sister, and
+restore her peace. She pretended not to see Camille till he was near
+her. He came eagerly towards her, his pale face flushing with great joy,
+and his eyes like diamonds.
+
+"Josephine! It is not Josephine, after all," said he. "Why, this must be
+Rose, little Rose, grown up to a fine lady, a beautiful lady."
+
+"What do you come here for, sir?" asked Rose in a tone of icy
+indifference.
+
+"What do I come here for? is that the way to speak to me? but I am too
+happy to mind. Dear Beaurepaire! do I see you once again!"
+
+"And madame?"
+
+"What madame?"
+
+"Madame Dujardin that is or was to be."
+
+"This is the first I have ever heard of her," said Camille, gayly.
+
+"This is odd, for we have heard all about it."
+
+"Are you jesting?"
+
+"No."
+
+"If I understand you right, you imply that I have broken faith with
+Josephine?"
+
+"Certainly."
+
+"Then you lie, Mademoiselle Rose de Beaurepaire."
+
+"Insolent!"
+
+"No. It is you who have insulted your sister as well as me. She was not
+made to be deserted for meaner women. Come, mademoiselle, affront me,
+and me alone, and you shall find me more patient. Oh! who would have
+thought Beaurepaire would receive me thus?"
+
+"It is your own fault. You never sent her a line for all these years."
+
+"Why, how could I?"
+
+"Well, sir, the information you did not supply others did. We know that
+you were seen in a Spanish village drinking between two guerillas."
+
+"That is true," said Camille.
+
+"An honest French soldier fired at you. Why, he told us so himself."
+
+"He told you true," said Camille, sullenly. "The bullet grazed my hand;
+see, here is the mark. Look!" She did look, and gave a little scream;
+but recovering herself, said she wished it had gone through his heart.
+"Why prolong this painful interview?" said she; "the soldier told us
+all."
+
+"I doubt that," said Camille. "Did he tell you that under the table I
+was chained tight down to the chair I sat in? Did he tell you that my
+hand was fastened to a drinking-horn, and my elbow to the table, and two
+fellows sitting opposite me with pistols quietly covering me, ready to
+draw the trigger if I should utter a cry? Did he tell you that I would
+have uttered that cry and died at that table but for one thing, I had
+promised her to live?"
+
+"Not he; he told me nothing so incredible. Besides, what became of you
+all these years? You are a double traitor, to your country and to her."
+
+Camille literally gasped for breath. "You are a most cruel young lady
+to insult me so," said he, and scalding tears forced themselves from his
+eyes.
+
+Rose eyed him with merciless scorn.
+
+He fought manfully against this weakness, with which his wound and his
+fatigue had something to do, as well as Rose's bitter words; and after
+a gallant struggle he returned her her haughty stare, and addressed her
+thus: "Mademoiselle, I feel myself blush, but it is for you I blush, not
+for myself. This is what BECAME of me. I went out alone to explore; I
+fell into an ambuscade; I shot one of the enemy, and pinked another,
+but my arm being broken by a bullet, and my horse killed under me, the
+rascals got me. They took me about, tried to make a decoy of me as I
+have told you, and ended by throwing me into a dungeon. They loaded me
+with chains, too, though the walls were ten feet thick, and the door
+iron, and bolted and double-bolted outside. And there for months and
+years, in spite of wounds, hunger, thirst, and all the tortures those
+cowards made me suffer, I lived, because, Rose, I had promised some one
+at that gate there (and he turned suddenly and pointed to it) that I
+would come back alive. At last, one night, my jailer came to my
+cell drunk. I seized him by the throat and throttled him till he was
+insensible; his keys unlocked my fetters, and locked him in the cell,
+and I got safely outside. But there a sentinel saw me, and fired at
+me. He missed me but ran after me, and caught me. You see I was stiff,
+confined so long. He gave me a thrust of his bayonet; I flung my heavy
+keys fiercely in his face; he staggered; I wrested his piece from him,
+and disabled him."
+
+"Ah!"
+
+"I crossed the frontier in the night, and got to Bayonne; and thence,
+day and night, to Paris. There I met a reward for all my anguish. They
+gave me the epaulets of a colonel. See, here they are. France does not
+give these to traitors, young lady." He held them out to her in both
+hands. She eyed them half stupidly; all her thoughts were on the
+oak-tree hard by. She began to shudder. Camille was telling the truth.
+She felt that; she saw it; and Josephine was hearing it. "Ay! look at
+them, you naughty girl," said Camille, trying to be jocose over it all
+with his poor trembling lip. He went on to say that from the moment he
+had left dark Spain, and entered fair France everybody was so kind, so
+sympathizing. "They felt for the poor worn soldier coming back to his
+love. All but you, Rose. You told me I was a traitor to her and to
+France."
+
+"I was told so," said Rose, faintly. She was almost at her wits' end
+what to say or do.
+
+"Well, are you sorry or not sorry for saying such a cruel thing to a
+poor fellow?"
+
+"Sorry, very sorry," whispered Rose. She could not persist in injustice,
+yet she did not want Josephine to hear.
+
+"Then say no more about it; there's my hand. You are not a soldier, and
+did not know what you were talking about."
+
+"I am very sorry I spoke so harshly to you. But you understand. How you
+look; how you pant."
+
+"There, I will show you I forgive you. These epaulets, dear, I have
+never put them on. I said, no; Josephine shall put them on for me. I
+will take honor as well as happiness from her dear hand. But you are her
+sister, and what are epaulets compared with what she will give me? You
+shall put them on, dear. Come, then you will be sure I bear no malice."
+
+Rose, faint at heart, consented in silence, and fastened on the
+epaulets. "Yes, Camille!" she cried, with sudden terror, "think of
+glory, now; nothing but glory."
+
+"No one thinks of it more. But to-day how can I think of it, how can I
+give her a rival? To-day I am all love. Rose, no man ever loved a human
+creature as I love Josephine. Your mother is well, dear? All are well
+at Beaurepaire? Oh, where is she all this time? in the house?" He was
+moving quickly towards the house; but Rose instinctively put out her
+hand to stop him. He recoiled a little and winced.
+
+"What is the matter?" cried she.
+
+"Nothing, dear girl; you put your hand on my wound, that is all. What is
+that noise in the tree? Anybody listening to us?"
+
+"I'll see," said Rose, with all a woman's wit, and whipped hastily
+round to hinder Camille from going. She found Josephine white as death,
+apparently fainting, and clutching at the tree convulsively with her
+nails. Such was the intensity of the situation that she left her beloved
+sister in that piteous state, and even hoped she would faint dead away,
+and so hear no more. She came back white, and told Camille it was only a
+bird got into the tree. "And to think you should be wounded," said she,
+to divert his attention from the tree.
+
+"Yes," said he, "and it is rather inflamed, and has worried me all the
+way. You need not go telling Josephine, though. They wanted me to stop
+and lay up at Bayonne. How could I? And again at Paris. How could I?
+They said, 'You will die.'--'Not before I get to Beaurepaire,' said I.
+I could bear the motion of a horse no longer, so at the nearest town I
+asked for a carriage. Would you believe it? both his carriages were
+OUT AT A WEDDING. I could not wait till they came back. I had waited an
+eternity. I came on foot. I dragged my self along; the body was weak,
+but the heart was strong. A little way from here my wound seemed
+inclined to open. I pressed it together tight with my hand; you see I
+could not afford to lose any more blood, and so struggled on. 'Die?'
+said I, 'not before Beaurepaire.' And, O Rose! now I could be content to
+die--at her feet; for I am happy. Oh! I am happy beyond words to utter.
+What I have gone through! But I kept my word, and this is Beaurepaire.
+Hurrah!" and his pale cheek flushed, and his eye gleamed, and he waved
+his hat feebly over his head, "hurrah! hurrah! hurrah!"
+
+"Oh, don't!--don't!--don't!" cried Rose wild with pity and dismay.
+
+"How can I help?--I am mad with joy--hurrah! hurrah! hurrah!"
+
+"No! no! no! no! no!"
+
+"What is the matter?"
+
+"And must I stab you worse than all your enemies have stabbed you?"
+sighed Rose, and tears of womanly pity now streamed down her cheeks.
+
+Camille's mind began to misgive him. What was become of Josephine? she
+did not appear. He faltered out, "Your mother is well; all are well
+I hope. Oh, where is she?" and receiving no reply, began to tremble
+visibly with the fear of some terrible calamity.
+
+Rose, with a sister fainting close by, and this poor lover trembling
+before her, lost all self-command, and began to wring her hands and cry
+wildly. "Camille," she almost screamed, "there is but one thing for you
+to do; leave Beaurepaire on the instant: fly from it; it is no place for
+you."
+
+"She is dead," said Camille, very quietly.
+
+When he said that, with an unnatural and monotonous calm such as
+precedes deliberate suicide, it flashed in one moment across Rose that
+it was much best he should think so.
+
+She did not reply; but she drooped her head and let him think it.
+
+"She would have come to me ere this if she was alive," said he. "You
+are all in white: they mourn in white for angels like her, that go to
+heaven, virgins. Oh! I was blind. You might have told me at once; you
+see I can bear it. What does it matter to one who loves as I love? It is
+only to give her one more proof I lived only for her. I would have died
+a hundred times but for my promise to her. Yes, I am coming, love; I am
+coming."
+
+He fell on his knees and smiled, and whispered, "I am coming, Josephine,
+I am coming."
+
+A sob and a moan as of a creature dying in anguish answered him.
+
+Rose screamed with terror when she heard it.
+
+Camille rose to his feet, awestruck. "That was her voice, behind this
+tree," he whispered.
+
+"No, no," cried Rose; "it was me."
+
+But at that moment a rustle and a rush was heard of some one darting out
+of the tree.
+
+Camille darted furiously round it in the same direction. Rose tried to
+stop him, but was too late. The next moment Raynal's wife was in his
+arms.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+
+Josephine wrestled long and terribly with nature in that old oak-tree.
+But who can so struggle forever? Anguish, remorse, horror, despair, and
+love wrenched her to and fro; and O mysterious human heart! gleams of
+a mad fitful joy shot through her, coming quick as lightning, going as
+quickly, and leaving the despair darker. And then the fierce struggle of
+the soul to make itself heard! More than once she had to close her mouth
+with her hand: more than once she seized her throat not to cry out. But
+as the struggle endured, she got weaker and weaker, and nature mightier
+and mightier. And when the wounded hero fell on his knees so close to
+her; when he who had resisted death so bravely for her, prepared to give
+up life calmly for her, her bosom rose beyond all control: it seemed to
+fill to choking, then to split wide open and give the struggling soul
+passage in one gasping sob and heart-stricken cry. Could she have pent
+this in she must have died.
+
+It betrayed her. She felt it had: so then came the woman's
+instinct--flight: the coward's impulse--flight: the chaste wife's
+inspiration--flight. She rushed from her hiding-place and made wildly
+for the house.
+
+But, unluckily, Camille was at that moment darting round the tree: she
+ran right into the danger she meant to flee. He caught her in his arms.
+He held her irresistibly. "I have got her; I have got her," he shouted
+in wild triumph. "No! I will not let you go. None but God shall ever
+take you from me, and he has spared you to me. You are not dead: you
+have kept faith as I have: you have lived. See! look at me. I am alive,
+I am well, I am happy. I told Rose that I suffered. If I had suffered
+I should remember it. It is all gone at sight of you, my love! my love!
+Oh, my Josephine! my love!"
+
+His arm was firm round her waist. His glowing eyes poured love upon her.
+She felt his beating heart.
+
+All that passed in her then, what mortal can say? She seemed two women:
+that part of her which could not get away from his strong arm lost all
+strength to resist, it yielded and thrilled under his embrace, her bosom
+heaving madly: all that was free writhed away from him; her face was
+averted with a glare of terror, and both her hands put up between his
+eyes and it.
+
+"You turn away your head. Rose, she turns away. Speak for me. Scold her;
+for I don't know how to scold her. No answer from either; oh, what has
+turned your hearts against me so?"
+
+"Camille," cried Rose--the tears streaming down her cheeks--"my poor
+Camille! leave Beaurepaire. Oh, leave it at once."
+
+Returned towards her with a look of inquiry.
+
+At that Josephine, like some feeble but nimble wild creature on whom
+a grasp has relaxed, writhed away from him and got free: "Farewell!
+Farewell!" she cried, in despair's own voice, and made swiftly for the
+house.
+
+Camille stood aghast, and did not follow her.
+
+Now ere she had gone many steps who should meet her right in front but
+Jacintha.
+
+"Madame Raynal, the baroness's carriage is just in sight. I thought
+you'd like to know." Then she bawled proudly to Rose, "I was the first
+to call her madame;" and off went Jacintha convinced she had done
+something very clever.
+
+This blow turned those three to stone.
+
+Josephine had no longer the power or the wish to fly. "Better so," she
+thought, and she stood cowering.
+
+The great passions that had spoken so loud were struck dumb, and a deep
+silence fell upon the place. Madame Raynal's quivering eye turned slowly
+and askant towards Camille, but stopped in terror ere it could see him.
+For she knew by this fearful stillness that the truth was creeping on
+Camille. And so did Rose.
+
+At last Camille spoke one word in a low whisper.
+
+"Madame?"
+
+Dead silence.
+
+"White? both in white?"
+
+Rose came between him and Josephine, and sobbed out, "Camille, it was
+our doing. We drove her to it. O sir, look how afraid of you she is. Do
+not reproach her, if you are a man."
+
+He waved her out of his way as if she had been some idle feather, and
+almost staggered up to Josephine.
+
+"It is for you to speak, my betrothed: are you married?"
+
+The poor creature, true to her nature, was thinking more of him than
+herself. Even in her despair it flashed across her, "If he knew all, he
+too would be wretched for life. If I let him think ill of me he may be
+happy one day." She cowered the picture of sorrow and tongue-tied guilt.
+
+"Are you a wife?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+He winced and quivered as if a bullet had pierced him.
+
+"This is how I came to be suspected; she I loved was false."
+
+"Yes, Camille."
+
+"No, no!" cried Rose; "don't believe HER: she never suspected you. We
+have brought her to this, we alone."
+
+"Be silent, Rose! oh, be silent!" gasped Josephine.
+
+"I lived for you: I would have died for you; you could not even wait for
+me."
+
+A low moan, but not a word of excuse.
+
+"What can I do for you now?"
+
+"Forget me, Camille," said she despairingly, doggedly.
+
+"Forget you? never, never! there is but one thing I can do to show you
+how I loved you: I will forgive you, and begone. Whither shall I go?
+whither shall I go now?"
+
+"Camile, your words stab her."
+
+"Let none speak but I," said Camille; "none but I have the right to
+speak. Poor weak angel that loved yet could not wait: I forgive you. Be
+happy, if you can; I bid you be hap-py."
+
+The quiet, despairing tones died away, and with them life seemed to end
+to her, and hope to go out. He turned his back quickly on her. He cried
+hoarsely, "To the army! Back to the army, and a soldier's grave!"
+Then with a prodigious effort he drew himself haughtily up in marching
+attitude. He took three strides, erect and fiery and bold.
+
+At the next something seemed to snap asunder in the great heart, and the
+worn body that heart had held up so long, rolled like a dead log upon
+the ground with a tremendous fall.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+
+The baroness and Aubertin were just getting out of their carriage, when
+suddenly they heard shrieks of terror in the Pleasaunce. They came with
+quaking hearts as fast as their old limbs would carry them. They found
+Rose and Josephine crouched over the body of a man, an officer.
+
+Rose was just tearing open his collar and jacket. Dard and Jacintha had
+run from the kitchen at the screams. Camille lay on his back, white and
+motionless.
+
+The doctor was the first to come up. "Who! what is this? I seem to know
+his face." Then shaking his head, "Whoever it is, it is a bad case.
+Stand away, ladies. Let me feel his pulse."
+
+Whilst the old man was going stiffly down on one knee, Jacintha uttered
+a cry of terror. "See, see! his shirt! that red streak! Ah, ah! it is
+getting bigger and bigger:" and she turned faint in a moment, and would
+have fallen but for Dard.
+
+The doctor looked. "All the better," said he firmly. "I thought he
+was dead. His blood flows; then I will save him. Don't clutch me so,
+Josephine; don't cling to me like that. Now is the time to show your
+breed: not turn sick at the sight of a little blood, like that foolish
+creature, but help me save him."
+
+"Take him in-doors," cried the baroness.
+
+"Into our house, mamma?" gasped Rose; "no, no."
+
+"What," said the baroness, "a wounded soldier who has fought for France!
+leave him to lie and die outside my door: what would my son say to that?
+He is a soldier himself."
+
+Rose cast a hasty look at Josephine. Josephine's eyes were bent on the
+ground, and her hands clenched and trembling.
+
+"Now, Jacintha, you be off," said the doctor. "I can't have cowards
+about him to make the others as bad. Go and stew down a piece of good
+beef for him. Stew it in red wine and water."
+
+"That I will: poor thing!"
+
+"Why, I know him," said the baroness suddenly; "it is an old
+acquaintance, young Dujardin: you remember, Josephine. I used to suspect
+him of a fancy for you, poor fellow! Why, he must have come here to see
+us, poor soul."
+
+"No matter who it is; it is a man. Now, girls, have you courage, have
+you humanity? Then come one on each side of him and take hands beneath
+his back, while I lift his head and Dard his legs."
+
+"And handle him gently whatever you do," said Dard. "I know what it is
+to be wounded."
+
+These four carried the lifeless burden very slowly and gently across the
+Pleasaunce to the house, then with more difficulty and caution up the
+stairs.
+
+All the while the sisters' hands griped one another tight beneath the
+lifeless burden, and spoke to one another. And Josephine's arm upheld
+tenderly but not weakly the hero she had struck down. She avoided Rose's
+eye, her mother's, and even the doctor's: one gasping sob escaped her as
+she walked with head half averted, and vacant, terror-stricken eyes, and
+her victim on her sustaining arm.
+
+The doctor selected the tapestried chamber for him as being most airy.
+Then he ordered the women out, and with Dard's help undressed the still
+insensible patient.
+
+Josephine sat down on the stairs in gloomy silence, her eyes on the
+ground, like one waiting for her deathblow.
+
+Rose, sick at heart, sat silent too at some distance. At last she said
+faintly, "Have we done well?"
+
+"I don't know," said Josephine doggedly. Her eyes never left the ground.
+
+"We could not let him die for want of care."
+
+"He will not thank us. Better for him to die than live. Better for me."
+
+At this instant Dard came running down. "Good news, mesdemoiselles, good
+news! the wound runs all along; it is not deep, like mine was. He has
+opened his eyes and shut them again. The dear good doctor stopped the
+blood in a twinkle. The doctor says he'll be bound to save him. I must
+run and tell Jacintha. She is taking on in the kitchen."
+
+Josephine, who had risen eagerly from her despairing posture, clasped
+her hands together, then lifted up her voice and wept. "He will live! he
+will live!"
+
+When she had wept a long while, she said to Rose, "Come, sister, help
+your poor Josephine."
+
+"Yes, love, what shall we do?"
+
+"My duty," faltered Josephine. "An hour ago it seemed so sweet," and
+she fell to weeping patiently again. They went to Josephine's room. She
+crept slowly to a wardrobe, and took out a gray silk dress.
+
+"Oh, never mind for to-day," cried Rose.
+
+"Help me, Rose. It is for myself as well; to remind me every moment I am
+Madame Raynal."
+
+They put the gray gown on her, both weeping patiently. It will be known
+at the last day, all that honest women have suffered weeping silently in
+this noisy world.
+
+
+Camille soon recovered his senses and a portion of his strength: then
+the irritation of his wound brought on fever. This in turn retired
+before the doctor's remedies and a sound constitution, but it left
+behind it a great weakness and general prostration. And in this state
+the fate of the body depends greatly on the mind.
+
+The baroness and the doctor went constantly to see him, and soothe him:
+he smiled and thanked them, but his eager eyes watched the door for one
+who came not.
+
+When he got well enough to leave his bed the largest couch was sent up
+to him from the saloon; a kind hand lined the baron's silk dressing-gown
+for him warm and soft and nice; and he would sit or lie on his couch, or
+take two turns in the room leaning upon Rose's shoulder, and glad of the
+support; and he looked piteously in her eyes when she came and when she
+went. Rose looked down; she could do nothing, she could say nothing.
+
+With his strength, Camille lost a portion of his pride: he pined for a
+sight of her he no longer respected; pined for her, as the thirsty pine
+for water in Sahara.
+
+At last one day he spoke out. "How kind you are to me, Rose! how kind
+you all are--but one."
+
+He waited in hopes she would say something, but she held her tongue.
+
+"At least tell me why it is. Is she ashamed? Is she afraid?"
+
+"Neither."
+
+"She hates me: it is true, then, that we hate those whom we have
+wounded. Cruel, cruel Josephine! Oh, heart of marble against which my
+heart has wrecked itself forever!"
+
+"No, no! She is anything but cruel: but she is Madame Raynal."
+
+"Ah! I forgot. But have I no claim on her? Nearly four years she has
+been my betrothed. What have I done? Was I ever false to her? I could
+forgive her for what she has done to me, but she cannot forgive me. Does
+she mean never to see me again?"
+
+"Ask yourself what good could come of it."
+
+"Very well," said Camille, with a malicious smile. "I am in her way. I
+see what she wants; she shall have it."
+
+Rose carried these words to Josephine. They went through her like a
+sword.
+
+Rose pitied her. Rose had a moment's weakness.
+
+"Let us go to him," she said; "anything is better than this."
+
+"Rose, I dare not," was the wise reply.
+
+But the next day early, Josephine took Rose to a door outside the house,
+a door that had long been disused. Nettles grew before it. She produced
+a key and with great difficulty opened this door. It led to the
+tapestried chamber, and years ago they used to steal up it and peep into
+the room.
+
+Rose scarcely needed to be told that she was to watch Camille, and
+report to her. In truth, it was a mysterious, vague protection against
+a danger equally mysterious. Yet it made Josephine easier. But so
+unflinching was her prudence that she never once could be prevailed on
+to mount those stairs, and peep at Camille herself. "I must starve my
+heart, not feed it," said she. And she grew paler and more hollow-eyed
+day by day.
+
+Yet this was the same woman who showed such feebleness and irresolution
+when Raynal pressed her to marry him. But then dwarfs feebly drew
+her this way and that. Now giants fought for her. Between a feeble
+inclination and a feeble disinclination her dead heart had drifted
+to and fro. Now honor, duty, gratitude,--which last with her was a
+passion,--dragged her one way: love, pity, and remorse another.
+
+Not one of these giants would relax his grasp, and nothing yielded
+except her vital powers. Yes; her temper, one of the loveliest Heaven
+ever gave a human creature, was soured at times.
+
+Was it a wonder? There lay the man she loved pining for her; cursing her
+for her cruelty, and alternately praying Heaven to forgive him and to
+bless her: sighing, at intervals, all the day long, so loud, so deep, so
+piteously, as if his heart broke with each sigh; and sometimes, for he
+little knew, poor soul, that any human eye was upon him, casting aside
+his manhood in his despair, and flinging himself on the very floor, and
+muffling his head, and sobbing; he a hero.
+
+And here was she pining in secret for him who pined for her? "I am not a
+woman at all," said she, who was all woman. "I am crueller to him than a
+tiger or any savage creature is to the victim she tears. I must cure him
+of his love for me; and then die; for what shall I have to live for? He
+weeps, he sighs, he cries for Josephine."
+
+Her enforced cruelty was more contrary to this woman's nature than black
+is to white, or heat to cold, and the heart rebelled furiously at times.
+As when a rock tries to stem a current, the water fights its way on more
+sides than one, so insulted nature dealt with Josephine. Not only did
+her body pine, but her nerves were exasperated. Sudden twitches came
+over her, that almost made her scream. Her permanent state was utter
+despondency, but across it came fitful flashes of irritation; and then
+she was scarce mistress of herself.
+
+Wherefore you, who find some holy woman cross and bitter, stop a moment
+before you sum her up vixen and her religion naught: inquire the history
+of her heart: perhaps beneath the smooth cold surface of duties well
+discharged, her life has been, or even is, a battle against some
+self-indulgence the insignificant saint's very blood cries out for: and
+so the poor thing is cross, not because she is bad, but because she is
+better than the rest of us; yet only human.
+
+Now though Josephine was more on her guard with the baroness than with
+Rose, or the doctor, or Jacintha, her state could not altogether escape
+the vigilance of a mother's eye.
+
+But the baroness had not the clew we have; and what a difference that
+makes! How small an understanding, put by accident or instruction on the
+right track, shall run the game down! How great a sagacity shall wander
+if it gets on a false scent!
+
+"Doctor," said the baroness one day, "you are so taken up with your
+patient you neglect the rest of us. Do look at Josephine! She is ill,
+or going to be ill. She is so pale, and so fretful, so peevish, which is
+not in her nature. Would you believe it, doctor, she snaps?"
+
+"Our Josephine snap? This is new."
+
+"And snarls."
+
+"Then look for the end of the world."
+
+"The other day I heard her snap Rose: and this morning she half snarled
+at me, just because I pressed her to go and console our patient. Hush!
+here she is. My child, I am accusing you to the doctor. I tell him you
+neglect his patient: never go near him."
+
+"I will visit him one of these days," said Josephine, coldly.
+
+"One of these days," said the baroness, shocked. "You used not to be so
+hard-hearted. A soldier, an old comrade of your husband's, wounded
+and sick, and you alone never go to him, to console him with a word of
+sympathy or encouragement."
+
+Josephine looked at her mother with a sort of incredulous stare. Then,
+after a struggle, she replied with a tone and manner so spiteful and icy
+that it would have deceived even us who know her had we heard it. "He
+has plenty of nurses without me." She added, almost violently, "My
+husband, if he were wounded, would not have so many, perhaps not have
+one."
+
+With this she rose and went out, leaving them aghast. She sat down in
+the passage on a window-seat, and laughed hysterically. Rose heard her
+and ran to her. Josephine told her what her mother had said to her.
+Rose soothed her. "Never mind, you have your sister who understands you:
+don't you go back till they have got some other topic."
+
+Rose out of curiosity went in, and found a discussion going on. The
+doctor was fathoming Josephine, for the benefit of his companion.
+
+"It is a female jealousy, and of a mighty innocent kind. We are so taken
+up with this poor fellow, she thinks her soldier is forgotten."
+
+"Surely, doctor, our Josephine would not be so unreasonable, so unjust,"
+suggested her mother.
+
+"She belongs to a sex, be it said without offending you, madame, among
+whose numberless virtues justice does not fill a prominent place."
+
+The baroness shook her head. "That is not it. It is a piece of prudery.
+This young gentleman was a sort of admirer of hers, though she did not
+admire him much, as far as I remember. But it was four years ago; and
+she is married to a man she loves, or is going to love."
+
+"Well, but, mamma, a trifling excess of delicacy is surely excusable."
+This from Rose.
+
+"No, no; it is not delicacy; it is prudery. And when people are sick and
+suffering, an honest woman should take up her charity and lay down her
+prudery, or her coquetry: two things that I suspect are the same thing
+in different shapes."
+
+Here Jacintha came in. "Mademoiselle, here is the colonel's broth;
+Madame Raynal has flavored it for him, and you are to take it up to him,
+and keep him company while he eats it."
+
+"Come," cried the baroness, "my lecture has not been lost."
+
+Rose followed Jacintha up-stairs.
+
+Rose was heart and head on Raynal's side.
+
+She had deceived him about Josephine's attachment, and felt all the more
+desirous to guard him against any ill consequences of it. Then he had
+been so generous to her: he had left her her sister, who would have gone
+to Egypt, and escaped this misery, but for her.
+
+But on the other hand,
+
+                                         --Gentle pity
+     Tugged at her heartstrings with complaining cries.
+
+This watching of Camille saddened even her. When she was with him his
+pride bore him up: but when he was alone as he thought, his anguish and
+despair were terrible, and broke out in so many ways that often Rose
+shrank in terror from her peep hole.
+
+She dared not tell Josephine the half of what she saw: what she did tell
+her agitated her so terribly: and often Rose had it on the tip of her
+tongue to say, "Do pray go and see if you can say nothing that will
+do him good;" but she fought the impulse down. This battle of feeling,
+though less severe than her sister's, was constant; it destroyed her
+gayety. She, whose merry laugh used to ring like chimes through the
+house, never laughed now, seldom smiled, and often sighed.
+
+Dr. Aubertin was the last to succumb to the deep depression, but his
+time came: and he had been for a day or two as grave and as sad as the
+rest, when one day that Rose was absent, spying on Camille, he took the
+baroness and Josephine into his confidence; and condescended finally to
+ask their advice.
+
+"It is humiliating," said he, "after all my experience, to be obliged to
+consult unprofessional persons. Forty years ago I should have been TOO
+WISE to do so. But since then I have often seen science baffled and
+untrained intelligences throw light upon hard questions: and your sex
+in particular has luminous instincts and reads things by flashes that
+we men miss with a microscope. Our dear Madame Raynal suspected that
+plausible notary, and to this day I believe she could not tell us why."
+
+Josephine admitted as much very frankly.
+
+"There you see," said the doctor. "Well, then, you must help me in this
+case. And this time I promise to treat your art with more respect."
+
+"And pray who is it she is to read now?" asked the baroness.
+
+"Who should it be but my poor patient? He puzzles me. I never knew a
+patient so faint-hearted."
+
+"A soldier faint-hearted!" exclaimed the baroness. "To be sure these men
+that storm cities, and fire cannon, and cut and hack one another with so
+much spirit, are poor creatures compared with us when they have to lie
+quiet and suffer."
+
+The doctor walked the room in great excitement. "It is not his wound
+that is killing him, there's something on his mind. You, Josephine,
+with your instincts do help me: do pray, for pity's sake, throw off that
+sublime indifference you have manifested all along to this man's fate."
+
+"She has not," cried the baroness, firing up. "Did I not see her lining
+his dressing-gown for him? and she inspects everything that he eats: do
+you not?"
+
+"Yes, mother." She then suggested in a faltering voice that time would
+cure the patient, and time alone.
+
+"Time! you speak as if time was a quality: time is only a measure of
+events, favorable or unfavorable; it kills as many as it cures."
+
+"Why, you surely would not imply his life is in any danger?" This was
+the baroness.
+
+"Madame, if the case was not grave, should I take this unusual step? I
+tell you if some change does not take place soon, he will be a dead man
+in another fortnight. That is all TIME will do for him."
+
+The baroness uttered an exclamation of pity and distress. Josephine put
+her hand to her bosom, and a creeping horror came over her, and then a
+faintness. She sat working mechanically, and turning like ice within.
+After a few minutes of this, she rose with every appearance of external
+composure and left the room. In the passage she met Rose coming hastily
+towards the salon laughing: the first time she had laughed this many a
+day. Oh, what a contrast between the two faces that met there--the one
+pale and horror stricken, the other rosy and laughing!
+
+"Well, dear, at last I am paid for all my trouble, and yours, by a
+discovery; he never drinks a drop of his medicine; he pours it into the
+ashes under the grate; I caught him in the fact."
+
+"Then this is too much: I can resist no longer. Come with me," said
+Josephine doggedly.
+
+"Where?"
+
+"To him."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+
+Josephine paused on the landing, and laid her hand on Rose's shoulder.
+It was so cold it made Rose shudder, and exacted a promise from her not
+to contradict a word she should say to Camille. "I do not go to him for
+my pleasure, but for his life," she said; "I must deceive him and save
+him; and then let me lie down and die."
+
+"Oh, that the wretch had never been born!" cried Rose, in despair.
+But she gave the required promise, and offered to go and tell Camille
+Josephine was coming to visit him.
+
+But Josephine declined this. "No," said she; "give me every advantage; I
+must think beforehand every word I shall say; but take him by surprise,
+coward and doubleface that I am."
+
+Rose knocked at the door. A faint voice said, "Come in." The sisters
+entered the room very softly. Camille sat on the sofa, his head bowed
+over his hands. A glance showed Josephine that he was doggedly and
+resolutely thrusting himself into the grave. Thinking it was only
+Rose--for he had now lost all hope of seeing Josephine come in at the
+door--he never moved. Some one glided gently but rapidly up to him. He
+looked up. Josephine was kneeling to him.
+
+He lifted his head with a start, and trembled all over.
+
+She whispered, "I am come to you to beg your pity; to appeal to your
+generosity; to ask a favor; I who deserve so little of you."
+
+"You have waited a long time," said Camille, agitated greatly; "and so
+have I."
+
+"Camille, you are torturing one who loved you once, and who has been
+very weak and faithless, but not so wicked as she appears."
+
+"How am I torturing you?"
+
+"With remorse; do I not suffer enough? Would you make me a murderess?"
+
+"Why have you never been near me?" retorted Camille. "I could forgive
+your weakness, but not your heartlessness."
+
+"It is my duty. I have no right to seek your society. If you really want
+mine, you have only to get well, and so join us down-stairs a week or
+two before you leave us."
+
+"How am I to get well? My heart is broken."
+
+"Camille, be a man. Do not fling away a soldier's life because a fickle,
+worthless woman could not wait for you. Forgive me like a man, or else
+revenge yourself like a man. If you cannot forgive me, kill me. See, I
+kneel at your feet. I will not resist you. Kill me."
+
+"I wish I could. Oh! if I could kill you with a look and myself with a
+wish! No man should ever take you from me, then. We would be together in
+the grave at this hour. Do not tempt me, I say;" and he cast a terrible
+look of love, and hatred, and despair upon her. Her purple eye never
+winced; it poured back tenderness and affection in return. He saw and
+turned away with a groan, and held out his hand to her. She seized it
+and kissed it. "You are great, you are generous; you will not strike me
+as a woman strikes; you will not die to drive me to despair."
+
+"I see," said he, more gently, "love is gone, but pity remains. I
+thought that was gone, too."
+
+"Yes, Camille," said Josephine, in a whisper, "pity remains, and remorse
+and terror at what I have done to a man of whom I was never worthy."
+
+"Well, madame, as you have come at last to me, and even do me the
+honor to ask me a favor--I shall try--if only out of courtesy--to--ah,
+Josephine! Josephine! when did I ever refuse you anything?"
+
+At this Josephine sank into a chair, and burst out crying. Camille, at
+this, began to cry too; and the two poor things sat a long way from one
+another, and sobbed bitterly.
+
+The man, weakened as he was, recovered his quiet despair first.
+
+"Don't cry so," said he. "But tell me what is your will, and I shall
+obey you as I used before any one came between us."
+
+"Then, live, Camille. I implore you to live."
+
+"Well, Josephine, since you care about it, I will try and live. Why did
+not you come before and ask me? I thought I was in your way. I thought
+you wanted me dead."
+
+Josephine cast a look of wonder and anguish on Camille, but she said
+nothing. She rang the bell, and, on Jacintha coming up, despatched her
+to Dr. Aubertin for the patient's medicine.
+
+"Tell the doctor," said she, "Colonel Dujardin has let fall the glass."
+While Jacintha was gone, she scolded Camille gently. "How could you be
+so unkind to the poor doctor who loves you so? Only think: to throw away
+his medicines! Look at the ashes; they are wet. Camille, are you, too,
+becoming disingenuous?"
+
+Jacintha came in with the tonic in a glass, and retired with an
+obeisance. Josephine took it to Camille.
+
+"Drink with me, then," said he, "or I will not touch it." Josephine took
+the glass. "I drink to your health, Camille, and to your glory; laurels
+to your brow, and some faithful woman to your heart, who will make you
+forget this folly: it is for her I am saving you." She put the glass
+with well-acted spirit to her lips; but in the very action a spasm
+seized her throat and almost choked her; she lowered her head that he
+might not see her face, and tried again; but the tears burst from her
+eyes and ran into the liquid, and her lips trembled over the brim, and
+were paralyzed.
+
+"No, no! give it me!" he cried; "there is a tear of yours in it." He
+drank off the bitter remedy now as if it had been nectar.
+
+Josephine blushed.
+
+"If you wanted me to live, why did you not come here before?"
+
+"I did not think you would be so foolish, so wicked, so cruel as to do
+what you have been doing."
+
+"Come and shine upon me every day, and you shall have no fresh cause of
+complaint; things flourish in the sunshine that die in the dark: Rose,
+it is as if the sun had come into my prison; you are pale, but you are
+beautiful as ever--more beautiful; what a sweet dress! so quiet, so
+modest, it sets off your beauty instead of vainly trying to vie with
+it." With this he put out his hand and took her gray silk dress, and
+went to kiss it as a devotee kisses the altar steps.
+
+She snatched it away with a shudder.
+
+"Yes, you are right," said she; "thank you for noticing my dress; it is
+a beautiful dress--ha! ha! A dress I take a pride in wearing, and
+always shall, I hope. I mean to be buried in it. Come, Rose. Thank you,
+Camille; you are very good, you have once more promised me to live. Get
+well; come down-stairs; then you will see me every day, you know--there
+is a temptation. Good-by, Camille!--are you coming, Rose? What are you
+loitering for? God bless you, and comfort you, and help you to forget
+what it is madness to remember!"
+
+With these wild words she literally fled; and in one moment the room
+seemed to darken to Camille.
+
+Outside the door Josephine caught hold of Rose. "Have I committed
+myself?"
+
+"Over and over again. Do not look so terrified; I mean to me, but not to
+him. How blind he is! and how much better you must know him than I do to
+venture on such a transparent deceit. He believes whatever you tell
+him. He is all ears and no eyes. Yes, love, I watched him keenly all
+the time. He really thinks it is pity and remorse, nothing more. My poor
+sister, you have a hard life to lead, a hard game to play; but so far
+you have succeeded; yet could look poor Raynal in the face if he came
+home to-day."
+
+"Then God be thanked!" cried Josephine. "I am as happy to-day as I can
+ever hope to be. Now let us go through the farce of dressing--it is near
+dinner-time--and then the farce of talking, and, hardest of all, the
+farce of living."
+
+From that hour Camille began to get better very slowly, yet perceptibly.
+
+The doctor, afraid of being mistaken, said nothing for some days, but
+at last he announced the good news at the dinner-table. "He is to come
+down-stairs in three days," added the doctor.
+
+But I am sorry to say that as Camille's body strengthened some of the
+worst passions in our nature attacked him. Fierce gusts of hate and love
+combined overpowered this man's high sentiments of honor and justice,
+and made him clench his teeth, and vow never to leave Beaurepaire
+without Josephine. She had been his four years before she ever saw this
+interloper, and she should be his forever. Her love would soon revive
+when they should meet every day, and she would end by eloping with him.
+
+Then conscience pricked him, and reminded him how and why Raynal had
+married her: for Rose had told him all. Should he undermine an absent
+soldier, whose whole conduct in this had been so pure, so generous, so
+unselfish?
+
+But this was not all. As I have already hinted, he was under a great
+personal obligation to his quondam comrade Raynal. Whenever this was
+vividly present to his mind, a great terror fell on him, and he would
+cry out in anguish, "Oh! that some angel would come to me and tear me by
+force from this place!" And the next moment passion swept over him like
+a flood, and carried away all his virtuous resolves. His soul was in
+deep waters; great waves drove it to and fro. Perilous condition,
+which seldom ends well. Camille was a man of honor. In no other earthly
+circumstance could he have hesitated an instant between right and
+wrong. But such natures, proof against all other temptations, have often
+fallen, and will fall, where sin takes the angel form of her they love.
+Yet, of all men, they should pray for help to stand; for when they fall
+they still retain one thing that divides them from mean sinners.
+
+Remorse, the giant that rends the great hearts which mock at fear.
+
+The day came in which the doctor had promised his patient he should come
+down-stairs. First his comfortable sofa was taken down into the saloon
+for his use: then the patient himself came down leaning on the doctor's
+arm, and his heart palpitating at the thought of the meeting. He came
+into the room; the baroness was alone. She greeted him kindly,
+and welcomed him. Rose came in soon after and did the same. But no
+Josephine. Camille felt sick at heart. At last dinner was announced;
+"She will surely join us at dinner," thought he. He cast his eyes
+anxiously on the table; the napkins were laid for four only. The
+baroness carelessly explained this to him as they sat down. "Madame
+Raynal dines in her own room. I am sorry to say she is indisposed."
+
+Camille muttered polite regrets: the rage of disappointment drove its
+fangs into him, and then came the heart-sickness of hope deferred.
+The next day he saw her, but could not get a word with her alone. The
+baroness tortured him another way. She was full of Raynal. She loved
+him. She called him her son; was never weary of descanting on his
+virtues to Camille. Not a day passed that she did not pester Camille to
+make a calculation as to the probable period of his return, and he was
+obliged to answer her. She related to him before Josephine and Rose, how
+this honest soldier had come to them like a guardian angel and saved the
+whole family. In vain he muttered that Rose had told him.
+
+"Let me have the pleasure of telling it you my way," cried she, and told
+it diffusely, and kept him writhing.
+
+The next thing was, Josephine had received no letter from him this
+month; the first month he had missed. In vain did Rose represent that
+he was only a few days over his time. The baroness became anxious,
+communicated her anxieties to Camille among the rest; and, by a
+torturing interrogatory, compelled him to explain to her before
+Josephine and them all, that ships do not always sail to a day, and
+are sometimes delayed. But oh! he winced at the man's name; and Rose
+observed that he never mentioned it, nor acknowledged the existence of
+such a person as Josephine's husband, except when others compelled him.
+Yet they were acquainted; and Rose sometimes wondered that he did not
+detract or sneer.
+
+"I should," said she; "I feel I should."
+
+"He is too noble," said Josephine, "and too wise. For, if he did, I
+should respect him less, and my husband more than I do--if possible."
+
+Certainly Camille was not the sort of nature that detracts, but the
+reason he avoided Raynal's name was simply that his whole internal
+battle was to forget such a man existed. From this dream he was rudely
+awakened every hour since he joined the family, and the wound his
+self-deceiving heart would fain have skinned over, was torn open. But
+worse than this was the torture of being tantalized. He was in company
+with Josephine, but never alone. Even if she left the room for an
+instant, Rose accompanied her and returned with her. Camille at last
+began to comprehend that Josephine had decided there should be no
+private interviews between her and him. Thus, not only the shadow of the
+absent Raynal stood between them, but her mother and sister in person,
+and worst of all, her own will. He called her a cold-blooded fiend in
+his rage. Then the thought of all her tenderness and goodness came to
+rebuke him. But even in rebuking it maddened him. "Yes, it is her very
+nature to love; but since she can make her heart turn whichever way her
+honor bids, she will love her husband; she does not now; but sooner or
+later she will. Then she will have children--(he writhed with anguish
+and fury at this thought)--loving ties between him and her. He has
+everything on his side. I, nothing but memories she will efface from her
+heart. Will efface? She must have effaced them, or she could not have
+married him." I know no more pitiable state of mind than to love and
+hate the same creature. But when the two feelings are both intense, and
+meet in an ardent bosom, such a man would do well to spend a day or two
+upon his knees, praying for grace divine. For he who with all his soul
+loves and hates one woman is next door to a maniac, and is scarcely
+safe an hour together from suicide or even from homicide; this truth the
+newspapers tell us, by examples, every month; but are wonderfully little
+heeded, because newspapers do not, nor is it their business to, analyze
+and dwell upon the internal feelings of the despairing lover, whose mad
+and bloody act they record. With such a tempest in his heart did Camille
+one day wander into the park. And soon an irresistible attraction drew
+him to the side of the stream that flowed along one side of it. He eyed
+it gloomily, and wherever the stagnant water indicated a deeper pool
+than usual he stopped, and looked, and thought, "How calm and peaceful
+you are!"
+
+He sat down at last by the water-side, his eyes bent on a calm, green
+pool.
+
+It looked very peaceful; and it could give peace. He thought, oh! what
+a blessing; to be quit of rage, jealousy, despair, and life, all in a
+minute!
+
+Yet that was a sordid death for a soldier to die, who had seen great
+battles. Could he not die more nobly than that? With this he suddenly
+felt in his pocket; and there sure enough fate had placed his pistols.
+He had put them into this coat; and he had not worn this coat until
+to-day. He had armed himself unconsciously. "Ah!" said he; "it is to be;
+all these things are preordained." (This notion of fate has strengthened
+many a fatal resolution.) Then he had a cruel regret. To die without a
+word; a parting word. Then he thought to himself, it was best so; for
+perhaps he should have taken her with him.
+
+"Sir! colonel!" uttered a solemn voice behind him.
+
+Absorbed and strung up to desperation as he was, this voice seemed
+unnaturally loud, and discordant with Camille's mood; a sudden trumpet
+from the world of small things.
+
+It was Picard, the notary.
+
+"Can you tell me where Madame Raynal is?"
+
+"No. At the chateau, I suppose."
+
+"She is not there; I inquired of the servant. She was out. You have not
+seen her, colonel?"
+
+"Not I; I never see her."
+
+"Then perhaps I had better go back to the chateau and wait for her:
+stay, are you a friend of the family? Colonel, suppose I were to tell
+you, and ask you to break it to Madame Raynal, or, better still, to the
+baroness, or Mademoiselle Rose."
+
+"Monsieur," said Camille coldly, "charge me with no messages, for I
+cannot deliver them. I AM GOING ANOTHER WAY."
+
+"In that case, I will go to the chateau once more; for what I have to
+say must be heard."
+
+Picard returned to the chateau wondering at the colonel's strange
+manner.
+
+Camille, for his part, wondered that any one could be so mad as to talk
+to him about trifles; to him, a man standing on the brink of eternity.
+Poor soul, it was he who was mad and unlucky. He should have heard what
+Picard had to say. The very gentleness and solemnity of manner ought to
+have excited his curiosity.
+
+He watched Picard's retiring form. When he was out of sight, then he
+turned round and resumed his thoughts as if Picard had been no more than
+a fly that had buzzed and then gone.
+
+"Yes, I should have taken her with me," he said. He sat gloomy and
+dogged like a dangerous maniac in his cell; never moved, scarce thought
+for more than half an hour; but his deadly purpose grew in him. Suddenly
+he started. A lady was at the style, about a hundred yards distant. He
+trembled. It was Josephine.
+
+She came towards him slowly, her eyes bent on the ground in a deep
+reverie. She stopped about a stone's throw from him, and looked at the
+river long and thoughtfully; then casting her eye around, she caught
+sight of Camille. He watched her grimly. He saw her give a little start,
+and half turn round; but if this was an impulse to retreat, it was
+instantly suppressed; for the next moment she pursued her way.
+
+Camille stood gloomy and bitter, awaiting her in silence. He planted
+himself in the middle of the path, and said not a word.
+
+She looked him all over, and her color came and went.
+
+"Out so far as this," she said kindly; "and without your cap."
+
+He put his hand to his head, and discovered that he was bareheaded.
+
+"You will catch your death of cold. Come, let us go in and get your
+cap."
+
+She made as if she would pass him. He planted himself right before her.
+
+"No."
+
+"Camille!"
+
+"Why do you shun me as if I was a viper?"
+
+"I do not shun you. I but avoid conferences that can lead to no good; it
+is my duty."
+
+"You are very wise; cold-hearted people can be wise."
+
+"Am I cold-hearted, Camille?"
+
+"As marble."
+
+She looked him in the face; the water came into her eyes; after awhile
+she whispered, sorrowfully, "Well, Camille, I am."
+
+"But with all your wisdom and all your coldness," he went on to say,
+"you have made a mistake; you have driven me to madness and despair."
+
+"Heaven forbid!" said she.
+
+"Your prayer comes too late; you have done it."
+
+"Camille, let me go to the oratory, and pray for you. You terrify me."
+
+"It is no use. Heaven has no mercy for me. Take my advice; stay where
+you are; don't hurry; for what remains of your life you gave to pass
+with me, do you understand that?"
+
+"Ah!" And she turned pale.
+
+"Can you read my riddle?"
+
+She looked him in the face. "I can read your eyes, and I know you love
+me. I think you mean to kill me. I have heard men kill the thing they
+love."
+
+"Of course they do; sooner than another should have it, they kill
+it--they kill it."
+
+"God has not made them patient like us women. Poor Camille!"
+
+"Patience dies when hope dies. Come, Madame Raynal, say a prayer, for
+you are going to die."
+
+"God bless you, Camille!" said the poor girl, putting her hands together
+in her last prayer. At this sweet touch of affection, Camille hung his
+head, and sobbed. Then suddenly lashing himself into fury, he cried,--
+
+"You are my betrothed! you talk of duty; but you forget your duty to me.
+Are you not my betrothed this four years? Answer me that."
+
+"Yes, Camille, I was."
+
+"Did I not suffer death a hundred times for you, to keep faith with you,
+you cold-blooded traitress with an angel's face?"
+
+"Ah, Camille! can you speak so bitterly to me? Have I denied your right
+to kill me? You shall never dishonor me, but you shall kill me, if it is
+your pleasure. I do not resist. Why, then, speak to me like that; must
+the last words I hear from your mouth be words of anger, cruel Camille?"
+
+"I was wrong. But it is so hard to kill her I love in cold blood. I want
+anger as well as despair to keep me to it. Come, turn your head away
+from me, and all our troubles shall end."
+
+"No, Camille, let me look at you. Then you will be the last thing I
+shall see on earth."
+
+At this he hesitated a moment; then, with a fierce stamp at what he
+thought was weakness, he levelled a pistol at her.
+
+She put up her hands with a piteous cry, "Oh! not my face, Camille! pray
+do not disfigure my face. Here--kill me here--in my bosom--my heart that
+loved you well, when it was no sin to love you."
+
+"I can't shoot you. I can't spill your blood. The river will end all,
+and not disfigure your beauty, that has driven me mad, and cost you,
+poor wretch, your life."
+
+"Thank you, dear Camille. The water does not frighten me as a pistol
+does; it will not hurt me; it will only kill me."
+
+"No, it is but a plunge, and you will be at peace forever; and so shall
+I. Come, take my hand, Madame Raynal, Madame Raynal."
+
+She gave him her hand with a look of infinite love. She only said, "My
+poor mother!" That word did not fall to the ground. It flashed like
+lightning at night across the demented lover, and lighted up his egotism
+(suicide, like homicide, is generally a fit of maniacal egotism), even
+to his eyes blinded by fury.
+
+"Wretch that I am," he shrieked. "Fly, Josephine, fly! escape this
+moment, that my better angel whispers to me. Do you hear? begone, while
+it is time."
+
+"I will not leave you, Camille."
+
+"I say you shall. Go to your mother and Rose; go to those you love, and
+I can pity; go to the chapel and thank Heaven for your escape."
+
+"Yes, but not without you, Camille. I am afraid to leave you."
+
+"You have more to fear if you stay. Well, I can't wait any longer. Stay,
+then, and live; and learn from me how to love Jean Raynal."
+
+He levelled the pistol at himself.
+
+Josephine threw herself on him with a cry, and seized his arm. With the
+strength excitement lent her she got the better, and all but overpowered
+him. But, as usual, the man's strength lasted longer, and with a
+sustained effort he threw her off; then, pale and panting, raised the
+pistol to take his life. This time she moved neither hand nor foot; but
+she palsied his rash hand with a word.
+
+"No; I LOVE YOU."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+
+
+There lie the dead corpses of those words on paper; but my art is
+powerless to tell you how they were uttered, those words, potent as a
+king's, for they saved a life.
+
+They were a cry of terror and a cry of reproach and a cry of love
+unfathomable.
+
+The weapon shook in his hand. He looked at her with growing astonishment
+and joy; she at him fixedly and anxiously, her hands clasped in
+supplication.
+
+"As you used to love me?"
+
+"More, far more. Give me the pistol. I love you, dearest. I love you."
+
+At these delicious words he lost all power of resistance, she saw;
+and her soft and supple hand stole in and closed upon his, and gently
+withdrew the weapon, and threw it into the water. "Good Camille! now
+give me the other."
+
+"How do you know there is another?"
+
+"I know you are not the man to kill a woman and spare yourself. Come."
+
+"Josephine, have pity on me, do not deceive me; pray do not take this,
+my only friend, from me, unless you really love me."
+
+"I love you; I adore you," was her reply.
+
+She leaned her head on his shoulder, but with her hand she sought his,
+and even as she uttered those loving words she coaxed the weapon from
+his now unresisting grasp.
+
+"There, it is gone; you are saved from death--saved from crime." And
+with that, the danger was over, she trembled for the first time, and
+fell to sobbing hysterically.
+
+He threw himself at her knees, and embraced them again and again, and
+begged her forgiveness in a transport of remorse and self-reproach.
+
+She looked down with tender pity on him, and heard his cries of
+penitence and shame.
+
+"Rise, Camille, and go home with me," said she faintly.
+
+"Yes, Josephine."
+
+They went slowly and in silence. Camille was too ashamed and penitent
+to speak; too full of terror too at the abyss of crime from which he
+had been saved. The ancients feigned that a virgin could subdue a lion;
+perhaps they meant that a pure gentle nature can subdue a nature fierce
+but generous. Lion-like Camille walked by Josephine's side with his eyes
+bent on the ground, the picture of humility and penitence.
+
+"This is the last walk you and I shall take together," said Josephine
+solemnly.
+
+"I know it," said he humbly. "I have forfeited all right to be by your
+side."
+
+"My poor, lost love," sighed Josephine, "will you never understand
+me? You never stood higher in my esteem than at this moment. It is the
+avowal you have forced from ME that parts us. The man to whom I have
+said 'I'--must not remain beneath my husband's roof. Does not your sense
+of honor agree with mine?"
+
+"It does," faltered he.
+
+"To-morrow you must leave the chateau."
+
+"I will obey you."
+
+"What, you do not resist, you do not break my heart by complaints, by
+reproaches?"
+
+"No, Josephine, all is changed. I thought you unfeeling: I thought you
+were going to be HAPPY with him; that was what maddened me."
+
+"I pray daily YOU may be happy, no matter how. But you and I are not
+alike, dear as we are to one another. Well, do not fear: I shall never
+be happy--will that soothe you, Camille?"
+
+"Yes, Josephine, all is changed; the words you have spoken have driven
+the fiends out of my heart. I have nothing to do now but to obey, you to
+command: it is your right. Since you love me a little still, dispose
+of me. Bid me live: bid me die: bid me stay: bid me go. I shall never
+disobey the angel who loves me, my only friend upon the earth."
+
+A single deep sob from Josephine was all the answer.
+
+Then he could not help asking her why she had not trusted him?
+
+"Why did you not say to me long ago, 'I love you, but I am a wife; my
+husband is an honest soldier, absent, and fighting for France: I am the
+guardian of his honor and my own; be just, be generous, be self-denying;
+depart and love me only as angels love'? Perhaps this might have helped
+me to show you that I too am a man of honor."
+
+"Perhaps I was wrong," sighed Josephine. "I think I should have trusted
+more to you. But then, who would have thought you could really doubt my
+love? You were ill; I could not bear you to go till you were well, quite
+well. I saw no other way to keep you but this, to treat you with feigned
+coldness. You saw the coldness, but not what it cost me to maintain it.
+Yes, I was unjust; and inconsiderate, for I had many furtive joys to
+sustain me: I had you in my house under my care--that thought was always
+sweet--I had a hand in everything that was for your good, for your
+comfort. I helped Jacintha make your soup and your chocolate every day.
+I had the delight of lining the dressing-gown you were to wear. I had
+always some little thing or other to do for you. These kept me up: I
+forgot in my selfishness that you had none of these supports, and that
+I was driving you to despair. I am a foolish, disingenuous woman: I have
+been very culpable. Forgive me!"
+
+"Forgive you, angel of purity and goodness? I alone am to blame.
+What right had I to doubt your heart? I knew the whole story of your
+marriage; I saw your sweet pale face; but I was not pure enough to
+comprehend angelic virtue and unselfishness. Well, I am brought to
+my senses. There is but one thing for me to do--you bade me leave you
+to-morrow."
+
+"I was very cruel."
+
+"No! not cruel, wise. But I will be wiser. I shall go to-night."
+
+"To-night, Camille?" said Josephine, turning pale.
+
+"Ay! for to-night I am strong; to-morrow I may be weak. To-night
+everything thrusts me on the right path. To-morrow everything will draw
+me from it. Do not cry, beloved one; you and I have a hard fight. We
+must be true allies; whenever one is weak, then is the time for the
+other to be strong. I have been weaker than you, to my shame be it said;
+but this is my hour of strength. A light from heaven shows me my path.
+I am full of passion, but like you I have honor. You are Raynal's wife,
+and--Raynal saved my life."
+
+"Ah! is it possible? When? where? may Heaven bless him for it!"
+
+"Ask HIM; and say I told you of it--I have not strength to tell it you,
+but I will go to-night."
+
+Then Josephine, who had resisted till all her strength was gone,
+whispered with a blush that it was too late to get a conveyance.
+
+"I need none to carry my sword, my epaulets, and my love for you. I
+shall go on foot."
+
+Josephine said nothing, but she began to walk slower and slower. And
+so the unfortunate pair came along creeping slowly with drooping heads
+towards the gate of the Pleasaunce. There their last walk in this world
+must end. Many a man and woman have gone to the scaffold with hearts
+less heavy and more hopeful than theirs.
+
+"Dry your eyes, Josephine," said Camille with a deep sigh. "They are all
+out on the Pleasaunce."
+
+"No, I will not dry my eyes," cried Josephine, almost violently. "I care
+for nothing now."
+
+The baroness, the doctor, and Rose, were all in the Pleasaunce: and as
+the pair came in, lo! every eye was bent on Josephine.
+
+She felt this, and her eyes sought the ground: benumbed as she was with
+despondency, she began now to dread some fresh stroke or other.
+
+Camille felt doubly guilty and confused. How they all look at us, he
+thought. Do they know what a villain I have been? He determined to slip
+away, and pack up, and begone. However, nobody took any notice of him.
+The baroness drew Josephine apart. And Rose followed her mother and
+sister with eyes bent on the ground.
+
+There was a strange solemnity about them all.
+
+Aubertin remained behind. But even he took no notice of Camille, but
+walked up and down with his hands behind him, and a sad and troubled
+face. Camille felt his utter desolation. He was nothing to any of them.
+He resolved to go at once, and charge Aubertin with his last adieus to
+the family. It was a wise and manly resolve. He stopped Aubertin in
+the middle of his walk, and said in a faint voice of the deepest
+dejection,--
+
+"Doctor, the time is come that I must once more thank you for all your
+goodness to me, and bid you all farewell."
+
+"What, going before your strength is re-established?" said the doctor
+politely, but not warmly.
+
+"I am out of all danger, thanks to your skill."
+
+"Colonel, at another time I should insist upon your staying a day or two
+longer; but now I think it would be unadvisable to press you to stay.
+Ah, colonel, you came to a happy house, but you leave a sad one. Poor
+Madame Raynal!"
+
+"Sir!"
+
+"You saw the baroness draw her aside."
+
+"Y-yes."
+
+"By this time she knows it."
+
+"In Heaven's name what do you mean?" asked Camille.
+
+"I forgot; you are not aware of the calamity that has fallen upon our
+beloved Josephine; on the darling of the house."
+
+Camille turned cold with vague apprehension. But he contrived to stammer
+out, "No; tell me! for Heaven's sake tell me."
+
+The doctor thus pressed revealed all in a very few words. "My poor
+friend," said he solemnly, "her husband--is dead."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV.
+
+
+The baroness, as I have said, drew Josephine aside, and tried to break
+to her the sad news: but her own grief overcame her, and bursting into
+tears she bewailed the loss of her son. Josephine was greatly shocked.
+Death!--Raynal dead--her true, kind friend dead--her benefactor dead.
+She clung to her mother's neck, and sobbed with her. Presently she
+withdrew her face and suddenly hid it in both her hands.
+
+She rose and kissed her mother once more: and went to her own room: and
+then, though there was none to see her, she hid her wet, but burning,
+cheeks in her hands.
+
+Josephine confined herself for some days to her own room, leaving it
+only to go to the chapel in the park, where she spent hours in prayers
+for the dead and in self-humiliation. Her "tender conscience" accused
+herself bitterly for not having loved this gallant spirit more than she
+had.
+
+Camille realized nothing at first; he looked all confused in the
+doctor's face, and was silent. Then after awhile he said, "Dead? Raynal
+dead?"
+
+"Killed in action."
+
+A red flush came to Camille's face, and his eyes went down to the ground
+at his very feet, nor did he once raise them while the doctor told him
+how the sad news had come. "Picard the notary brought us the Moniteur,
+and there was Commandant Raynal among the killed in a cavalry skirmish."
+With this, he took the journal from his pocket, and Camille read it,
+with awe-struck, and other feelings he would have been sorry to see
+analyzed. He said not a word; and lowered his eyes to the ground.
+
+"And now," said Aubertin, "you will excuse me. I must go to my poor
+friend the baroness. She had a mother's love for him who is no more:
+well she might."
+
+Aubertin went away, and left Dujardin standing there like a statue, his
+eyes still glued to the ground at his feet.
+
+The doctor was no sooner out of sight, than Camille raised his eyes
+furtively, like a guilty person, and looked irresolutely this way
+and that: at last he turned and went back to the place where he had
+meditated suicide and murder; looked down at it a long while, then
+looked up to heaven--then fell suddenly on his knees: and so remained
+till night-fall. Then he came back to the chateau.
+
+He whispered to himself, "And I am afraid it is too late to go away
+to-night." He went softly into the saloon. Nobody was there but Rose and
+Aubertin. At sight of him Rose got up and left the room. But I suppose
+she went to Josephine; for she returned in a few minutes, and rang the
+bell, and ordered some supper to be brought up for Colonel Dujardin.
+
+"You have not dined, I hear," said she, very coldly.
+
+"I was afraid you were gone altogether," said the doctor: then turning
+to Rose, "He told me he was going this evening. You had better stay
+quiet another day or two," added he, kindly.
+
+"Do you think so?" said Camille, timidly.
+
+He stayed upon these terms. And now he began to examine himself. "Did
+I wish him dead? I hope I never formed such a thought! I don't remember
+ever wishing him dead." And he went twice a day to that place by the
+stream, and thought very solemnly what a terrible thing ungoverned
+passion is; and repented--not eloquently, but silently, sincerely.
+
+But soon his impatient spirit began to torment itself again. Why did
+Josephine shun him now? Ah! she loved Raynal now that he was dead. Women
+love the thing they have lost; so he had heard say. In that case, the
+very sight of him would of course be odious to her: he could understand
+that. The absolute, unreasoning faith he once had in her had been
+so rudely shaken by her marriage with Raynal, that now he could only
+believe just so much as he saw, and he saw that she shunned him.
+
+He became moody, sad, and disconsolate: and as Josephine shunned him, so
+he avoided all the others, and wandered for hours by himself, perplexed
+and miserable. After awhile, he became conscious that he was under a
+sort of surveillance. Rose de Beaurepaire, who had been so kind to him
+when he was confined to his own room, but had taken little notice of him
+since he came down, now resumed her care of him, and evidently made it
+her business to keep up his heart. She used to meet him out walking in
+a mysterious way, and in short, be always falling in with him and trying
+to cheer him up: with tolerable success.
+
+Such was the state of affairs when the party was swelled and matters
+complicated by the arrival of one we have lost sight of.
+
+Edouard Riviere retarded his cure by an impatient spirit: but he got
+well at last, and his uncle drove him in the cabriolet to his own
+quarters. The news of the house had been told him by letter, but, of
+course, in so vague and general a way that, thinking he knew all, in
+reality he knew nothing.
+
+Josephine had married Raynal. The marriage was sudden, but no doubt
+there was an attachment: he had some reason to believe in sudden
+attachments. Colonel Dujardin, an old acquaintance, had come back
+to France wounded, and the good doctor had undertaken his cure: this
+incident appeared neither strange nor any way important. What affected
+him most deeply was the death of Raynal, his personal friend and patron.
+But when his tyrants, as he called the surgeon and his uncle, gave him
+leave to go home, all feelings were overpowered by his great joy at the
+prospect of seeing Rose. He walked over to Beaurepaire, his arm in a
+sling, his heart beating. He was coming to receive the reward of all he
+had done, and all he had attempted. "I will surprise them," thought he.
+"I will see her face when I come in at the door: oh, happy hour! this
+pays for all." He entered the house without announcing himself; he went
+softly up to the saloon; to his great disappointment he found no one
+but the baroness: she received him kindly, but not with the warmth he
+expected. She was absorbed in her new grief. He asked timidly after her
+daughters. "Madame Raynal bears up, for the sake of others. You will
+not, however, see her: she keeps her room. My daughter Rose is taking
+a walk, I believe." After some polite inquiries, and sympathy with his
+accident, the baroness retired to indulge her grief, and Edouard thus
+liberated ran in search of his beloved.
+
+He met her at the gate of the Pleasaunce, but not alone. She was walking
+with an officer, a handsome, commanding, haughty, brilliant officer. She
+was walking by his side, talking earnestly to him.
+
+An arrow of ice shot through young Riviere; and then came a feeling of
+death at his heart, a new symptom in his young life.
+
+The next moment Rose caught sight of him. She flushed all over and
+uttered a little exclamation, and she bounded towards him like a little
+antelope, and put out both her hands at once. He could only give her
+one.
+
+"Ah!" she cried with an accent of heavenly pity, and took his hand with
+both hers.
+
+This was like the meridian sun coming suddenly on a cold place. He was
+all happiness.
+
+When Josephine heard he was come her eye flashed, and she said quickly,
+"I will come down to welcome him--dear Edouard!"
+
+The sisters looked at one another. Josephine blushed. Rose smiled and
+kissed her. She colored higher still, and said, "No, she was ashamed to
+go down."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Look at my face."
+
+"I see nothing wrong with it, except that it eclipses other people's,
+and I have long forgiven you that."
+
+"Oh, yes, dear Rose: look what a color it has, and a fortnight ago it
+was pale as ashes."
+
+"Never mind; do you expect me to regret that?"
+
+"Rose, I am a very bad woman."
+
+"Are you, dear? then hook this for me."
+
+"Yes, love. But I sometimes think you would forgive me if you knew how
+hard I pray to be better. Rose, I do try so to be as unhappy as I ought;
+but I can't, I can't. My cold heart seems as dead to unhappiness as once
+it was to happiness. Am I a heartless woman after all?"
+
+"Not altogether," said Rose dryly. "Fasten my collar, dear, and don't
+torment yourself. You have suffered much and nobly. It was Heaven's
+will: you bowed to it. It was not Heaven's will that you should be
+blighted altogether. Bow in this, too, to Heaven's will: take things
+as they come, and do cease to try and reconcile feelings that are too
+opposite to live together."
+
+"Ah! these are such comfortable words, Rose; but mamma will see this
+dreadful color in my cheek, and what can I say to her?"
+
+"Ten to one it will not be observed; and if it should, I will say it is
+the excitement of seeing Edouard. Leave all to me."
+
+Josephine greeted Edouard most affectionately, drew from him his whole
+history, and petted him and sympathized with him deliciously, and made
+him the hero of the evening. Camille, who was not naturally of a jealous
+temper, bore this very well at first, but at last he looked so bitter
+at her neglect of him, that Rose took him aside to soothe him. Edouard,
+missing the auditor he most valued, and seeing her in secret conference
+with the brilliant colonel, felt a return of the jealous pangs that
+had seized him at first sight of the man; and so they played at cross
+purposes.
+
+At another period of the evening the conversation became more general;
+and Edouard took a dislike to Colonel Dujardin. A young man of
+twenty-eight nearly always looks on a boy of twenty-one with the air of
+a superior, and this assumption, not being an ill-natured one, is apt to
+be so easy and so undefined that the younger hardly knows how to resent
+or to resist it. But Edouard was a little vain as we know; and the
+Colonel jarred him terribly. His quick haughty eye jarred him. His
+regimentals jarred him: they fitted like a glove. His mustache and his
+manner jarred him, and, worst of all, his cool familiarity with Rose,
+who seemed to court him rather than be courted by him. He put this act
+of Rose's to the colonel's account, according to the custom of lovers,
+and revenged himself in a small way by telling Josephine in her ear
+"that the colonel produced on his mind the effect of an intolerable
+puppy."
+
+Josephine colored up and looked at him with a momentary surprise. She
+said quietly, "Military men do give themselves some airs, but he is very
+amiable at bottom. You must make a better acquaintance with him, and
+then he will reveal to you his nobler qualities."--"Oh! I have no
+particular desire," sneered unlucky Edouard. Sweet as Josephine was,
+this was too much for her: she said nothing; but she quietly turned
+Edouard over to Aubertin, and joined Rose, and under cover of her had a
+sweet timid chat with her falsely accused.
+
+This occupied the two so entirely that Edouard was neglected. This hurt
+his foible, and seemed to be so unkind on the very first day of his
+return that he made his adieus to the baroness, and marched off in
+dudgeon unobserved.
+
+Rose missed him first, but said nothing.
+
+When Josephine saw he was gone, she uttered a little exclamation, and
+looked at Rose. Rose put on a mien of haughty indifference, but the
+water was in her eyes.
+
+Josephine looked sorrowful.
+
+When they talked over everything together at night, she reproached
+herself. "We behaved ill to poor Edouard: we neglected him."
+
+"He is a little cross, ill-tempered fellow," said Rose pettishly.
+
+"Oh, no! no!"
+
+"And as vain as a peacock."
+
+"Has he not some right to be vain in this house?"
+
+"Yes,--no. I am very angry with him. I won't hear a word in his favor,"
+said Rose pouting: then she gave his defender a kiss. "Yes, dear," said
+Josephine, answering the kiss, and ignoring the words, "he is a dear;
+and he is not cross, nor so very vain, poor boy! now don't you see what
+it was?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Yes, you do, you little cunning thing: you are too shrewd not to see
+everything."
+
+"No, indeed, Josephine; do tell me, don't keep me waiting: I can't bear
+that."
+
+"Well, then--jealous! A little."
+
+"Jealous? Oh, what fun! Of Camille? Ha! ha! Little goose!"
+
+"And," said Josephine very seriously, "I almost think he would be
+jealous of any one that occupied your attention. I watched him more or
+less all the evening."
+
+"All the better. I'll torment my lord."
+
+"Heaven forbid you should be so cruel."
+
+"Oh! I will not make him unhappy, but I'll tease him a little; it is not
+in nature to abstain."
+
+This foible detected in her lover, Rose was very gay at the prospect of
+amusement it afforded her.
+
+And I think I have many readers who at this moment are awaiting unmixed
+enjoyment and hilarity from the same source.
+
+I wish them joy of their prospect.
+
+Edouard called the next day: he wore a gloomy air. Rose met this with
+a particularly cheerful one; on this, Edouard's face cleared up, and
+he was himself again; agreeable as this was, Rose felt a little
+disappointed. "I am afraid he is not very jealous after all," thought
+she.
+
+Josephine left her room this day and mingled once more with the family.
+The bare sight of her was enough for Camille at first, but after awhile
+he wanted more. He wanted to be often alone with her; but several causes
+co-operated to make her shy of giving him many such opportunities:
+first, her natural delicacy, coupled with her habit of self-denial; then
+her fear of shocking her mother, and lastly her fear of her own heart,
+and of Camille, whose power over her she knew. For Camille, when he did
+get a sweet word alone with her, seemed to forget everything except that
+she was his betrothed, and that he had come back alive to marry her.
+He spoke to her of his love with an ardor and an urgency that made her
+thrill with happiness, but at the same time shrink with a certain fear
+and self-reproach. Possessed with a feeling no stronger than hers, but
+single, he did not comprehend the tumult, the trouble, the daily contest
+in her heart. The wind seemed to him to be always changing, and hot and
+cold the same hour. Since he did not even see that she was acting in
+hourly fear of her mother's eye, he was little likely to penetrate
+her more hidden sentiments; and then he had not touched her
+key-note,--self-denial.
+
+Women are self-denying and uncandid. Men are self-indulgent and
+outspoken.
+
+And this is the key to a thousand double misunderstandings; for believe
+me, good women are just as stupid in misunderstanding men as honest men
+are in misunderstanding women.
+
+To Camille, Josephine's fluctuations, joys, tremors, love, terror,
+modesty, seemed one grand total, caprice. The component parts of it he
+saw not; and her caprice tortured him almost to madness. Too penitent
+to give way again to violent passion, he gently fretted. His health
+retrograded and his temper began to sour. The eye of timid love that
+watched him with maternal anxiety from under its long lashes saw this
+with dismay, and Rose, who looked into her sister's bosom, devoted
+herself once more to soothe him without compromising Josephine's
+delicacy. Matters were not so bad but what a fine sprightly girl like
+Rose could cheer up a dejected but manly colonel; and Rose was generally
+successful.
+
+But then, unfortunately, this led to a fresh mystification. Riviere's
+natural jealousy revived, and found constant food in the attention Rose
+paid Camille, a brilliant colonel living in the house while he, poor
+wretch, lived in lodgings. The false position of all the parties brought
+about some singular turns. I give from their number one that forms a
+link, though a small one, in my narrative.
+
+One day Edouard came to tell Rose she was making him unhappy; he had her
+alone in the Pleasaunce; she received him with a radiant smile, and they
+had a charming talk,--a talk all about HIM: what the family owed him,
+etc.
+
+On this, his late jealousy and sense of injury seemed a thing of three
+years ago, and never to return. So hard it is for the loving heart to
+resist its sun.
+
+Jacintha came with a message from the colonel: "Would it be agreeable to
+Mademoiselle Rose to walk with him at the usual hour?"
+
+"Certainly," said Rose.
+
+As Jacintha was retiring Edouard called to her to stop a minute.
+
+Then, turning to Rose, he begged her very ceremoniously to reconsider
+that determination.
+
+"What determination?"
+
+"To sacrifice me to this Colonel Dujardin." Still politely, only a
+little grimly.
+
+Rose opened her eyes. "Are you mad?" inquired she with quiet hauteur.
+
+"Neither mad nor a fool," was the reply. "I love you too well to share
+your regard with any one, upon any terms; least of all upon these, that
+there is to be a man in the world at whose beck and call you are to
+be, and at whose orders you are to break off an interview with me.
+Perdition!"
+
+"Dear Edouard, what folly! Can you suspect me of discourtesy, as well as
+of--I know not what. Colonel Dujardin will join us, that is all, and we
+shall take a little walk with him."
+
+"Not I. I decline the intrusion; you are engaged with me, and I have
+things to say to you that are not fit for that puppy to hear. So choose
+between me and him, and choose forever."
+
+Rose colored. "I should be very sorry to choose either of you forever;
+but for this afternoon I choose you."
+
+"Oh, thank you--my whole life shall prove my gratitude for this
+preference."
+
+Rose beckoned Jacintha, and sent her with an excuse to Colonel Dujardin.
+She then turned with an air of mock submission to Edouard. "I am at
+monsieur's ORDERS."
+
+Then this unhappy novice, being naturally good-natured, thanked her
+again and again for her condescension in setting his heart at rest. He
+proposed a walk, since his interference had lost her one. She yielded
+a cold assent. This vexed him, but he took it for granted it would wear
+off before the end of the walk. Edouard's heart bounded, but he loved
+her too sincerely to be happy unless he could see her happy too; the
+malicious thing saw this, or perhaps knew it by instinct, and by means
+of this good feeling of his she revenged herself for his tyranny. She
+tortured him as only a woman can torture, and as even she can torture
+only a worthy man, and one who loves her. In the course of that short
+walk this inexperienced girl, strong in the instincts and inborn arts
+of her sex, drove pins and needles, needles and pins, of all sorts and
+sizes, through her lover's heart.
+
+She was everything by turns, except kind, and nothing for long together.
+She was peevish, she was ostentatiously patient and submissive, she was
+inattentive to her companion and seemingly wrapped up in contemplation
+of absent things and persons, the colonel to wit; she was dogged,
+repulsive, and cold; and she never was herself a single moment. They
+returned to the gate of the Pleasaunce. "Well, mademoiselle," said
+Riviere very sadly, "that interloper might as well have been with us."
+
+"Of course he might, and you would have lost nothing by permitting me
+to be courteous to a guest and an invalid. If you had not played the
+tyrant, and taken the matter into your own hands, I should have found
+means to soothe your jeal--I mean your vanity; but you preferred to have
+your own way. Well, you have had it."
+
+"Yes, mademoiselle, you have given me a lesson; you have shown me how
+idle it is to attempt to force a young lady's inclinations in anything."
+
+He bade her good-day, and went away sorrowful.
+
+She cut Camille dead for the rest of the day.
+
+Next morning, early, Edouard called expressly to see her. "Mademoiselle
+Rose," said he, humbly, "I called to apologize for the ungentlemanly
+tone of my remonstrances yesterday."
+
+"Fiddle-dee," said Rose. "Don't do it again; that is the best apology."
+
+"I am not likely to offend so again," said he sadly. "I am going away. I
+am sorry to say I am promoted; my new post is ten leagues. HE WILL HAVE
+IT ALL HIS OWN WAY NOW. But perhaps it is best. Were I to stay here, I
+foresee you would soon lose whatever friendly feeling you have for me."
+
+"Am I so changeable? I am not considered so," remonstrated Rose, gently.
+
+Riviere explained; "I am not vain," said he, with that self-knowledge
+which is so general an attribute of human beings; "no man less so, nor
+am I jealous; but I respect myself, and I could never be content to
+share your time and your regard with Colonel Dujardin, nor with a much
+better man. See now; he has made me arrogant. Was I ever so before?"
+
+"No! no! no! and I forgive you now, my poor Edouard."
+
+"He has made you cold as ice to me."
+
+"No! that was my own wickedness and spitefulness."
+
+"Wickedness, spitefulness! they are not in your nature. It is all that
+wretch's doing."
+
+Rose sighed, but she said nothing; for she saw that to excuse Camille
+would only make the jealous one more bitter against him.
+
+"Will you deign to write to me at my new post? once a month? in answer
+to my letters?"
+
+"Yes, dear. But you will ride over sometimes to see us."
+
+"Oh, yes; but for some little time I shall not be able. The duties of a
+new post."
+
+"Perhaps in a month--a fortnight?"
+
+"Sooner perhaps; the moment I hear that man is out of the house."
+
+Edouard went away, dogged and sad; Rose shut herself up in her room and
+had a good cry. In the afternoon Josephine came and remonstrated with
+her. "You have not walked with him at all to-day."
+
+"No; you must pet him yourself for once. I hate the sight of him; it
+has made mischief between Edouard and me, my being so attentive to him.
+Edouard is jealous, and I cannot wonder. After all, what right have I to
+mystify him who honors me with his affection?"
+
+Then, being pressed with questions by Josephine, she related to her all
+that had passed between Edouard and her, word for word.
+
+"Poor Camille!" sighed Josephine the just.
+
+"Oh, dear, yes! poor Camille! who has the power to make us all
+miserable, and who does it, and will go on doing it until he is happy
+himself."
+
+"Ah! would to Heaven I could make him as happy as he deserves to be."
+
+"You could easily make him much happier than that. And why not do it?"
+
+"O Rose," said Josephine, shocked, "how can you advise me so?"
+
+She then asked her if she thought it possible that Camille could be
+ignorant of her heart.
+
+"Josephine," replied Rose, angrily, "these men are absurd: they believe
+only what they see. I have done what I can for you and Camille, but it
+is useless. Would you have him believe you love him, you must yourself
+be kind to him; and it would be a charitable action: you would make four
+unhappy people happy, or, at least, put them on the road; NOW they are
+off the road, and, by what I have seen to-day, I think, if we go on so
+much longer, it will be too late to try to return. Come, Josephine,
+for my sake! Let me go and tell him you will consent--to all our
+happinesses. There, the crime is mine." And she ran off in spite of
+Josephine's faint and hypocritical entreaties. She returns the next
+minute looking all aghast. "It is too late," said she. "He is going
+away. I am sure he is, for he is packing up his things to go. I spied
+through the old place and saw him. He was sighing like a furnace as he
+strapped his portmanteau. I hate him, of course, but I was sorry for
+him. I could not help being. He sighed so all the time, piteously."
+
+Josephine turned pale, and lifted her hands in surprise and dismay.
+
+"Depend on it, Josephine, we are wrong," said Rose, firmly: "these
+wretches will not stand our nonsense above a certain time: they are not
+such fools. We are mismanaging: one gone, the other going; both losing
+faith in us."
+
+Josephine's color returned to her cheek, and then mounted high.
+Presently she smiled, a smile full of conscious power and furtive
+complacency, and said quietly, "He will not go."
+
+Rose was pleased, but not surprised, to hear her sister speak so
+confidently, for she knew her power over Camille. "That is right," said
+she, "go to him, and say two honest words: 'I bid you stay.'"
+
+"O Rose! no!"
+
+"Poltroon! You know he would go down on his knees, and stay directly."
+
+"No: I should blush all my life before you and him. I COULD not. I
+should let him go sooner, almost. Oh, no! I will never ask a man to stay
+who wishes to leave me. But just you go to him, and say Madame Raynal
+is going to take a little walk: will he do her the honor to be her
+companion? Not a word more, if you love me."
+
+"I'll go. Hypocrite!"
+
+
+Josephine received Camille with a bright smile. She seemed in unusually
+good spirits, and overflowing with kindness and innocent affection. On
+this his high gloomy brow relaxed, and all his prospects brightened as
+by magic. Then she communicated to him a number of little plans for next
+week and the week after. Among the rest he was to go with her and Rose
+to Frejus. "Such a sweet place: I want to show it you. You will come?"
+
+He hesitated a single moment: a moment of intense anxiety to the smiling
+Josephine.
+
+"Yes! he would come: it was a great temptation, he saw so little of
+her."
+
+"Well, you will see more of me now."
+
+"Shall I see you every day--alone, I mean?"
+
+"Oh, yes, if you wish it," replied Josephine, in an off-hand,
+indifferent way.
+
+He seized her hand and devoured it with kisses. "Foolish thing!"
+murmured she, looking down on him with ineffable tenderness. "Should I
+not be always with you if I consulted my inclination?--let me go."
+
+"No! consult your inclination a little longer."
+
+"Must I?"
+
+"Yes; that shall be your punishment."
+
+"For what? What have I done?" asked she with an air of great innocence.
+
+"You have made me happy, me who adore you," was the evasive reply.
+
+Josephine came in from her walk with a high color and beaming eyes, and
+screamed, "Run, Rose!"
+
+On this concise, and to us not very clear instruction, Rose slipped up
+the secret stair. She saw Camille come in and gravely unpack his little
+portmanteau, and dispose his things in the drawers with soldier-like
+neatness, and hum an agreeable march. She came and told Josephine.
+
+"Ah!" said Josephine with a little sigh of pleasure, and a gentle
+triumph in her eyes.
+
+She had not only got her desire, but had arrived at it her way,--woman's
+way, round about.
+
+This adroit benevolence led to more than she bargained for. She and
+Camille were now together every day: and their hearts, being under
+restraint in public, melted together all the more in their stolen
+interviews.
+
+At the third delicious interview the modest Camille begged Josephine to
+be his wife directly.
+
+Have you noticed those half tame deer that come up to you in a park so
+lovingly, with great tender eyes, and, being now almost within reach,
+stop short, and with bodies fixed like statues on pedestals, crane
+out their graceful necks for sugar, or bread, or a chestnut, or a
+pocket-handkerchief? Do but offer to put your hand upon them, away they
+bound that moment twenty yards, and then stand quite still, and look at
+your hand and you, with great inquiring, suspicious, tender eyes.
+
+So Josephine started at Camille's audacious proposal. "Never mention
+such a thing to me again: or--or, I will not walk with you any more:"
+then she thrilled with pleasure at the obnoxious idea, "she Camille's
+wife!" and colored all over--with rage, Camille thought. He promised
+submissively not to renew the topic: no more he did till next day.
+Josephine had spent nearly the whole interval in thinking of it; so she
+was prepared to put him down by calm reasons. She proceeded to do so,
+gently, but firmly.
+
+Lo and behold! what does he do, but meets her with just as many reasons,
+and just as calm ones: and urges them gently, but firmly.
+
+Heaven had been very kind to them: why should they be unkind to
+themselves? They had had a great escape: why not accept the happiness,
+as, being persons of honor, they had accepted the misery? with many
+other arguments, differing in other things, but agreeing in this, that
+they were all sober, grave, and full of common-sense.
+
+Finding him not defenceless on the score of reason, she shifted her
+ground and appealed to his delicacy. On this he appealed to her
+love, and then calm reason was jostled off the field, and passion and
+sentiment battled in her place.
+
+In these contests day by day renewed, Camille had many advantages.
+
+Rose, though she did not like him, had now declared on his side. She
+refused to show him the least attention. This threw him on Josephine:
+and when Josephine begged her to help reduce Camille to reason, her
+answer would be,--
+
+"Hypocrite!" with a kiss: or else she would say, with a half comic
+petulance, "No! no! I am on his side. Give him his own way, or he will
+make us all four miserable."
+
+Thus Josephine's ally went over to the enemy.
+
+And then this coy young lady's very power of resistance began to give
+way. She had now battled for months against her own heart: first for her
+mother; then, in a far more terrible conflict for Raynal, for honor and
+purity; and of late she had been battling, still against her own heart,
+for delicacy, for etiquette, things very dear to her, but not so great,
+holy, and sustaining as honor and charity that were her very household
+gods: and so, just when the motives of resistance were lowered, the
+length of the resistance began to wear her out.
+
+For nothing is so hard to her sex as a long steady struggle. In matters
+physical, this is the thing the muscles of the fair cannot stand; in
+matters intellectual and moral, the long strain it is that beats them
+dead.
+
+Do not look for a Bacona, a Newtona, a Handella, a Victoria Huga.
+
+Some American ladies tell us education has stopped the growth of these.
+
+No! mesdames. These are not in nature.
+
+They can bubble letters in ten minutes that you could no more deliver
+to order in ten days than a river can play like a fountain. They can
+sparkle gems of stories: they can flash little diamonds of poems. The
+entire sex has never produced one opera nor one epic that mankind could
+tolerate: and why? these come by long, high-strung labor. But, weak as
+they are in the long run of everything but the affections (and there
+giants), they are all overpowering while their gallop lasts. Fragilla
+shall dance any two of you flat on the floor before four o'clock, and
+then dance on till the peep of day.
+
+Only you trundle off to your business as usual, and could dance again
+the next night, and so on through countless ages.
+
+She who danced you into nothing is in bed, a human jelly tipped with
+headache.
+
+What did Josephine say to Rose one day? "I am tired of saying 'No! no!
+no! no! no!' forever and ever to him I love."
+
+But this was not all. She was not free from self-reproach. Camille's
+faith in her had stood firm. Hers in him had not. She had wronged him,
+first by believing him false, then by marrying another. One day she
+asked his pardon for this. He replied that he had forgiven that; but
+would she be good enough to make him forget it?
+
+"I wish I could."
+
+"You can. Marry me: then your relation to that man will seem but a
+hideous dream. I shall be able to say, looking at you, my wife, 'I was
+faithful: I suffered something for her; I came home: she loved me still;
+the proof is, she was my wife within three months of my return.'"
+
+When he said that to her in the Pleasaunce, if there had been a priest
+at hand--. In a word, Josephine longed to show him her love, yet wished
+not to shock her mother, nor offend her own sense of delicacy; but
+Camille cared for nothing but his love. To sacrifice love and happiness,
+even for a time, to etiquette, seemed to him to be trifling with the
+substance of great things for the shadow of petty things; and he said
+so: sometimes sadly, sometimes almost bitterly.
+
+So Josephine was a beleagured fortress, attacked with one will, and
+defended by troops, one-third of which were hot on the side of the
+besiegers.
+
+When singleness attacks division, you know the result beforehand. Why
+then should I spin words? I will not trace so ill-matched a contest step
+by step, sentence by sentence: let me rather hasten to relate the one
+peculiarity that arose out of this trite contest, where, under the names
+of Camille and Josephine, the two great sexes may be seen acting the
+whole world-wide distich,--
+
+     "It's a man's part to try,
+     And a woman's to deny [for a while?]."
+
+Finding her own resolutions oozing away, Josephine caught at another
+person.
+
+She said to Camille before Rose,--
+
+"Even if I could bring myself to snatch at happiness in this indelicate
+way--scarce a month after, oh!" And there ended the lady's sentence.
+In the absence of a legitimate full stop, she put one hand before her
+lovely face to hide it, and so no more. But some two minutes after she
+delivered the rest in the form and with the tone of a distinct remark,
+"No: my mother would never consent."
+
+"Yes, she would if you could be brought to implore her as earnestly as I
+implore you."
+
+"Now would she?" asked Josephine, turning quickly to her sister.
+
+"No, never. Our mother would look with horror on such a proposal. A
+daughter of hers to marry within a twelvemonth of her widowhood!"
+
+"There, you see, Camille."
+
+"And, besides, she loved Raynal so; she has not forgotten him as we
+have, almost."
+
+"Ungrateful creature that I am!" sighed Josephine!
+
+"She mourns for him every day. Often I see her eyes suddenly fill; that
+is for him. Josephine's influence with mamma is very great: it is double
+mine: but if we all went on our knees to her, the doctor and all, she
+would never consent."
+
+"There you see, Camille: and I could not defy my mother, even for you."
+
+Camille sighed.
+
+"I see everything is against me, even my love: for that love is too much
+akin to veneration to propose to you a clandestine marriage."
+
+"Oh, thank you! bless you for respecting as well as loving me, dear
+Camille," said Josephine.
+
+These words, uttered with gentle warmth, were some consolation to
+Camille, and confirmed him, as they were intended to do, in the above
+good resolution. He smiled.
+
+"Maladroit!" muttered Rose.
+
+"Why maladroit?" asked Camille, opening his eyes.
+
+"Let us talk of something else," replied Rose, coolly.
+
+Camille turned red. He understood that he had done something very
+stupid, but he could not conceive what. He looked from one sister to the
+other alternately. Rose was smiling ironically, Josephine had her eyes
+bent demurely on a handkerchief she was embroidering.
+
+That evening Camille drew Rose aside, and asked for an explanation of
+her "maladroit."
+
+"So it was," replied Rose, sharply.
+
+But as this did not make the matter quite clear, Camille begged a little
+further explanation.
+
+"Was it your part to make difficulties?"
+
+"No, indeed."
+
+"Was it for you to tell her a secret marriage would not be delicate?
+Do you think she will be behind you in delicacy? or that a love without
+respect will satisfy her? yet you must go and tell her you respected her
+too much to ask her to marry you secretly. In other words, situated as
+she is, you asked her not to marry you at all: she consented to that
+directly; what else could you expect?"
+
+"Maladroit! indeed," said Camille, "but I would not have said it, only I
+thought"--
+
+"You thought nothing would induce her to marry secretly, so you said to
+yourself, 'I will assume a virtue: I will do a bit of cheap self-denial:
+decline to the sound of trumpets what another will be sure to deny me if
+I don't--ha! ha!'--well, for your comfort, I am by no means so sure she
+might not have been brought to do ANYTHING for you, except openly defy
+mamma: but now of course"--
+
+And here this young lady's sentence ended: for the sisters, unlike in
+most things, were one in grammar.
+
+Camille was so disconcerted and sad at what he had done, that Rose began
+to pity him: so she rallied him a little longer in spite of her pity:
+and then all of a sudden gave him her hand, and said she would try and
+repair the mischief.
+
+He began to smother her hand with kisses.
+
+"Oh!" said she, "I don't deserve all that: I have a motive of my own;
+let me alone, child, do. Your unlucky speech will be quoted to me a
+dozen times. Never mind."
+
+Rose went and bribed Josephine to consent.
+
+"Come, mamma shall not know, and as for you, you shall scarcely move in
+the matter; only do not oppose me very violently, and all will be well."
+
+"Ah, Rose!" said Josephine; "it is delightful--terrible, I mean--to have
+a little creature about one that reads one like this. What shall I do?
+What shall I do?"
+
+"Why, do the best you can under all the circumstances. His wound is
+healed, you know; he must go back to the army; you have both suffered to
+the limits of mortal endurance. Is he to go away unhappy, in any
+doubt of your affection? and you to remain behind with the misery of
+self-reproach added to the desolation of absence?--think."
+
+"It is cruel. But to deceive my mother!"
+
+"Do not say deceive our mother; that is such a shocking phrase."
+
+Rose then reminded Josephine that their confessor had told them a wise
+reticence was not the same thing as a moral deceit. She reminded her,
+too, how often they had acted on his advice and always with good effect;
+how many anxieties and worries they had saved their mother by reticence.
+Josephine assented warmly to this.
+
+Was there not some reason to think they had saved their mother's very
+life by these reticences? Josephine assented. "And, Josephine, you are
+of age; you are your own mistress; you have a right to marry whom you
+please: and, sooner or later, you will certainly marry Camille. I doubt
+whether even our mother could prevail on you to refuse him altogether.
+So it is but a question of time, and of giving our mother pain, or
+sparing her pain. Dear mamma is old; she is prejudiced. Why shock her
+prejudices? She could not be brought to understand the case: these
+things never happened in her day. Everything seems to have gone by rule
+then. Let us do nothing to worry her for the short time she has to
+live. Let us take a course between pain to her and cruelty to you and
+Camille."
+
+These arguments went far to convince Josephine: for her own heart
+supported them. She went from her solid objections to untenable ones--a
+great point gained. She urged the difficulty, the impossibility of a
+secret marriage.
+
+Camille burst in here: he undertook at once to overcome these imaginary
+difficulties. "They could be married at a distance."
+
+"You will find no priest who will consent to do such a wicked thing as
+marry us without my mother's knowledge," objected Josephine.
+
+"Oh! as to that," said Rose, "you know the mayor marries people
+nowadays."
+
+"I will not be married again without a priest," said Josephine, sharply.
+
+"Nor I," said Camille. "I know a mayor who will do the civil forms for
+me, and a priest who will marry me in the sight of Heaven, and both will
+keep it secret for love of me till it shall please Josephine to throw
+off this disguise."
+
+"Who is the priest?" inquired Josephine, keenly.
+
+"An old cure: he lives near Frejus: he was my tutor, and the mayor is
+the mayor of Frejus, also an old friend of mine."
+
+"But what on earth will you say to them?"
+
+"That is my affair: I must give them some reasons which compel me to
+keep my marriage secret. Oh! I shall have to tell them some fibs, of
+course."
+
+"There, I thought so! I will not have you telling fibs; it lowers you."
+
+"Of course it does; but you can't have secrecy without a fib or two."
+
+"Fibs that will injure no one," said Rose, majestically.
+
+From this day Camille began to act as well as to talk. He bought a
+light caleche and a powerful horse, and elected factotum Dard his groom.
+Camille rode over to Frejus and told a made-up story to the old cure and
+the mayor, and these his old friends believed every word he said, and
+readily promised their services and strict secrecy.
+
+He told the young ladies what he had done.
+
+Rose approved. Josephine shook her head, and seeing matters going as
+her heart desired and her conscience did not quite approve, she suddenly
+affected to be next to nobody in the business--to be resigned, passive,
+and disposed of to her surprise by Queen Rose and King Camille, without
+herself taking any actual part in their proceedings.
+
+At last the great day arrived on which Camille and Josephine were to be
+married at Frejus.
+
+The mayor awaited them at eleven o'clock. The cure at twelve. The family
+had been duly prepared for this excursion by several smaller ones.
+
+Rose announced their intention over night; a part of it.
+
+"Mamma," said she, blushing a little, "Colonel Dujardin is good enough
+to take us to Frejus tomorrow. It is a long way, and we must breakfast
+early or we shall not be back to dinner."
+
+"Do so, my child. I hope you will have a fine day: and mind you take
+plenty of wraps with you in case of a shower."
+
+At seven o'clock the next morning Camille and the two ladies took a
+hasty cup of coffee together instead of breakfast, and then Dard brought
+the caleche round.
+
+The ladies got in, and Camille had just taken the reins in his hand,
+when Jacintha screamed to him from the hall, "Wait a moment, colonel,
+wait a moment! The doctor! don't go without the doctor!" And the next
+moment Dr. Aubertin appeared with his cloak on his arm, and, saluting
+the ladies politely, seated himself quietly in the vehicle before the
+party had recovered their surprise.
+
+The ladies managed to keep their countenances, but Dujardin's
+discomfiture was evident.
+
+He looked piteously at Josephine, and then asked Aubertin if they were
+to set him down anywhere in particular.
+
+"Oh, no; I am going with you to Frejus," was the quiet reply.
+
+Josephine quaked. Camille was devoured with secret rage: he lashed the
+horse and away they went.
+
+It was a silent party. The doctor seemed in a reverie. The others did
+not know what to think, much less to say. Aubertin sat by Camille's
+side; so the latter could hold no secret communication with either lady.
+
+Now it was not the doctor's habit to rise at this time of the morning:
+yet there he was, going with them to Frejus uninvited.
+
+Josephine was in agony; had their intention transpired through some
+imprudence of Camille?
+
+Camille was terribly uneasy. He concluded the secret had transpired
+through female indiscretion. Then they all tortured themselves as to the
+old man's intention. But what seemed most likely was, that he was with
+them to prevent a clandestine marriage by his bare presence, without
+making a scene and shocking Josephine's pride: and if so, was he there
+by his own impulse? No, it was rather to be feared that all this was
+done by order of the baroness. There was a finesse about it that smacked
+of a feminine origin, and the baroness was very capable of adopting such
+a means as this, to spare her own pride and her favorite daughter's.
+"The clandestine" is not all sugar. A more miserable party never went
+along, even to a wedding.
+
+After waiting a long time for the doctor to declare himself, they turned
+desperate, and began to chatter all manner of trifles. This had a good
+effect: it roused Aubertin from his reverie, and presently he gave them
+the following piece of information: "I told you the other day that a
+nephew of mine was just dead; a nephew I had not seen for many years.
+Well, my friends, I received last night a hasty summons to his funeral."
+
+"At Frejus?"
+
+"No, at Paris. The invitation was so pressing, that I was obliged to go.
+The letter informed me, however, that a diligence passes through Frejus,
+at eleven o'clock, for Paris. I heard you say you were going to
+Frejus; so I packed up a few changes of linen, and my MS., my work on
+entomology, which at my last visit to the capital all the publishers
+were mad enough to refuse: here it is. Apropos, has Jacintha put my bag
+into the carriage?"
+
+On this a fierce foot-search, and the bag was found. Meantime, Josephine
+leaned back in her seat with a sigh of thankfulness. She was more intent
+on not being found out than on being married. But Camille, who was more
+intent on being married than on not being found out, was asking himself,
+with fury, how on earth they should get rid of Aubertin in time.
+
+Well, of course, under such circumstances as these the diligence did
+not come to its time, nor till long after; and all the while, they were
+waiting for it they were failing their rendezvous with the mayor, and
+making their rendezvous with the curate impossible. But, above all,
+there was the risk of one or other of those friends coming up and
+blurting all out, taking for granted that the doctor must be in their
+confidence, or why bring him.
+
+At last, at half-past eleven o'clock, to their great relief, up came the
+diligence. The doctor prepared to take his place in the interior, when
+the conductor politely informed him that the vehicle stopped there a
+quarter of an hour.
+
+"In that case I will not abandon my friends," said the doctor,
+affectionately.
+
+One of his friends gnashed his teeth at this mark of affection. But
+Josephine smiled sweetly.
+
+At last he was gone; but it wanted ten minutes only to twelve.
+
+Josephine inquired amiably, whether it would not be as well to postpone
+matters to another day--meaning forever. "My ARDOR is chilled," said
+she, and showed symptoms of crying at what she had gone through.
+
+Camille replied by half dragging them to the mayor. That worthy received
+them with profound, though somewhat demure respect, and invited them to
+a table sumptuously served. The ladies, out of politeness, were about to
+assent, but Camille begged permission to postpone that part until after
+the ceremony.
+
+At last, to their astonishment, they were married. Then, with a promise
+to return and dine with the mayor, they went to the cure. Lo and behold!
+he was gone to visit a sick person. "He had waited a long time for
+them," said the servant.
+
+Josephine was much disconcerted, and showed a disposition to cry again.
+The servant, a good-natured girl, nosed a wedding, and offered to run
+and bring his reverence in a minute.
+
+Presently there came an old silvery-haired man, who addressed them all
+as his children. He took them to the church, and blessed their union;
+and for the first time Josephine felt as if Heaven consented. They took
+a gentle farewell of him, and went back to the mayor's to dine; and
+at this stage of the business Rose and Josephine at last effected a
+downright simultaneous cry, apropos of nothing that was then occurring.
+
+This refreshed them mightily, and they glowed at the mayor's table like
+roses washed with dew.
+
+But oh! how glad at heart they all were to find themselves in the
+carriage once more going home to Beaurepaire.
+
+Rose and Josephine sat intertwined on the back seat; Camille, the reins
+in his right hand, nearly turned his back on the horse, and leaned back
+over to them and purred to Rose and his wife with ineffable triumph and
+tenderness.
+
+The lovers were in Elysium, and Rose was not a little proud of her good
+management in ending all their troubles. Their mother received them
+back with great, and as they fancied, with singular, affection. She was
+beginning to be anxious about them, she said. Then her kindness gave
+these happy souls a pang it never gave them before.
+
+Since the above events scarce a fortnight had elapsed; but such
+a change! Camille sunburnt and healthy, and full of animation and
+confidence; Josephine beaming with suppressed happiness, and more
+beautiful than Rose could ever remember to have seen her. For a soft
+halo of love and happiness shone around her head; a new and indefinable
+attraction bloomed on her face. She was a wife. Her eye, that used to
+glance furtively on Camille, now dwelt demurely on him; dwelt with a
+sort of gentle wonder and admiration as well as affection, and, when
+he came or passed very near her, a keen observer might have seen her
+thrill.
+
+She kept a good deal out of her mother's way; for she felt within that
+her face must be too happy. She feared to shock her mother's grief with
+her radiance. She was ashamed of feeling unmixed heaven. But the flood
+of secret bliss she floated in bore all misgivings away. The pair were
+forever stealing away together for hours, and on these occasions Rose
+used to keep out of her mother's sight, until they should return. So
+then the new-married couple could wander hand in hand through the thick
+woods of Beaurepaire, whose fresh green leaves were now just out, and
+hear the distant cuckoo, and sit on mossy banks, and pour love into
+one another's eyes, and plan ages of happiness, and murmur their deep
+passion and their bliss almost more than mortal; could do all this and
+more, without shocking propriety. These sweet duets passed for trios:
+for on their return Rose would be out looking for them, or would go and
+meet them at some distance, and all three would go up together to the
+baroness, as from a joint excursion. And when they went up to their
+bedrooms, Josephine would throw her arms round her sister's neck, and
+sigh, "It is not happiness, it is beatitude!"
+
+Meantime, the baroness mourned for Raynal. Her grief showed no decrease.
+Rose even fancied at times she wore a gloomy and discontented look as
+well; but on reflection she attributed that to her own fancy, or to the
+contrast that had now sprung up in her sister's beaming complacency.
+
+Rose, when she found herself left day after day alone for hours, was sad
+and thought of Edouard. And this feeling gained on her day by day.
+
+At last, one afternoon, she locked herself in her own room, and, after a
+long contest with her pride, which, if not indomitable, was next door to
+it, she sat down to write him a little letter. Now, in this letter,
+in the place devoted by men to their after-thoughts, by women to their
+pretended after-thoughts; i. e., to what they have been thinking of
+all through the letter, she dropped a careless hint that all the party
+missed him very much, "even the obnoxious colonel, who, by-the-by, has
+transferred his services elsewhere. I have forgiven him that, because he
+has said civil things about you."
+
+Rose was reading her letter over again, to make sure that all the
+principal expressions were indistinct, and that the composition
+generally, except the postscript, resembled a Delphic oracle, when
+there was a hasty footstep, and a tap at her door, and in came Jacintha,
+excited.
+
+"He is come, mademoiselle," cried she, and nodded her head like a
+mandarin, only more knowingly; then she added, "So you may burn that."
+For her quick eye had glanced at the table.
+
+"Who is come?" inquired Rose, eagerly.
+
+"Why, your one?"
+
+"My one?" asked the young lady, reddening, "my what?"
+
+"The little one--Edouard--Monsieur Riviere."
+
+"Oh, Monsieur Riviere," said Rose, acting nonchalance. "Why could you
+not say so? you use such phrases, who can conjecture what you mean? I
+will come to Monsieur Riviere directly; mamma will be so glad."
+
+Jacintha gone, Rose tore up the letter and locked up the pieces, then
+ran to the glass. Etc.
+
+Edouard had been so profoundly miserable he could stand it no longer; in
+spite of his determination not to visit Beaurepaire while it contained
+a rival, he rode over to see whether he had not tormented himself idly:
+above all, to see the beloved face.
+
+Jacintha put him into the salle a manger. "By that you will see her
+alone," said the knowing Jacintha. He sat down, hat and whip in hand,
+and wondered how he should be received--if at all.
+
+In glides Rose all sprightliness and good-humor, and puts out her hand
+to him; the which he kisses.
+
+"How could I keep away so long?" asked he vaguely, and self-astonished.
+
+"How indeed, and we missing you so all the time!"
+
+"Have YOU missed me?" was the eager inquiry.
+
+"Oh, no!" was the cheerful reply; "but all the rest have."
+
+Presently the malicious thing gave a sudden start.
+
+"Oh! such a piece of news; you remember Colonel Dujardin, the obnoxious
+colonel?"
+
+No answer.
+
+"Transferred his attentions. Fancy!"
+
+"Who to?"
+
+"To Josephine and mamma. But such are the military. He only wanted to
+get rid of you: this done (through your want of spirit), he scorns the
+rich prize; so now I scorn HIM. Will you come for a walk?"
+
+"Oh, yes!"
+
+"We will go and look for my deserter. I say, tell me now; cannot I write
+to the commander-in-chief about this? a soldier has no right to be a
+deserter, has he? tell me, you are a public man, and know everything
+except my heart."
+
+"Is it not too bad to tease me to-day?"
+
+"Yes! but please! I have had few amusements of late. I find it so dull
+without you to tease."
+
+Formal permission to tease being conceded, she went that instant on the
+opposite tack, and began to tell him how she had missed him, and how
+sorry she had been anything should have occurred to vex their kind good
+friend. In short, Edouard spent a delightful day, for Rose took him one
+way to meet Josephine, who, she knew, was coming another. At night the
+last embers of jealousy got quenched, for Josephine was a wife now, and
+had already begun to tell Camille all her little innocent secrets; and
+she told him all about Edouard and Rose, and gave him his orders; so he
+treated Rose with great respect before Edouard; but paid her no marked
+attention; also he was affable to Riviere, who, having ceased to
+suspect, began to like him.
+
+In the course of the evening, the colonel also informed the baroness
+that he expected every day an order to join the army of the Rhine.
+
+Edouard pricked his ears.
+
+The baroness said no more than politeness dictated. She did not press
+him to stay, but treated his departure as a matter of course. Riviere
+rode home late in the evening in high spirits.
+
+The next day Rose varied her late deportment; she sang snatches of
+melody, going about the house; it was for all the world like a bird
+chirping. In the middle of one chirp Jacintha interfered. "Hush,
+mademoiselle, your mamma! she is at the bottom of the corridor."
+
+"What was I thinking of?" said Rose.
+
+"Oh! I dare say you know, mademoiselle," replied the privileged
+domestic.
+
+A letter of good news came from Aubertin. That summons to his nephew's
+funeral was an era in his harmless life.
+
+The said nephew was a rich man and an oddity; one of those who love to
+surprise folk. Moreover, he had no children, and detected his nephews
+and nieces being unnaturally civil to him. "Waiting to cut me up," was
+his generous reading of them. So with this he made a will, and there
+defied, as far as in him lay, the laws of nature; for he set his wealth
+a-flowing backwards instead of forwards; he handed his property up to an
+ancestor, instead of down to posterity.
+
+All this the doctor's pen set down with some humor, and in the calm
+spirit with which a genuine philosopher receives prosperity as well as
+adversity. Yet one natural regret escaped him; that all this wealth,
+since it was to come, had not come a year or two sooner.
+
+All at Beaurepaire knew what their dear old friend meant.
+
+His other news to them was that they might expect him any moment.
+
+So here was another cause of rejoicing.
+
+"I am so glad," said Josephine. "Now, perhaps, he will be able to
+publish his poor dear entomology, that the booksellers were all so
+unkind, so unfeeling about."
+
+I linger on the brink of painful scenes to observe that a sweet and
+loving friendship, such as this was between the good doctor and three
+persons of another sex, is one of the best treasures of the human heart.
+Poverty had strengthened it; yet now wealth could not weaken it. With
+no tie of blood it yet was filial, sisterly, brotherly, national,
+chivalrous; happy, unalloyed sentiment, free from ups and downs, from
+heats and chills, from rivalry, from caprice; and, indeed, from all
+mortal accidents but one--and why say one? methinks death itself does
+but suspend these gentle, rare, unselfish amities a moment, then waft
+them upward to their abiding home.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV.
+
+
+It was a fair morning in June: the sky was a bright, deep, lovely,
+speckless blue: the flowers and bushes poured perfume, and sprinkled
+song upon the balmy air. On such a day, so calm, so warm, so bright, so
+scented, so tuneful, to live and to be young is to be happy. With gentle
+hand it wipes all other days out of the memory; it smiles, it smells,
+it sings, and clouds and rain and biting wind seem as far off and
+impossible as grief and trouble.
+
+Camille and Josephine had stolen out, and strolled lazily up and down
+close under the house, drinking the sweet air, fragrant with perfume and
+melody; the blue sky, and love.
+
+Rose was in the house. She had missed them; but she thought they must be
+near; for they seldom took long walks early in the day. Meeting Jacintha
+on the landing of the great staircase, she asked her where her sister
+was.
+
+"Madame Raynal is gone for a walk. She has taken the colonel with her.
+You know she always takes the colonel out with her now."
+
+"That will do. You can finish your work."
+
+Jacintha went into Camille's room.
+
+Rose, who had looked as grave as a judge while Jacintha was present,
+bubbled into laughter. She even repeated Jacintha's words aloud, and
+chuckled over them. "You know she always takes the colonel out with her
+now--ha, ha, ha!"
+
+"Rose!" sighed a distant voice.
+
+She looked round, and saw the baroness at some distance in the corridor,
+coming slowly towards her, with eyes bent gloomily on the ground. Rose
+composed her features into a settled gravity, and went to meet her.
+
+"I wish to speak with you," said the baroness; "let us sit down; it is
+cool here."
+
+Rose ran and brought a seat without a back, but well stuffed, and set it
+against the wall. The old lady sat down and leaned back, and looked at
+Rose in silence a good while; then she said,--
+
+"There is room for you; sit down, for I want to speak seriously to you."
+
+"Yes, mamma; what is it?"
+
+"Turn a little round, and let me see your face."
+
+Rose complied; and began to feel a little uneasy.
+
+"Perhaps you can guess what I am going to say to you?"
+
+"I have no idea."
+
+"Well, I am going to put a question to you."
+
+"With all my heart, dear mamma."
+
+"I invite you to explain to me the most singular, the most unaccountable
+thing that ever fell under my notice. Will you do this for your mother?"
+
+"O mamma! of course I will do anything to please you that I can; but,
+indeed, I don't know what you mean."
+
+"I am going to tell you."
+
+The old lady paused. The young one, naturally enough, felt a chill of
+vague anxiety strike across her frame.
+
+"Rose," said the old lady, speaking very gently but firmly, and leaning
+in a peculiar way on her words, while her eye worked like an ice gimlet
+on her daughter's face, "a little while ago, when my poor Raynal--our
+benefactor--was alive--and I was happy--you all chilled my happiness by
+your gloom: the whole house seemed a house of mourning--tell me now why
+was this."
+
+"Mamma!" said Rose, after a moment's hesitation, "we could hardly be
+gay. Sickness in the house! And if Colonel Raynal was alive, still he
+was absent, and in danger."
+
+"Oh! then it was out of regard for him we were all dispirited?"
+
+"Why, I suppose so," said Rose, stoutly; but then colored high at her
+own want of candor. However, she congratulated herself that her mother's
+suspicion was confined to past events.
+
+Her self-congratulation on that score was short; for the baroness, after
+eying her grimly for a second or two in silence, put her this awkward
+question plump.
+
+"If so, tell me why is it that ever since that black day when the news
+of his DEATH reached us, the whole house has gone into black, and has
+gone out of mourning?"
+
+"Mamma," stammered Rose, "what DO you mean?"
+
+"Even poor Camille, who was so pale and wan, has recovered like magic."
+
+"O mamma! is not that fancy?" said Rose, piteously. "Of what do you
+suspect me? Can you think I am unfeeling--ungrateful? I should not be
+YOUR daughter."
+
+"No, no," said the baroness, "to do you justice, you attempt sorrow;
+as you put on black. But, my poor child, you do it with so little skill
+that one sees a horrible gayety breaking through that thin disguise:
+you are no true mourners: you are like the mutes or the undertakers at
+a funeral, forced grief on the surface of your faces, and frightful
+complacency below."
+
+"Tra la! lal! la! la! Tra la! la! Tra la! la!" carolled Jacintha, in the
+colonel's room hard by.
+
+The ladies looked at one another: Rose in great confusion.
+
+"Tra la! la! la! Tra lal! lal! la! la! la!"
+
+"Jacintha!" screamed Rose angrily.
+
+"Hush! not a word," said the baroness. "Why remonstrate with HER?
+Servants are but chameleons: they take the color of those they serve. Do
+not cry. I wanted your confidence, not your tears, love. There, I will
+not twice in one day ask you for your heart: it would be to lower the
+mother, and give the daughter the pain of refusing it, and the regret,
+sure to come one day, of having refused it. I will discover the meaning
+of it all by myself." She went away with a gentle sigh; and Rose was cut
+to the heart by her words; she resolved, whatever it might cost her and
+Josephine, to make a clean breast this very day. As she was one of those
+who act promptly, she went instantly in search of her sister, to gain
+her consent, if possible.
+
+Now, the said Josephine was in the garden walking with Camille, and
+uttering a wife's tender solicitudes.
+
+"And must you leave me? must you risk your life again so soon; the life
+on which mine depends?"
+
+"My dear, that letter I received from headquarters two days ago, that
+inquiry whether my wound was cured. A hint, Josephine--a hint too broad
+for any soldier not to take."
+
+"Camille, you are very proud," said Josephine, with an accent of
+reproach, and a look of approval.
+
+"I am obliged to be. I am the husband of the proudest woman in France."
+
+"Hush! not so loud: there is Dard on the grass."
+
+"Dard!" muttered the soldier with a word of meaning. "Josephine," said
+he after a pause, and a little peevishly, "how much longer are we to
+lower our voices, and turn away our eyes from each other, and be ashamed
+of our happiness?"
+
+"Five months longer, is it not?" answered Josephine quietly.
+
+"Five months longer!"
+
+Josephine was hurt at this, and for once was betrayed into a serious and
+merited remonstrance.
+
+"Is this just?" said she. "Think of two months ago: yes, but two months
+ago, you were dying. You doubted my love, because it could not overcome
+my virtue and my gratitude: yet you might have seen it was destroying my
+life. Poor Raynal, my husband, my benefactor, died. Then I could do more
+for you, if not with delicacy, at least with honor; but no! words, and
+looks, and tender offices of love were not enough, I must give stronger
+proof. Dear Camille, I have been reared in a strict school: and perhaps
+none of your sex can know what it cost me to go to Frejus that day with
+him I love."
+
+"My own Josephine!"
+
+"I made but one condition: that you would not rob me of my mother's
+respect: to her our hasty marriage would appear monstrous, heartless.
+You consented to be secretly happy for six months. One fortnight has
+passed, and you are discontented again."
+
+"Oh, no! do not think so. It is every word true. I am an ungrateful
+villain."
+
+"How dare you say so? and to me! No! but you are a man."
+
+"So I have been told; but my conduct to you, sweet one, has not been
+that of a man from first to last. Yet I could die for you, with a smile
+on my lips. But when I think that once I lifted this sacrilegious hand
+against your life--oh!"
+
+"Do not be silly, Camille. I love you all the better for loving me well
+enough to kill me. What woman would not? I tell you, you foolish thing,
+you are a man: monseigneur is one of the lordly sex, that is accustomed
+to have everything its own way. My love, in a world that is full of
+misery, here are two that are condemned to be secretly happy a few
+months longer: a hard fate for one of your sex, it seems: but it is so
+much sweeter than the usual lot of mine, that really I cannot share your
+misery," and she smiled joyously.
+
+"Then share my happiness, my dear wife."
+
+"I do; only mine is deep, not loud."
+
+"Why, Dard is gone, and we are out of doors; will the little birds
+betray us?"
+
+"The lower windows are open, and I saw Jacintha in one of the rooms."
+
+"Jacintha? we are in awe of the very servants. Well, if I must not
+say it loud I will say it often," and putting his mouth to her ear, he
+poured a burning whisper of love into it--"My love! my angel! my wife!
+my wife! my wife!"
+
+She turned her swimming eyes on him.
+
+"My husband!" she whispered in return.
+
+Rose came out, and found them billing and cooing. "You MUST not be so
+happy, you two," said she authoritatively.
+
+"How can we help it?" asked Camille.
+
+"You must and shall help it, somehow," retorted this little tyrant.
+"Mamma suspects. She has given me such a cross-examination, my blood
+runs cold. No, on second thoughts, kiss her again, and you may both be
+as happy as you like; for I am going to tell mamma all, and no power on
+earth shall hinder me."
+
+"Rose," said Camille, "you are a sensible girl; and I always said so."
+
+But Josephine was horrified. "What! tell my mother that within a month
+of my husband's death?"--
+
+"Don't say your husband," put in Camille wincing; "the priest never
+confirmed that union; words spoken before a magistrate do not make a
+marriage in the sight of Heaven."
+
+Josephine cut him short. "Amongst honorable men and women all oaths are
+alike sacred: and Heaven's eye is in a magistrate's room as in a church.
+A daughter of Beaurepaire gave her hand to him, and called herself
+his wife. Therefore, she was his wife: and is his widow. She owes him
+everything; the house you are all living in among the rest. She ought
+to be proud of her brief connection with that pure, heroic spirit, and,
+when she is so little noble as to disown him, then say that gratitude
+and justice have no longer a place among mankind."
+
+"Come into the chapel," said Camille, with a voice that showed he was
+hurt.
+
+They entered the chapel, and there they saw something that thoroughly
+surprised them: a marble monument to the memory of Raynal. It leaned
+at present against the wall below the place prepared to receive it.
+The inscription, short, but emphatic, and full of feeling, told of the
+battles he had fought in, including the last fatal skirmish, and his
+marriage with the heiress of Beaurepaire; and, in a few soldier-like
+words, the uprightness, simplicity, and generosity of his character.
+
+They were so touched by this unexpected trait in Camille that they both
+threw their arms round his neck by one impulse. "Am I wrong to be proud
+of him?" said Josephine, triumphantly.
+
+"Well, don't say too much to me," said Camille, looking down confused.
+"One tries to be good; but it is very hard--to some of us--not to you,
+Josephine; and, after all, it is only the truth that we have written on
+that stone. Poor Raynal! he was my old comrade; he saved me from death,
+and not a soldier's death--drowning; and he was a better man than I am,
+or ever shall be. Now he is dead, I can say these things. If I had said
+them when he was alive, it would have been more to my credit."
+
+They all three went back towards the house; and on the way Rose told
+them all that had passed between the baroness and her. When she came to
+the actual details of that conversation, to the words, and looks, and
+tones, Josephine's uneasiness rose to an overpowering height; she even
+admitted that further concealment would be very difficult.
+
+"Better tell her than let her find out," said Rose. "We must tell her
+some day."
+
+At last, after a long and agitated discussion, Josephine consented;
+but Rose must be the one to tell. "So then, you at least will make
+your peace with mamma," argued Josephine, "and let us go in and do
+this before our courage fails; besides, it is going to rain, and it has
+turned cold. Where have all these clouds come from? An hour ago there
+was not one in the sky."
+
+They went, with hesitating steps and guilty looks, to the saloon. Their
+mother was not there. Here was a reprieve.
+
+Rose had an idea. She would take her to the chapel, and show her the
+monument, and that would please her with poor Camille. "After that,"
+said Rose, "I will begin by telling her all the misery you have both
+gone through; and, when she pities you, then I will show her it was all
+my fault your misery ended in a secret marriage."
+
+The confederates sat there in a chilly state, waiting for the baroness.
+At last, as she did not come, Rose got up to go to her. "When the mind
+is made up, it is no use being cowardly, and putting off," said she,
+firmly. For all that, her cheek had but little color left in it, when
+she left her chair with this resolve.
+
+Now as Rose went down the long saloon to carry out their united resolve,
+Jacintha looked in; and, after a hasty glance to see who was present,
+she waited till Rose came up to her, and then whipped a letter from
+under her apron and gave it her.
+
+"For my mistress," said she, with an air of mystery.
+
+"Why not take it to her, then?" inquired Rose.
+
+"I thought you might like to see it first, mademoiselle," said Jacintha,
+with quiet meaning.
+
+"Is it from the dear doctor?" asked Josephine.
+
+"La, no, mademoiselle, don't you know the doctor is come home? Why, he
+has been in the house near an hour. He is with my lady."
+
+The doctor proved Jacintha correct by entering the room in person soon
+after; on this Rose threw down the letter, and she and the whole party
+were instantly occupied in greeting him.
+
+When the ladies had embraced him and Camille shaken hands with him, they
+plied him with a thousand questions. Indeed, he had not half satisfied
+their curiosity, when Rose happened to catch sight of the letter again,
+and took it up to carry to the baroness. She now, for the first time,
+eyed it attentively, and the consequence was she uttered an exclamation,
+and took the first opportunity to beckon Aubertin.
+
+He came to her; and she put the letter into his hand.
+
+He put up his glasses, and eyed it. "Yes!" whispered he, "it is from
+HIM."
+
+Josephine and Camille saw something was going on; they joined the other
+two, with curiosity in their faces.
+
+Rose put her hand on a small table near her, and leaned a moment. She
+turned half sick at a letter coming from the dead. Josephine now came
+towards her with a face of concern, and asked what was the matter.
+
+The reply came from Aubertin. "My poor friends," said he, solemnly,
+"this is one of those fearful things that you have not seen in your
+short lives, but it has been more than once my lot to witness it. The
+ships that carry letters from distant countries vary greatly in speed,
+and are subject to detaining accidents. Yes, this is the third time I
+have seen a letter come written by a hand known to be cold. The baroness
+is a little excited to-day, I don't know from what cause. With your
+approbation, Madame Raynal, I will read this letter before I let her see
+it."
+
+"Read it, if you please."
+
+"Shall I read it out?"
+
+"Certainly. There may be some wish expressed in it; oh, I hope there
+is!"
+
+Camille, from delicacy, retired to some little distance, and the doctor
+read the letter in a low and solemn voice.
+
+
+"MY DEAR MOTHER,--I hope all are well at Beaurepaire, as I am, or I hope
+soon to be. I received a wound in our last skirmish; not a very severe
+one; but it put an end to my writing for some time."
+
+
+"Poor fellow! it was his death wound. Why, when was this written?--why,"
+and the doctor paused, and seemed stupefied: "why, my dears, has my
+memory gone, or"--and again he looked eagerly at the letter--"what was
+the date of the battle in which he was killed? for this letter is dated
+the 15th of May. Is it a dream? no! this was written since the date of
+his death."
+
+"No, doctor," said Rose, "you deceive yourself."
+
+"Why, what was the date of the Moniteur, then?" asked Aubertin, in great
+agitation.
+
+"Considerably later than this," said Camille.
+
+"I don't think so; the journal! where is it?"
+
+"My mother has it locked up. I'll run."
+
+"No, Rose; no one but me. Now, Josephine, do not you go and give way to
+hopes that may be delusive. I must see that journal directly. I will go
+to the baroness. I shall excuse her less than you would."
+
+He was scarcely gone when a cry of horror filled the room, a cry as of
+madness falling like a thunderbolt on a human mind. It was Josephine,
+who up to this had not uttered one word. But now she stood, white as
+a corpse, in the middle of the room, and wrung her hands. "What have
+I done? What shall I do? It was the 3d of May. I see it before me in
+letters of fire; the 3d of May! the 3d of May!--and he writes the 15th."
+
+"No! no!" cried Camille wildly. "It was long, long after time 3d."
+
+"It was the 3d of May," repeated Josephine in a hoarse voice that none
+would have known for hers.
+
+Camille ran to her with words of comfort and hope; he did not share her
+fears. He remembered about when the Moniteur came, though not the very
+day. He threw his arm lovingly round her as if to protect her against
+these shadowy terrors. Her dilating eyes seemed fixed on something
+distant in space or time, at some horrible thing coming slowly towards
+her. She did not see Camille approach her, but the moment she felt him
+she turned upon him swiftly.
+
+"Do you love me?" still in the hoarse voice that had so little in it of
+Josephine. "I mean, does one grain of respect or virtue mingle in your
+love for me?"
+
+"What words are these, my wife?"
+
+"Then leave Raynal's house upon the instant. You wonder I can be so
+cruel? I wonder too; and that I can see my duty so clear in one short
+moment. But I have lived twenty years since that letter came. Oh! my
+brain has whirled through a thousand agonies. And I have come back a
+thousand times to the same thing; you and I must see each other's face
+no more."
+
+"Oh!" cried Rose, "is there no way but this?"
+
+"Take care," she screamed, wildly, to her and Camille, "I am on the
+verge of madness; is it for you two to thrust me over the precipice?
+Come, now, if you are a man of honor, if you have a spark of gratitude
+towards the poor woman who has given you all except her fair name--that
+she will take to the grave in spite of you all--promise that you will
+leave Raynal's house this minute if he is alive, and let me die in honor
+as I have lived."
+
+"No, no!" cried Camille, terror-stricken; "it cannot be. Heaven is
+merciful, and Heaven sees how happy we are. Be calm! these are idle
+fears; be calm! I say. For if it is so I will obey you. I will stay; I
+will go; I will die; I will live; I will obey you."
+
+"Swear this to me by the thing you hold most sacred," she almost
+shrieked.
+
+"I swear by my love for you," was his touching reply.
+
+Ere they had recovered a miserable composure after this passionate
+outburst, all the more terrible as coming from a creature so tender
+as Josephine, agitated voices were heard at the door, and the baroness
+tottered in, followed by the doctor, who was trying in vain to put some
+bounds to her emotion and her hopes.
+
+"Oh, my children! my children!" cried she, trembling violently. "Here,
+Rose, my hands shake so; take this key, open the cabinet, there is the
+Moniteur. What is the date?"
+
+The journal was found, and rapidly examined. The date was the 20th of
+May.
+
+"There!" cried Camille. "I told you!"
+
+The baroness uttered a feeble moan. Her hopes died as suddenly as they
+had been born, and she sank drooping into a chair, with a bitter sigh.
+
+Camille stole a joyful look at Josephine. She was in the same attitude
+looking straight before her as at a coming horror. Presently Rose
+uttered a faint cry, "The battle was BEFORE."
+
+"To be sure," cried the doctor. "You forget, it is not the date of the
+paper we want, but of the battle it records. For Heaven's sake, when was
+the battle?"
+
+"The 3d of May," said Josephine, in a voice that seemed to come from the
+tomb.
+
+Rose's hands that held the journal fell like a dead weight upon her
+knees, journal and all. She whispered, "It was the 3d of May."
+
+"Ah!" cried the baroness, starting up, "he may yet be alive. He must be
+alive. Heaven is merciful! Heaven would not take my son from me, a poor
+old woman who has not long to live. There was a letter; where is the
+letter?"
+
+"Are we mad, not to read the letter?" said the doctor. "I had it; it has
+dropped from my old fingers when I went for the journal."
+
+A short examination of the room showed the letter lying crumpled up near
+the door. Camille gave it to the baroness. She tried to read it, but
+could not.
+
+"I am old," said she; "my hand shakes and my eyes are troubled. This
+young gentleman will read it to us. His eyes are not dim and troubled.
+Something tells me that when I hear this letter, I shall find out
+whether my son lives. Why do you not read it to me, Camille?" cried she,
+almost fiercely.
+
+Camille, thus pressed, obeyed mechanically, and began to read Raynal's
+letter aloud, scarce knowing what he did, but urged and driven by the
+baroness.
+
+
+"MY DEAR MOTHER,--I hope all are well at Beaurepaire, as I am, or I hope
+soon to be. I received a wound in our last skirmish; not a very severe
+one, but it put an end to my writing for some time."
+
+
+"Go on, dear Camille! go on."
+
+"The page ends there, madame."
+
+The paper was thin, and Camille, whose hand trembled, had some
+difficulty in detaching the leaves from one another. He succeeded,
+however, at last, and went on reading and writhing.
+
+
+"By the way, you must address your next letter to me as Colonel Raynal.
+I was promoted just before this last affair, but had not time to tell
+you; and my wound stopped my writing till now."
+
+
+"There, there!" cried the baroness. "He was Colonel Raynal, and Colonel
+Raynal was not killed."
+
+The doctor implored her not to interrupt.
+
+"Go on, Camille. Why do you hesitate? what is the matter? Do for pity's
+sake go on, sir."
+
+Camille cast a look of agony around, and put his hand to his brow,
+on which large drops of cold perspiration, like a death dew, were
+gathering; but driven to the stake on all sides, he gasped on rather
+than read, for his eye had gone down the page.
+
+"A namesake of mine, Commandant Raynal,"--
+
+"Ah!"
+
+"has not been--so fortunate. He"--
+
+"Go on! go on!"
+
+The wretched man could now scarcely utter Raynal's words; they came from
+him in a choking groan.
+
+"he was killed, poor fellow! while heading a gallant charge upon the
+enemy's flank."
+
+He ground the letter convulsively in his hand, then it fell all crumpled
+on the floor.
+
+"Bless you, Camille!" cried the baroness, "bless you! bless you! I have
+a son still."
+
+She stooped with difficulty, took up the letter, and, kissing it again
+and again, fell on her knees, and thanked Heaven aloud before them all.
+Then she rose and went hastily out, and her voice was heard crying very
+loud, "Jacintha! Jacintha!"
+
+The doctor followed in considerable anxiety for the effects of this
+violent joy on so aged a person. Three remained behind, panting and
+pale like those to whom dead Lazarus burst the tomb, and came forth in a
+moment, at a word. Then Camille half kneeled, half fell, at Josephine's
+feet, and, in a voice choked with sobs, bade her dispose of him.
+
+She turned her head away. "Do not speak to me; do not look at me; if we
+look at one another, we are lost. Go! die at your post, and I at mine."
+
+He bowed his head, and kissed her dress, then rose calm as despair, and
+white as death, and, with his knees knocking under him, tottered away
+like a corpse set moving.
+
+He disappeared from the house.
+
+The baroness soon came back, triumphant and gay.
+
+"I have sent her to bid them ring the bells in the village. The poor
+shall be feasted; all shall share our joy: my son was dead, and lives.
+Oh, joy! joy! joy!"
+
+"Mother!" shrieked Josephine.
+
+"Mad woman that I am, I am too boisterous. Help me, Rose! she is going
+to faint; her lips are white."
+
+Dr. Aubertin and Rose brought a chair. They forced Josephine into it.
+She was not the least faint; yet her body obeyed their hands just like
+a dead body. The baroness melted into tears; tears streamed from Rose's
+eyes. Josephine's were dry and stony, and fixed on coming horror. The
+baroness looked at her with anxiety. "Thoughtless old woman! It was
+too sudden; it is too much for my dear child; too much for me," and she
+kneeled, and laid her aged head on her daughter's bosom, saying feebly
+through her tears, "too much joy, too much joy!"
+
+Josephine took no notice of her. She sat like one turned to stone
+looking far away over her mother's head with rigid eyes fixed on the air
+and on coming horrors.
+
+Rose felt her arm seized. It was Aubertin. He too was pale now, though
+not before. He spoke in a terrible whisper to Rose, his eye fixed on the
+woman of stone that sat there.
+
+"IS THIS JOY?"
+
+Rose, by a mighty effort, raised her eyes and confronted his full. "What
+else should it be?" said she.
+
+And with these words this Spartan girl was her sister's champion once
+more against all comers, friend or foe.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI.
+
+
+Dr. Aubertin received one day a note from a publishing bookseller, to
+inquire whether he still thought of giving the world his valuable work
+on insects. The doctor was amazed. "My valuable work! Why, Rose, they
+all refused it, and this person in particular recoiled from it as if my
+insects could sting on paper."
+
+The above led to a correspondence, in which the convert to insects
+explained that the work must be published at the author's expense, the
+publisher contenting himself with the profits. The author, thirsting for
+the public, consented. Then the publisher wrote again to say that the
+immortal treatise must be spiced; a little politics flung in: "Nothing
+goes down, else." The author answered in some heat that he would not
+dilute things everlasting with the fleeting topics of the day, nor
+defile science with politics. On this his Mentor smoothed him down,
+despising him secretly for not seeing that a book is a matter of trade
+and nothing else. It ended in Aubertin going to Paris to hatch his
+Phoenix. He had not been there a week, when a small deputation called on
+him, and informed him he had been elected honorary member of a certain
+scientific society. The compliment was followed by others, till at last
+certain ladies, with the pliancy of their sex, find out they had always
+secretly cared for butterflies. Then the naturalist smelt a rat, or, in
+other words, began to scent that entomology, a form of idiocy in a poor
+man, is a graceful decoration of the intellect in a rich one.
+
+Philosopher without bile, he saw through this, and let it amuse, not
+shock him. His own species, a singularly interesting one in my opinion,
+had another trait in reserve for him.
+
+He took a world of trouble to find out the circumstances of his nephew's
+nephews and nieces: then he made arrangements for distributing a large
+part of his legacy among them. His intentions and the proportions of his
+generosity transpired.
+
+Hitherto they had been silent, but now they all fell-to and abused him:
+each looking only to the amount of his individual share, not at the sum
+total the doctor was giving way to an ungrateful lot.
+
+The donor was greatly amused, and noted down the incident and some
+of the remarks in his commonplace book, under the general head of
+"Bestiarium;" and the particular head of "Homo."
+
+Paris with its seductions netted the good doctor, and held him two or
+three months; would have detained him longer, but for alarming accounts
+the baroness sent of Josephine's health. These determined him to return
+to Beaurepaire; and, must I own it, the announcement was no longer
+hailed at Beaurepaire with universal joy as heretofore.
+
+
+Josephine Raynal, late Dujardin, is by this time no stranger to my
+intelligent reader. I wish him to bring his knowledge of her character
+and her sensibility to my aid. Imagine, as the weary hours and days and
+weeks roll over her head, what this loving woman feels for her lover
+whom she has dismissed; what this grateful wife feels for the benefactor
+she has unwittingly wronged; but will never wrong with her eyes open;
+what this lady pure as snow, and proud as fire, feels at the seeming
+frailty into which a cruel combination of circumstances has entrapped
+her.
+
+Put down the book a moment: shut your eyes: and imagine this strange and
+complicated form of human suffering.
+
+Her mental sufferings were terrible; and for some time Rose feared for
+her reason. At last her agonies subsided into a listlessness and apathy
+little less alarming. She seemed a creature descending inch by inch into
+the tomb. Indeed, I fully believe she would have died of despair: but
+one of nature's greatest forces stepped into the arena and fought on the
+side of life. She was affected with certain bilious symptoms that added
+to Rose's uneasiness, but Jacintha assured her it was nothing, and would
+retire and leave the sufferer better. Jacintha, indeed, seemed now to
+take a particular interest in Josephine, and was always about her with
+looks of pity and interest.
+
+"Good creature!" thought Rose, "she sees my sister is unhappy: and that
+makes her more attentive and devoted to her than ever."
+
+One day these three were together in Josephine's room. Josephine was
+mechanically combing her long hair, when all of a sudden she stretched
+out her hand and cried, "Rose!"
+
+Rose ran to her, and coming behind her saw in the glass that her
+lips were colorless. She screamed to Jacintha, and between them they
+supported Josephine to the bed. She had hardly touched it when she
+fainted dead away. "Mamma! mamma!" cried Rose in her terror.
+
+"Hush!" cried Jacintha roughly, "hold your tongue: it is only a faint.
+Help me loosen her: don't make any noise, whatever." They loosened her
+stays, and applied the usual remedies, but it was some time before she
+came-to. At last the color came back to her lips, then to her cheek, and
+the light to her eye. She smiled feebly on Jacintha and Rose, and asked
+if she had not been insensible.
+
+"Yes, love, and frightened us--a little--not much--oh, dear! oh, dear!"
+
+"Don't be alarmed, sweet one, I am better. And I will never do it again,
+since it frightens you." Then Josephine said to her sister in a low
+voice, and in the Italian language, "I hoped it was death, my sister;
+but he comes not to the wretched."
+
+"If you hoped that," replied Rose in the same language, "you do not love
+your poor sister who so loves you."
+
+While the Italian was going on, Jacintha's dark eyes glanced
+suspiciously on each speaker in turn. But her suspicions were all wide
+of the mark.
+
+"Now may I go and tell mamma?" asked Rose.
+
+"No, mademoiselle, you shall not," said Jacintha. "Madame Raynal, do
+take my side, and forbid her."
+
+"Why, what is it to you?" said Rose, haughtily.
+
+"If it was not something to me, should I thwart my dear young lady?"
+
+"No. And you shall have your own way, if you will but condescend to give
+me a reason."
+
+This to some of us might appear reasonable, but not to Jacintha: it even
+hurt her feelings.
+
+"Mademoiselle Rose," she said, "when you were little and used to ask me
+for anything, did I ever say to you, 'Give me a REASON first'?"
+
+"There! she is right," said Josephine. "We should not make terms with
+tried friends. Come, we will pay her devotion this compliment. It is
+such a small favor. For my part I feel obliged to her for asking it."
+
+Josephine's health improved steadily from that day. Her hollow cheeks
+recovered their plump smoothness, and her beauty its bloom, and her
+person grew more noble and statue-like than ever, and within she felt
+a sense of indomitable vitality. Her appetite had for some time been
+excessively feeble and uncertain, and her food tasteless; but of late,
+by what she conceived to be a reaction such as is common after youth has
+shaken off a long sickness, her appetite had been not only healthy
+but eager. The baroness observed this, and it relieved her of a large
+portion of her anxiety. One day at dinner her maternal heart was so
+pleased with Josephine's performance that she took it as a personal
+favor, "Well done, Josephine," said she; "that gives your mother
+pleasure to see you eat again. Soup and bouillon: and now twice you
+have been to Rose for some of that pate, which does you so much credit,
+Jacintha."
+
+Josephine colored high at this compliment.
+
+"It is true," said she, "I eat like a pig;" and, with a furtive glance
+at the said pate, she laid down her knife and fork, and ate no more of
+anything. The baroness had now a droll misgiving.
+
+"The doctor will be angry with me," said she: "he will find her as well
+as ever."
+
+"Madame," said Jacintha hastily, "when does the doctor come, if I may
+make so bold, that I may get his room ready, you know?"
+
+"Well thought of, Jacintha. He comes the day after to-morrow, in the
+afternoon."
+
+At night when the young ladies went up to bed, what did they find but a
+little cloth laid on a little table in Josephine's room, and the remains
+of the pate she had liked. Rose burst out laughing. "Look at that dear
+duck of a goose, Jacintha! Our mother's flattery sank deep: she thinks
+we can eat her pates at all hours of the day and night. Shall I send it
+away?"
+
+"No," said Josephine, "that would hurt her culinary pride, and perhaps
+her affection: only cover it up, dear, for just now I am not in the
+humor: it rather turns me."
+
+It was covered up. The sisters retired to rest. In the morning Rose
+lifted the cover and found the plate cleared, polished. She was
+astounded.
+
+The large tapestried chamber, once occupied by Camille Dujardin, was
+now turned into a sitting-room, and it was a favorite on account of the
+beautiful view from the windows.
+
+One day Josephine sat there alone with some work in her hand; but the
+needle often stopped, and the fair head drooped. She heaved a deep sigh.
+To her surprise it was echoed by a sigh that, like her own, seemed to
+come from a heart full of sighs.
+
+She turned hastily round and saw Jacintha.
+
+Now Josephine had all a woman's eye for reading faces, and she was
+instantly struck by a certain gravity in Jacintha's gaze, and a flutter
+which the young woman was suppressing with tolerable but not complete
+success.
+
+Disguising the uneasiness this discovery gave her, she looked her
+visitor full in the face, and said mildly, but a little coldly, "Well,
+Jacintha?"
+
+Jacintha lowered her eyes and muttered slowly,--
+
+"The doctor--comes--to-day," then raised her eyes all in a moment to
+take Josephine off her guard; but the calm face was impenetrable.
+So then Jacintha added, "to our misfortune," throwing in still more
+meaning.
+
+"To our misfortune? A dear old friend--like him?"
+
+Jacintha explained. "That old man makes me shake. You are never safe
+with him. So long as his head is in the clouds, you might take his shoes
+off, and on he'd walk and never know it; but every now and then he comes
+out of the clouds all in one moment, without a word of warning, and when
+he does his eye is on everything, like a bird's. Then he is so old: he
+has seen a heap. Take my word for it, the old are more knowing than the
+young, let them be as sharp as you like: the old have seen everything.
+WE have only heard talk of the most part, with here and there a glimpse.
+To know life to the bottom you must live it out, from the soup to the
+dessert; and that is what the doctor has done, and now he is coming
+here. And Mademoiselle Rose will go telling him everything; and if she
+tells him half what she has seen, your secret will be no secret to that
+old man."
+
+"My secret!" gasped Josephine, turning pale.
+
+"Don't look so, madame: don't be frightened at poor Jacintha. Sooner or
+later you MUST trust somebody besides Mademoiselle Rose."
+
+Josephine looked at her with inquiring, frightened eyes.
+
+Jacintha drew nearer to her.
+
+"Mademoiselle,--I beg pardon, madame,--I carried you in my arms when I
+was a child. When I was a girl you toddled at my side, and held my gown,
+and lisped my name, and used to put your little arms round my neck, and
+kissed me, you would; and if ever I had the least pain or sickness your
+dear little face would turn as sorrowful, and all the pretty color leave
+it for Jacintha; and now you are in trouble, in sore trouble, yet you
+turn away from me, you dare not trust me, that would be cut in pieces
+ere I would betray you. Ah, mademoiselle, you are wrong. The poor can
+feel: they have all seen trouble, and a servant is the best of friends
+where she has the heart to love her mistress; and do not I love you?
+Pray do not turn from her who has carried you in her arms, and laid you
+to sleep upon her bosom, many's and many's the time."
+
+Josephine panted audibly. She held out her hand eloquently to Jacintha,
+but she turned her head away and trembled.
+
+Jacintha cast a hasty glance round the room. Then she trembled too at
+what she was going to say, and the effect it might have on the young
+lady. As for Josephine, terrible as the conversation had become, she
+made no attempt to evade it: she remained perfectly passive. It was the
+best way to learn how far Jacintha had penetrated her secret, if at all.
+
+Jacintha looked fearfully round and whispered in Josephine's ear, "When
+the news of Colonel Raynal's death came, you wept, but the color came
+back to your cheek. When the news of his life came, you turned to stone.
+Ah! my poor young lady, there has been more between you and THAT MAN
+than should be. Ever since one day you all went to Frejus together, you
+were a changed woman. I have seen you look at him as--as a wife looks at
+her man. I have seen HIM"--
+
+"Hush, Jacintha! Do not tell me what you have seen: oh! do not remind
+me of joys I pray God to help me forget. He was my husband, then!--oh,
+cruel Jacintha, to remind me of what I have been, of what I am! Ah me!
+ah me! ah me!"
+
+"Your husband!" cried Jacintha in utter amazement.
+
+Then Josephine drooped her head on this faithful creature's shoulder,
+and told her with many sobs the story I have told you. She told it very
+briefly, for it was to a woman who, though little educated, was full of
+feeling and shrewdness, and needed but the bare facts: she could add the
+rest from her own heart and experience: could tell the storm of feelings
+through which these two unhappy lovers must have passed. Her frequent
+sighs of pity and sympathy drew Josephine on to pour out all her griefs.
+When the tale was ended she gave a sigh of relief.
+
+"It might have been worse: I thought it was worse the more fool I. I
+deserve to have my head cut off." This was Jacintha's only comment at
+that time.
+
+It was Josephine's turn to be amazed. "It could have been worse?" said
+she. "How? tell me," added she bitterly. "It would be a consolation to
+me, could I see that."
+
+Jacintha colored and evaded this question, and begged her to go on, to
+keep nothing back from her. Josephine assured her she had revealed all.
+Jacintha looked at her a moment in silence.
+
+"It is then as I half suspected. You do not know all that is before you.
+You do not see why I am afraid of that old man."
+
+"No, not of him in particular."
+
+"Nor why I want to keep Mademoiselle Rose from prattling to him?"
+
+"No. I assure you Rose is to be trusted; she is wise--wiser than I am."
+
+"You are neither of you wise. You neither of you know anything. My poor
+young mistress, you are but a child still. You have a deep water to wade
+through," said Jacintha, so solemnly that Josephine trembled. "A deep
+water, and do not see it even. You have told me what is past, now I must
+tell you what is coming. Heaven help me! But is it possible you have no
+misgiving? Tell the truth, now."
+
+"Alas! I am full of them; at your words, at your manner, they fly around
+me in crowds."
+
+"Have you no ONE?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Then turn your head from me a bit, my sweet young lady; I am an honest
+woman, though I am not so innocent as you, and I am forced against my
+will to speak my mind plainer than I am used to."
+
+Then followed a conversation, to detail which might anticipate our
+story; suffice it to say, that Rose, coming into the room rather
+suddenly, found her sister weeping on Jacintha's bosom, and Jacintha
+crying and sobbing over her.
+
+She stood and stared in utter amazement.
+
+
+Dr. Aubertin, on his arrival, was agreeably surprised at Madame Raynal's
+appearance. He inquired after her appetite.
+
+"Oh, as to her appetite," cried the baroness, "that is immense."
+
+"Indeed!"
+
+"It was," explained Josephine, "just when I began to get better, but
+now it is as much as usual." This answer had been arranged beforehand by
+Jacintha. She added, "The fact is, we wanted to see you, doctor, and
+my ridiculous ailments were a good excuse for tearing you from
+Paris."--"And now we have succeeded," said Rose, "let us throw off the
+mask, and talk of other things; above all, of Paris, and your eclat."
+
+"For all that," persisted the baroness, "she was ill, when I first
+wrote, and very ill too."
+
+"Madame Raynal," said the doctor solemnly, "your conduct has been
+irregular; once ill, and your illness announced to your medical adviser,
+etiquette forbade you to get well but by his prescriptions. Since, then,
+you have shown yourself unfit to conduct a malady, it becomes my
+painful duty to forbid you henceforth ever to be ill at all, without my
+permission first obtained in writing."
+
+This badinage was greatly relished by Rose, but not at all by the
+baroness, who was as humorless as a swan.
+
+He stayed a month at Beaurepaire, then off to Paris again: and being now
+a rich man, and not too old to enjoy innocent pleasures, he got a habit
+of running backwards and forwards between the two places, spending a
+month or so at each alternately. So the days rolled on. Josephine fell
+into a state that almost defies description; her heart was full of
+deadly wounds, yet it seemed, by some mysterious, half-healing balm,
+to throb and ache, but bleed no more. Beams of strange, unreasonable
+complacency would shoot across her; the next moment reflection would
+come, she would droop her head, and sigh piteously. Then all would merge
+in a wild terror of detection. She seemed on the borders of a river of
+bliss, new, divine, and inexhaustible: and on the other bank mocking
+malignant fiends dared her to enter that heavenly stream. The past to
+her was full of regrets; the future full of terrors, and empty of hope.
+Yet she did not, could not succumb. Instead of the listlessness and
+languor of a few months back, she had now more energy than ever; at
+times it mounted to irritation. An activity possessed her: it broke out
+in many feminine ways. Among the rest she was seized with what we men
+call a cacoethes of the needle: "a raging desire" for work. Her fingers
+itched for work. She was at it all day. As devotees retire to pray, so
+she to stitch. On a wet day she would often slip into the kitchen, and
+ply the needle beside Jacintha: on a dry day she would hide in the old
+oak-tree, and sit like a mouse, and ply the tools of her craft, and make
+things of no mortal use to man or woman; and she tried little fringes of
+muslin upon her white hand, and held it up in front of her, and smiled,
+and then moaned. It was winter, and Rose used sometimes to bring her out
+a thick shawl, as she sat in the old oak-tree stitching, but Josephine
+nearly always declined it. SHE WAS NEARLY IMPERVIOUS TO COLD.
+
+Then, her purse being better filled than formerly, she visited the
+poor more than ever, and above all the young couples; and took a warm
+interest in their household matters, and gave them muslin articles of
+her own making, and sometimes sniffed the soup in a young housewife's
+pot, and took a fancy to it, and, if invited to taste it, paid her the
+compliment of eating a good plateful of it, and said it was much better
+soup than the chateau produced, and, what is stranger, thought so: and,
+whenever some peevish little brat set up a yell in its cradle and the
+father naturally enough shook his fist at the destroyer of his peace,
+Madame Raynal's lovely face filled with concern not for the sufferer but
+the pest, and she flew to it and rocked it and coaxed it and consoled
+it, till the young housewife smiled and stopped its mouth by other
+means. And, besides the five-franc pieces she gave the infants to hold,
+these visits of Madame Raynal were always followed by one from Jacintha
+with a basket of provisions on her stalwart arm, and honest Sir John
+Burgoyne peeping out at the corner. Kind and beneficent as she was,
+her temper deteriorated considerably, for it came down from angelic
+to human. Rose and Jacintha were struck with the change, assented to
+everything she said, and encouraged her in everything it pleased her
+caprice to do. Meantime the baroness lived on her son Raynal's letters
+(they came regularly twice a month). Rose too had a correspondence,
+a constant source of delight to her. Edouard Riviere was posted at a
+distance, and could not visit her; but their love advanced rapidly.
+Every day he wrote down for his Rose the acts of the day, and twice a
+week sent the budget to his sweetheart, and told her at the same time
+every feeling of his heart. She was less fortunate than he; she had to
+carry a heavy secret; but still she found plenty to tell him, and tender
+feelings too to vent on him in her own arch, shy, fitful way. Letters
+can enchain hearts; it was by letters that these two found themselves
+imperceptibly betrothed. Their union was looked forward to as certain,
+and not very distant. Rose was fairly in love.
+
+One day, Dr. Aubertin, coming back from Paris to Beaurepaire rather
+suddenly, found nobody at home but the baroness. Josephine and Rose were
+gone to Frejus; had been there more than a week. She was ailing again;
+so as Frejus had agreed with her once, Rose thought it might again. "She
+would send for them back directly."
+
+"No," said the doctor, "why do that? I will go over there and see them."
+Accordingly, a day or two after this, he hired a carriage, and went off
+early in the morning to Frejus. In so small a place he expected to find
+the young ladies at once; but, to his surprise, no one knew them nor had
+heard of them. He was at a nonplus, and just about to return home and
+laugh at himself and the baroness for this wild-goose chase, when he
+fell in with a face he knew, one Mivart, a surgeon, a young man of some
+talent, who had made his acquaintance in Paris. Mivart accosted him with
+great respect; and, after the first compliments, informed him that he
+had been settled some months in this little town, and was doing a fair
+stroke of business.
+
+"Killing some, and letting nature cure others, eh?" said the doctor;
+then, having had his joke, he told Mivart what had brought him to
+Frejus.
+
+"Are they pretty women, your friends? I think I know all the pretty
+women about," said Mivart with levity. "They are not pretty,"
+replied Aubertin. Mivart's interest in them faded visibly out of his
+countenance. "But they are beautiful. The elder might pass for Venus,
+and the younger for Hebe."
+
+"I know them then!" cried he; "they are patients of mine."
+
+The doctor colored. "Ah, indeed!"
+
+"In the absence of your greater skill," said Mivart, politely; "it is
+Madame Aubertin and her sister you are looking for, is it not?"
+
+Aubertin groaned. "I am rather too old to be looking for a Madame
+Aubertin," said he; "no; it is Madame Raynal, and Mademoiselle de
+Beaurepaire."
+
+Mivart became confidential. "Madame Aubertin and her sister," said he,
+"are so lovely they make me ill to look at them: the deepest blue eyes
+you ever saw, both of them; high foreheads; teeth like ivory mixed with
+pearl; such aristocratic feet and hands; and their arms--oh!" and by way
+of general summary the young surgeon kissed the tips of his fingers,
+and was silent; language succumbed under the theme. The doctor smiled
+coldly.
+
+Mivart added, "If you had come an hour sooner, you might have seen
+Mademoiselle Rose; she was in the town."
+
+"Mademoiselle Rose? who is that?"
+
+"Why, Madame Aubertin's sister."
+
+At this Dr. Aubertin looked first very puzzled, then very grave.
+
+"Hum!" said he, after a little reflection, "where do these paragons
+live?"
+
+"They lodge at a small farm; it belongs to a widow; her name is Roth."
+They parted. Dr. Aubertin walked slowly towards his carriage, his hands
+behind him, his eyes on the ground. He bade the driver inquire where
+the Widow Roth lived, and learned it was about half a league out of the
+town. He drove to the farmhouse; when the carriage drove up, a young
+lady looked out of the window on the first floor. It was Rose de
+Beaurepaire. She caught the doctor's eye, and he hers. She came down and
+welcomed him with a great appearance of cordiality, and asked him, with
+a smile, how he found them out.
+
+"From your medical attendant," said the doctor, dryly.
+
+Rose looked keenly in his face.
+
+"He said he was in attendance on two paragons of beauty, blue eyes,
+white teeth and arms."
+
+"And you found us out by that?" inquired Rose, looking still more keenly
+at him.
+
+"Hardly; but it was my last chance of finding you, so I came. Where is
+Madame Raynal?"
+
+"Come into this room, dear friend. I will go and find her."
+
+Full twenty minutes was the doctor kept waiting, and then in came Rose,
+gayly crying, "I have hunted her high and low, and where do you think my
+lady was? sitting out in the garden--come."
+
+Sure enough, they found Josephine in the garden, seated on a low chair.
+She smiled when the doctor came up to her, and asked after her mother.
+There was an air of languor about her; her color was clear, delicate,
+and beautiful.
+
+"You have been unwell, my child."
+
+"A little, dear friend; you know me; always ailing, and tormenting those
+I love."
+
+"Well! but, Josephine, you know this place and this sweet air always set
+you up. Look at her now, doctor; did you ever see her look better? See
+what a color. I never saw her look more lovely."
+
+"I never saw her look SO lovely; but I have seen her look better. Your
+pulse. A little languid?"
+
+"Yes, I am a little."
+
+"Do you stay at Beaurepaire?" inquired Rose; "if so, we will come home."
+
+"On the contrary, you will stay here another fortnight," said the
+doctor, authoritatively.
+
+"Prescribe some of your nice tonics for me, doctor," said Josephine,
+coaxingly.
+
+"No! I can't do that; you are in the hands of another practitioner."
+
+"What does that matter? You were at Paris."
+
+"It is not the etiquette in our profession to interfere with another
+man's patients."
+
+"Oh, dear! I am so sorry," began Josephine.
+
+"I see nothing here that my good friend Mivart is not competent to deal
+with," said the doctor, coldly.
+
+Then followed some general conversation, at the end of which the doctor
+once more laid his commands on them to stay another fortnight where they
+were, and bade them good-by.
+
+He was no sooner gone than Rose went to the door of the kitchen, and
+called out, "Madame Jouvenel! Madame Jouvenel! you may come into the
+garden again."
+
+The doctor drove away; but, instead of going straight to Beaurepaire,
+he ordered the driver to return to the town. He then walked to Mivart's
+house.
+
+In about a quarter of an hour he came out of it, looking singularly
+grave, sad, and stern.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII.
+
+
+Edouard Riviere contrived one Saturday to work off all arrears of
+business, and start for Beaurepaire. He had received a very kind letter
+from Rose, and his longing to see her overpowered him. On the road his
+eyes often glittered, and his cheek flushed with expectation. At last he
+got there. His heart beat: for four months he had not seen her. He
+ran up into the drawing-room, and there found the baroness alone; she
+welcomed him cordially, but soon let him know Rose and her sister were
+at Frejus. His heart sank. Frejus was a long way off. But this was not
+all. Rose's last letter was dated from Beaurepaire, yet it must have
+been written at Frejus. He went to Jacintha, and demanded an explanation
+of this. The ready Jacintha said it looked as if she meant to be home
+directly; and added, with cool cunning, "That is a hint for me to get
+their rooms ready."
+
+"This letter must have come here enclosed in another," said Edouard,
+sternly.
+
+"Like enough," replied Jacintha, with an appearance of sovereign
+indifference.
+
+Edouard looked at her, and said, grimly, "I will go to Frejus."
+
+"So I would," said Jacintha, faltering a little, but not perceptibly;
+"you might meet them on the road, if so be they come the same road;
+there are two roads, you know."
+
+Edouard hesitated; but he ended by sending Dard to the town on his own
+horse, with orders to leave him at the inn, and borrow a fresh horse. "I
+shall just have time," said he. He rode to Frejus, and inquired at the
+inns and post-office for Mademoiselle de Beaurepaire. They did not know
+her; then he inquired for Madame Raynal. No such name known. He rode by
+the seaside upon the chance of their seeing him. He paraded on horseback
+throughout the place, in hopes every moment that a window would open,
+and a fair face shine at it, and call him. At last his time was up, and
+he was obliged to ride back, sick at heart, to Beaurepaire. He told the
+baroness, with some natural irritation, what had happened. She was as
+much surprised as he was.
+
+"I write to Madame Raynal at the post-office, Frejus," said she.
+
+"And Madame Raynal gets your letters?"
+
+"Of course she does, since she answers them; you cannot have inquired at
+the post."
+
+"Why, it was the first place I inquired at, and neither Mademoiselle de
+Beaurepaire nor Madame Raynal were known there."
+
+Jacintha, who could have given the clew, seemed so puzzled herself, that
+they did not even apply to her. Edouard took a sorrowful leave of the
+baroness, and set out on his journey home.
+
+Oh! how sad and weary that ride seemed now by what it had been coming.
+His disappointment was deep and irritating; and ere he had ridden half
+way a torturer fastened on his heart. That torture is suspicion; a vague
+and shadowy, but gigantic phantom that oppresses and rends the mind more
+terribly than certainty. In this state of vague, sickening suspicion, he
+remained some days: then came an affectionate letter from Rose, who
+had actually returned home. In this she expressed her regret and
+disappointment at having missed him; blamed herself for misleading him,
+but explained that their stay at Frejus had been prolonged from day to
+day far beyond her expectation. "The stupidity of the post-office was
+more than she could account for," said she. But, what went farthest to
+console Edouard, was, that after this contretemps she never ceased to
+invite him to come to Beaurepaire. Now, before this, though she said
+many kind and pretty things in her letters, she had never invited him to
+visit the chateau; he had noticed this. "Sweet soul," thought he, "she
+really is vexed. I must be a brute to think any more about it. Still"--
+
+So this wound was skinned over.
+
+At last, what he called his lucky star ordained that he should be
+transferred to the very post his Commandant Raynal had once occupied. He
+sought and obtained permission to fix his quarters in the little village
+near Beaurepaire, and though this plan could not be carried out for
+three months, yet the prospect of it was joyful all that time--joyful to
+both lovers. Rose needed this consolation, for she was very unhappy: her
+beloved sister, since their return from Frejus, had gone back. The flush
+of health was faded, and so was her late energy. She fell into
+deep depression and languor, broken occasionally by fits of nervous
+irritation.
+
+She would sit for hours together at one window languishing and fretting.
+Can the female reader guess which way that window looked?
+
+Now, Edouard was a favorite of Josephine's; so Rose hoped he would help
+to distract her attention from those sorrows which a lapse of years
+alone could cure.
+
+On every account, then, his visit was looked forward to with hope and
+joy.
+
+He came. He was received with open arms. He took up his quarters at
+his old lodgings, but spent his evenings and every leisure hour at the
+chateau.
+
+He was very much in love, and showed it. He adhered to Rose like a
+leech, and followed her about like a little dog.
+
+This would have made her very happy if there had been nothing great to
+distract her attention and her heart; but she had Josephine, whose deep
+depression and fits of irritation and terror filled her with anxiety;
+and so Edouard was in the way now and then. On these occasions he was
+too vain to see what she was too polite to show him offensively.
+
+But on this she became vexed at his obtuseness.
+
+"Does he think I can be always at his beck and call?" thought she.
+
+"She is always after her sister," said he.
+
+He was just beginning to be jealous of Josephine when the following
+incident occurred:--
+
+Rose and the doctor were discussing Josephine. Edouard pretended to be
+reading a book, but he listened to every word.
+
+Dr. Aubertin gave it as his opinion that Madame Raynal did not make
+enough blood.
+
+"Oh! if I thought that!" cried Rose.
+
+"Well, then, it is so, I assure you."
+
+"Doctor," said Rose, "do you remember, one day you said healthy blood
+could be drawn from robust veins and poured into a sick person's?"
+
+"It is a well-known fact," said Aubertin.
+
+"I don't believe it," said Rose, dryly.
+
+"Then you place a very narrow limit to science," said the doctor,
+coldly.
+
+"Did you ever see it done?" asked Rose, slyly.
+
+"I have not only seen it done, but have done it myself."
+
+"Then do it for us. There's my arm; take blood from that for dear
+Josephine!" and she thrust a white arm out under his eye with such a
+bold movement and such a look of fire and love as never beamed from
+common eyes.
+
+A keen, cold pang shot through the human heart of Edouard Riviere.
+
+The doctor started and gazed at her with admiration: then he hung his
+head. "I could not do it. I love you both too well to drain either of
+life's current."
+
+Rose veiled her fire, and began to coax. "Once a week; just once a week,
+dear, dear doctor; you know I should never miss it. I am so full of that
+health, which Heaven denies to her I love."
+
+"Let us try milder measures first," said the doctor. "I have most faith
+in time."
+
+"What if I were to take her to Frejus? hitherto, the sea has always done
+wonders for her."
+
+"Frejus, by all means," said Edouard, mingling suddenly in the
+conversation; "and this time I will go with you, and then I shall find
+out where you lodged before, and how the boobies came to say they did
+not know you."
+
+Rose bit her lip. She could not help seeing then how much dear Edouard
+was in her way and Josephine's. Their best friends are in the way of all
+who have secrets. Presently the doctor went to his study. Then Edouard
+let fall a mock soliloquy. "I wonder," said he, dropping out his words
+one by one, "whether any one will ever love me well enough to give a
+drop of their blood for me."
+
+"If you were in sickness and sorrow, who knows?" said Rose, coloring up.
+
+"I would soon be in sickness and sorrow if I thought that."
+
+"Don't jest with such matters, monsieur."
+
+"I am serious. I wish I was as ill as Madame Raynal is, to be loved as
+she is."
+
+"You must resemble her in some other things to be loved as she is.
+
+"You have often made me feel that of late, dear Rose."
+
+This touched her. But she fought down the kindly feeling. "I am glad of
+it," said she, out of perverseness. She added after a while, "Edouard,
+you are naturally jealous."
+
+"Not the least in the world, Rose, I assure you. I have many faults, but
+jealous I am not."
+
+"Oh, yes, you are, and suspicious, too; there is something in your
+character that alarms me for our happiness."
+
+"Well, if you come to that, there are things in YOUR conduct I could
+wish explained."
+
+"There! I said so. You have not confidence in me."
+
+"Pray don't say that, dear Rose. I have every confidence in you; only
+please don't ask me to divest myself of my senses and my reason."
+
+"I don't ask you to do that or anything else for me; good-by, for the
+present."
+
+"Where are you going now? tic! tic! I never can get a word in peace with
+you."
+
+"I am not going to commit murder. I'm only going up-stairs to my
+sister."
+
+"Poor Madame Raynal, she makes it very hard for me not to dislike her."
+
+"Dislike my Josephine?" and Rose bristled visibly.
+
+"She is an angel, but I should hate an angel if it came forever between
+you and me."
+
+"Excuse me, she was here long before you. It is you that came between
+her and me."
+
+"I came because I was told I should be welcome," said Edouard bitterly,
+and equivocating a little; he added, "and I dare say I shall go when I
+am told I am one too many."
+
+"Bad heart! who says you are one too many in the house? But you are
+too exigent, monsieur; you assume the husband, and you tease me. It is
+selfish; can you not see I am anxious and worried? you ought to be kind
+to me, and soothe me; that is what I look for from you, and, instead of
+that, I declare you are getting to be quite a worry."
+
+"I should not be if you loved me as I love you. I give YOU no rival.
+Shall I tell you the cause of all this? you have secrets."
+
+"What secrets?"
+
+"Is it me you ask? am I trusted with them? Secrets are a bond that not
+even love can overcome. It is to talk secrets you run away from me
+to Madame Raynal. Where did you lodge at Frejus, Mademoiselle the
+Reticent?"
+
+"In a grotto, dry at low water, Monsieur the Inquisitive."
+
+"That is enough: since you will not tell me, I will find it out before I
+am a week older."
+
+This alarmed Rose terribly, and drove her to extremities. She decided to
+quarrel.
+
+"Sir," said she, "I thank you for playing the tyrant a little
+prematurely; it has put me on my guard. Let us part; you and I are not
+suited to each other, Edouard Riviere."
+
+He took this more humbly than she expected. "Part!" said he, in
+consternation; "that is a terrible word to pass between you and me.
+Forgive me! I suppose I am jealous."
+
+"You are; you are actually jealous of my sister. Well, I tell you
+plainly I love you, but I love my sister better. I never could love any
+man as I do her; it is ridiculous to expect such a thing."
+
+"And do you think I could bear to play second fiddle to her all my
+life?"
+
+"I don't ask you. Go and play first trumpet to some other lady."
+
+"You speak your wishes so plainly now, I have nothing to do but to
+obey."
+
+He kissed her hand and went away disconsolately.
+
+Rose, instead of going to Josephine, her determination to do which had
+mainly caused the quarrel, sat sadly down, and leaned her head on her
+hand. "I am cruel. I am ungrateful. He has gone away broken-hearted.
+And what shall I do without him?--little fool! I love him better than he
+loves me. He will never forgive me. I have wounded his vanity; and they
+are vainer than we are. If we meet at dinner I will be so kind to him,
+he will forget it all. No! Edouard will not come to dinner. He is not a
+spaniel that you can beat, and then whistle back again. Something tells
+me I have lost him, and if I have, what shall I do? I will write him a
+note. I will ask him to forgive me."
+
+She sat down at the table, and took a sheet of notepaper and began to
+write a few conciliatory words. She was so occupied in making these kind
+enough, and not too kind, that a light step approached her unobserved.
+She looked up and there was Edouard. She whipped the paper off the
+table.
+
+A look of suspicion and misery crossed Edouard's face.
+
+Rose caught it, and said, "Well, am I to be affronted any more?"
+
+"No, Rose. I came back to beg you to forget what passed just now," said
+he.
+
+Rose's eye flashed; his return showed her her power. She abused it
+directly.
+
+"How can I forget it if you come reminding me?"
+
+"Dear Rose, now don't be so unkind, so cruel--I have not come back to
+tease you, sweet one. I come to know what I can do to please you; to
+make you love me again?" and he was about to kneel graciously on one
+knee.
+
+"I'll tell you. Don't come near me for a month."
+
+Edouard started up, white as ashes with mortification and wounded love.
+
+"This is how you treat me for humbling myself, when it is you that ought
+to ask forgiveness."
+
+"Why should I ask what I don't care about?"
+
+"What DO you care about?--except that sister of yours? You have no
+heart. And on this cold-blooded creature I have wasted a love an empress
+might have been proud of inspiring. I pray Heaven some man may sport
+with your affections, you heartless creature, as you have played with
+mine, and make you suffer what I suffer now!"
+
+And with a burst of inarticulate grief and rage he flung out of the
+room.
+
+Rose sank trembling on the sofa a little while: then with a mighty
+effort rose and went to comfort her sister.
+
+Edouard came no more to Beaurepaire.
+
+
+There is an old French proverb, and a wise one, "Rien n'est certain que
+l'imprevu;" it means you can make sure of nothing but this, that matters
+will not turn as you feel sure they will. And, even for this reason,
+you, who are thinking of suicide because trade is declining, speculation
+failing, bankruptcy impending, or your life going to be blighted forever
+by unrequited love--DON'T DO IT. Whether you are English, American,
+French, or German, listen to a man that knows what is what, and DON'T DO
+IT. I tell you none of those horrors, when they really come, will affect
+you as you fancy they will. The joys we expect are not a quarter
+so bright, nor the troubles half so dark as we think they will be.
+Bankruptcy coming is one thing, come is quite another: and no heart
+or life was ever really blighted at twenty years of age. The love-sick
+girls that are picked out of the canal alive, all, without exception,
+marry another man, have brats, and get to screech with laughter when
+they think of sweetheart No. 1, generally a blockhead, or else a
+blackguard, whom they were fools enough to wet their clothes for, let
+alone kill their souls. This happens INVARIABLY. The love-sick girls
+that are picked out of the canal dead have fled from a year's misery
+to eternal pain, from grief that time never failed to cure, to anguish
+incurable. In this world "Rien n'est certain que l'imprevu."
+
+Edouard and Rose were tender lovers, at a distance. How much happier and
+more loving they thought they should be beneath the same roof. They came
+together: their prominent faults of character rubbed: the secret
+that was in the house did its work: and altogether, they quarrelled.
+L'imprevu.
+
+Dard had been saying to Jacintha for ever so long, "When granny dies, I
+will marry you."
+
+Granny died. Dard took possession of her little property. Up came a
+glittering official, and turned him out; he was not her heir. Perrin,
+the notary, was. He had bought the inheritance of her two sons, long
+since dead.
+
+Dard had not only looked on the cottage and cow, as his, but had spoken
+of them as such for years. The disappointment and the irony of comrades
+ate into him.
+
+"I will leave this cursed place," said he.
+
+Josephine instantly sent for him to Beaurepaire. He came, and was
+factotum with the novelty of a fixed salary. Jacintha accommodated him
+with a new little odd job or two. She set him to dance on the oak floors
+with a brush fastened to his right foot; and, after a rehearsal or two,
+she made him wait at table. Didn't he bang the things about: and when
+he brought a lady a dish, and she did not instantly attend, he gave her
+elbow a poke to attract attention: then she squeaked; and he grinned
+at her double absurdity in minding a touch, and not minding the real
+business of the table.
+
+But his wrongs rankled in him. He vented antique phrases such as, "I
+want a change;" "This village is the last place the Almighty made," etc.
+
+Then he was attacked with a moral disease: affected the company of
+soldiers. He spent his weekly salary carousing with the military, a
+class of men so brilliant that they are not expected to pay for their
+share of the drink; they contribute the anecdotes and the familiar
+appeals to Heaven: and is not that enough?
+
+Present at many recitals, the heroes of which lost nothing by being
+their own historians, Dard imbibed a taste for military adventure. His
+very talk, which used to be so homely, began now to be tinselled with
+big swelling words of vanity imported from the army. I need hardly say
+these bombastical phrases did not elevate his general dialect: they lay
+fearfully distinct upon the surface, "like lumps of marl upon a barren
+soil, encumbering the ground they could not fertilize."
+
+Jacintha took leave to remind him of an incident connected with
+warfare--wounds.
+
+"Do you remember how you were down upon your luck when you did but cut
+your foot? Why, that is nothing in the army. They never go out to fight
+but some come back with arms off, and some with legs off and some with
+heads; and the rest don't come back at all: and how would you like
+that?"
+
+This intrusion of statistics into warfare at first cooled Dard's
+impatience for the field. But presently the fighting half of his heart
+received an ally in one Sergeant La Croix (not a bad name for a military
+aspirant). This sergeant was at the village waiting to march with the
+new recruits to the Rhine. Sergeant La Croix was a man who, by force of
+eloquence, could make soldiering appear the most delightful as well as
+glorious of human pursuits. His tongue fired the inexperienced soul with
+a love of arms, as do the drums and trumpets and tramp of soldiers,
+and their bayonets glittering in the sun. He would have been worth his
+weight in fustian here, where we recruit by that and jargon; he was
+superfluous in France, where they recruited by force: but he was
+ornamental: and he set Dard and one or two more on fire. Indeed, so
+absorbing was his sense of military glory, that there was no room left
+in him for that mere verbal honor civilians call veracity.
+
+To speak plainly, the sergeant was a fluent, fertile, interesting,
+sonorous, prompt, audacious liar: and such was his success, that Dard
+and one or two more became mere human fiction pipes--of comparatively
+small diameter--irrigating a rural district with false views of military
+life, derived from that inexhaustible reservoir, La Croix.
+
+At last the long-threatened conscription was levied: every person fit to
+bear arms, and not coming under the allowed exceptions, drew a number:
+and at a certain hour the numbers corresponding to these were deposited
+in an urn, and one-third of them were drawn in presence of the
+authorities. Those men whose numbers were drawn had to go for soldiers.
+Jacintha awaited the result in great anxiety. She could not sit at home
+for it; so she went down the road to meet Dard, who had promised to
+come and tell her the result as soon as known. At last she saw him
+approaching in a disconsolate way. "O Dard! speak! are we undone? are
+you a dead man?" cried she. "Have they made a soldier of you?"
+
+"No such luck: I shall die a man of all work," grunted Dard.
+
+"And you are sorry? you unnatural little monster! you have no feeling
+for me, then."
+
+"Oh, yes, I have; but glory is No. 1 with me now."
+
+"How loud the bantams crow! You leave glory to fools that be six feet
+high."
+
+"General Bonaparte isn't much higher than I am, and glory sits upon his
+brow. Why shouldn't glory sit upon my brow?"
+
+"Because it would weigh you down, and smother you, you little fool."
+She added, "And think of me, that couldn't bear you to be killed at any
+price, glory or no glory."
+
+Then, to appease her fears, Dard showed her his number, 99; and assured
+her he had seen the last number in the functionary's hand before he came
+away, and it was sixty something.
+
+This ocular demonstration satisfied Jacintha; and she ordered Dard to
+help her draw the water.
+
+"All right," said he, "there is no immortal glory to be picked up
+to-day, so I'll go in for odd jobs."
+
+While they were at this job a voice was heard hallooing. Dard looked
+up, and there was a rigid military figure, with a tremendous
+mustache, peering about. Dard was overjoyed. It was his friend, his
+boon-companion. "Come here, old fellow," cried he, "ain't I glad to
+see you, that is all?" La Croix marched towards the pair. "What are you
+skulking here for, recruit ninety-nine?" said he, sternly, dropping the
+boon-companion in the sergeant; "the rest are on the road."
+
+"The rest, old fellow! what do you mean? why, I was not drawn."
+
+"Yes, you were."
+
+"No, I wasn't."
+
+"Thunder of war, but I say you were. Yours was the last number."
+
+"That is an unlucky guess of yours, for I saw the last number. Look
+here," and he fumbled in his pocket, and produced his number.
+
+La Croix instantly fished out a corresponding number.
+
+"Well, and here you are; this was the last number drawn."
+
+Dard burst out laughing.
+
+"You goose!" said he, "that is sixty-six--look at it."
+
+"Sixty-six!" roared the sergeant; "no more than yours is--they are both
+sixty-sixes when you play tricks with them, and turn them up like that;
+but they are both ninety-nines when you look at them fair."
+
+Dard scratched his head.
+
+"Come," said the corporal, briskly, "make up his bundle, girl, and let
+us be off; we have got our marching orders; going to the Rhine."
+
+"And do you think that I will let him go?" screamed Jacintha. "No! I
+will say one word to Madame Raynal, and she will buy him a substitute
+directly."
+
+Dard stopped her sullenly. "No! I have told all in the village that I
+would go the first chance: it is come, and I'll go. I won't stay to be
+laughed at about this too. If I was sure to be cut in pieces, I'd go.
+Give over blubbering, girl, and get us a bottle of the best wine, and
+while we are drinking it, the sergeant and I, you make up my bundle. I
+shall never do any good here."
+
+Jacintha knew the obstinate toad. She did as she was bid, and soon
+the little bundle was ready, and the two men faced the wine; La Croix,
+radiant and bellicose; Dard, crestfallen but dogged (for there was a
+little bit of good stuff at the bottom of the creature); and Jacintha
+rocking herself, with her apron over her head.
+
+"I'll give you a toast," said La Croix. "Here's gunpowder."
+
+Jacintha promptly honored the toast with a flood of tears.
+
+"Drop that, Jacintha," said Dard, angrily; "do you think that is
+encouraging? Sergeant, I told this poor girl all about glory before you
+came, but she was not ripe for it: say something to cheer her up, for I
+can't."
+
+"I can," cried this trumpet of battle, emptying its glass. "Attention,
+young woman."
+
+"Oh, dear! oh, dear! yes, sir."
+
+"A French soldier is a man who carries France in his heart"--
+
+"But if the cruel foreign soldiers kill him? Oh!"
+
+"Why, in that case, he does not care a straw. Every man must die; horses
+likewise, and dogs, and donkeys, when they come to the end of
+their troubles; but dogs and donkeys and chaps in blouses can't die
+gloriously; as Dard may, if he has any luck at all: so, from this hour,
+if there was twice as little of him, be proud of him, for from this
+time he is a part of France and her renown. Come, recruit ninety-nine,
+shoulder your traps at duty's call, and let us go forth in form.
+Attention! Quick--march! Halt! is that the way I showed you to march?
+Didn't I tell you to start from the left? Now try again. QUICK--march!
+left--right--left--right--left--right--NOW you've--GOT it--DRAT
+ye,--KEEP it--left--right--left--right--left--right." And with no more
+ado the sergeant marched the little odd-job man to the wars.
+
+VIVE LA FRANCE!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII.
+
+
+Edouard, the moment his temper cooled, became very sad. He longed to be
+friends again with Rose, but did not know how. His own pride held
+him back, and so did his fear that he had gone too far, and that his
+offended mistress would not listen to an offer of reconciliation from
+him. He sat down alone now to all his little meals. No sweet, mellow
+voices in his ear after the fatigues of the day. It was a dismal change
+in his life.
+
+At last, one day, he received three lines from Josephine, requesting him
+to come and speak to her. He went over directly, full of vague hopes. He
+found her seated pale and languid in a small room on the ground floor.
+
+"What has she been doing to you, dear?" began she kindly.
+
+"Has she not told you, Madame Raynal?"
+
+"No; she is refractory. She will tell me nothing, and that makes me fear
+she is the one in fault."
+
+"Oh! if she does not accuse me, I am sure I will not accuse her. I dare
+say I am to blame; it is not her fault that I cannot make her love me."
+
+"But you can. She does."
+
+"Yes; but she loves others better, and she holds me out no hope it will
+ever be otherwise. On this one point how can I hope for your sympathy;
+unfortunately for me you are one of my rivals. She told me plainly she
+never could love me as she loves you."
+
+"And you believed her?"
+
+"I had good reason to believe her."
+
+Josephine smiled sadly. "Dear Edouard," said she, "you must not attach
+so much importance to every word we say. Does Rose at her age know
+everything? Is she a prophet? Perhaps she really fancies she will always
+love her sister as she does now; but you are a man of sense; you ought
+to smile and let her talk. When you marry her you will take her to your
+own house; she will only see me now and then; she will have you and your
+affection always present. Each day some new tie between you and her. You
+two will share every joy, every sorrow. Your children playing at your
+feet, and reflecting the features of both parents, will make you one.
+Your hearts will melt together in that blessed union which raises earth
+so near to heaven; and then you will wonder you could ever be jealous of
+poor Josephine, who must never hope--ah, me!"
+
+Edouard, wrapped up in himself, mistook Josephine's emotion at the
+picture she had drawn of conjugal love. He soothed her, and vowed upon
+his honor he never would separate Rose from her.
+
+"Madame Raynal," said he, "you are an angel, and I am a fiend. Jealousy
+must be the meanest of all sentiments. I never will be jealous again,
+above all, of you, sweet angel. Why, you are my sister as well as hers,
+and she has a right to love you, for I love you myself."
+
+"You make me very happy when you talk so," sighed Josephine. "Peace is
+made?"
+
+"Never again to be broken. I will go and ask her pardon. What is the
+matter now?"
+
+For Jacintha was cackling very loud, and dismissing with ignominy two
+beggars, male and female.
+
+She was industry personified, and had no sympathy with mendicity. In
+vain the couple protested, Heaven knows with what truth, that they were
+not beggars, but mechanics out of work. "March! tramp!" was Jacintha's
+least word. She added, giving the rein to her imagination, "I'll loose
+the dog." The man moved away, the woman turned appealingly to Edouard.
+He and Josephine came towards the group. She had got a sort of large
+hood, and in that hood she carried an infant on her shoulders. Josephine
+inspected it. "It looks sickly, poor little thing," said she.
+
+"What can you expect, young lady?" said the woman. "Its mother had to
+rise and go about when she ought to have been in her bed, and now she
+has not enough to give it."
+
+"Oh, dear!" cried Josephine. "Jacintha, give them some food and a nice
+bottle of wine."
+
+"That I will," cried Jacintha, changing her tone with courtier-like
+alacrity. "I did not see she was nursing."
+
+Josephine put a franc into the infant's hand; the little fingers closed
+on it with that instinct of appropriation, which is our first and often
+our last sentiment. Josephine smiled lovingly on the child, and the
+child seeing that gave a small crow.
+
+"Bless it," said Josephine, and thereupon her lovely head reared itself
+like a snake's, and then darted down on the child; and the young noble
+kissed the beggar's brat as if she would eat it.
+
+This won the mother's heart more than even the gifts.
+
+"Blessings on you, my lady!" she cried. "I pray the Lord not to forget
+this when a woman's trouble comes on you in your turn! It is a small
+child, mademoiselle, but it is not an unhealthy one. See." Inspection
+was offered, and eagerly accepted.
+
+Edouard stood looking on at some distance in amazement, mingled with
+disgust.
+
+"Ugh!" said he, when she rejoined him, "how could you kiss that nasty
+little brat?"
+
+"Dear Edouard, don't speak so of a poor little innocent. Who would pity
+them if we women did not? It had lovely eyes."
+
+"Like saucers."
+
+"Yes."
+
+"It is no compliment when you are affectionate to anybody; you overflow
+with benevolence on all creation, like the rose which sheds its perfume
+on the first-comer."
+
+"If he is not going to be jealous of me next," whined Josephine.
+
+She took him to Rose, and she said, "There, whenever good friends
+quarrel, it is understood they were both in the wrong. Bygones are to be
+bygones; and when your time comes round to quarrel again, please consult
+me first, since it is me you will afflict." She left them together, and
+went and tapped timidly at the doctor's study.
+
+Aubertin received her with none of that reserve she had seen in him. He
+appeared both surprised and pleased at her visit to his little sanctum.
+He even showed an emotion Josephine was at a loss to account for. But
+that wore off during the conversation, and, indeed, gave place to a sort
+of coldness.
+
+"Dear friend," said she, "I come to consult you about Rose and Edouard."
+She then told him what had happened, and hinted at Edouard's one fault.
+The doctor smiled. "It is curious. You have come to draw my attention to
+a point on which it has been fixed for some days past. I am preparing a
+cure for the two young fools; a severe remedy, but in their case a sure
+one."
+
+He then showed her a deed, wherein he had settled sixty thousand francs
+on Rose and her children. "Edouard," said he, "has a good place. He is
+active and rising, and with my sixty thousand francs, and a little purse
+of ten thousand more for furniture and nonsense, they can marry next
+week, if they like. Yes, marriage is a sovereign medicine for both of
+these patients. She does not love him quite enough. Cure: marriage. He
+loves her a little too much. Cure: marriage."
+
+"O doctor!"
+
+"Can't help it. I did not make men and women. We must take human nature
+as we find it, and thank God for it on the whole. Have you nothing else
+to confide to me?"
+
+"No, doctor."
+
+"Are you sure?"
+
+"No, dear friend. But this is very near my heart," faltered Josephine.
+
+The doctor sighed; then said gently, "They shall be happy: as happy as
+you wish them."
+
+Meantime, in another room, a reconciliation scene was taking place, and
+the mutual concessions of two impetuous but generous spirits.
+
+
+The baroness noticed the change in Josephine's appearance.
+
+She asked Rose what could be the matter.
+
+"Some passing ailment," was the reply.
+
+"Passing? She has been so, on and off, a long time. She makes me very
+anxious."
+
+Rose made light of it to her mother, but in her own heart she grew more
+and more anxious day by day. She held secret conferences with Jacintha;
+that sagacious personage had a plan to wake Josephine from her deathly
+languor, and even soothe her nerves, and check those pitiable fits
+of nervous irritation to which she had become subject. Unfortunately,
+Jacintha's plan was so difficult and so dangerous, that at first even
+the courageous Rose recoiled from it; but there are dangers that seem to
+diminish when you look them long in the face.
+
+The whole party was seated in the tapestried room: Jacintha was there,
+sewing a pair of sheets, at a respectful distance from the gentlefolks,
+absorbed in her work; but with both ears on full cock.
+
+The doctor, holding his glasses to his eye, had just begun to read out
+the Moniteur.
+
+The baroness sat close to him, Edouard opposite; and the young ladies
+each in her corner of a large luxurious sofa, at some little distance.
+
+
+"'The Austrians left seventy cannon, eight thousand men, and three
+colors upon the field. Army of the North: General Menard defeated the
+enemy after a severe engagement, taking thirteen field-pieces and a
+quantity of ammunition.'"
+
+
+The baroness made a narrow-minded renmark. "That is always the way with
+these journals," said she. "Austrians! Prussians! when it's Egypt one
+wants to hear about."--"No, not a word about Egypt," said the doctor;
+"but there is a whole column about the Rhine, where Colonel Dujardin
+is--and Dard. If I was dictator, the first nuisance I would put down
+is small type." He then spelled out a sanguinary engagement: "eight
+thousand of the enemy killed. We have some losses to lament. Colonel
+Dujardin"--
+
+"Only wounded, I hope," said the baroness.
+
+The doctor went coolly on. "At the head of the 24th brigade made a
+brilliant charge on the enemy's flank, that is described in the general
+order as having decided the fate of the battle."
+
+"How badly you do read," said the old lady, sharply. "I thought he was
+gone; instead of that he has covered himself with glory; but it is all
+our doing, is it not, young ladies? We saved his life."
+
+"We saved it amongst us, madame."
+
+"What is the matter, Rose?" said Edouard.
+
+"Nothing: give me the salts, quick."
+
+She only passed them, as it were, under her own nostrils; then held
+them to Josephine, who was now observed to be trembling all over. Rose
+contrived to make it appear that this was mere sympathy on Josephine's
+part.
+
+"Don't be silly, girls," cried the baroness, cheerfully; "there is
+nobody killed that we care about."
+
+Dr. Aubertin read the rest to himself.
+
+Edouard fell into a gloomy silence and tortured himself about Camille,
+and Rose's anxiety and agitation.
+
+By and by the new servant brought in a letter. It was the long-expected
+one from Egypt.
+
+"Here is something better than salts for you. A long letter, Josephine,
+and all in his own hand; so he is safe, thank Heaven! I was beginning
+to be uneasy again. You frightened me for that poor Camille: but this
+is worth a dozen Camilles; this is my son; I would give my old life
+for him."--"My dear Mother--('Bless him!'), my dear wife, and my dear
+sister--('Well! you sit there like two rocks!')--We have just gained
+a battle--fifty colors. ('What do you think of that?') All the enemy's
+baggage and ammunition are in our hands. ('This is something like
+a battle, this one.') Also the Pasha of Natolie. ('Ah! the Pasha of
+Natolie; an important personage, no doubt, though I never had the honor
+of hearing of him. Do you hear?--you on the sofa. My son has captured
+the Pasha of Natolie. He is as brave as Caesar.') But this success is
+not one of those that lead to important results ('Never mind, a victory
+is a victory'), and I should not wonder if Bonaparte was to dash home
+any day. If so, I shall go with him, and perhaps spend a whole day with
+you, on my way to the Rhine."
+
+At this prospect a ghastly look passed quick as lightning between Rose
+and Josephine.
+
+The baroness beckoned Josephine to come close to her, and read her what
+followed in a lower tone of voice.
+
+"Tell my wife I love her more and more every day. I don't expect as much
+from her, but she will make me very happy if she can make shift to like
+me as well as her family do."--"No danger! What husband deserves to be
+loved as he does? I long for his return, that his wife, his mother, and
+his sister may all combine to teach this poor soldier what happiness
+means. We owe him everything, Josephine, and if we did not love him, and
+make him happy, we should be monsters; now should we not?"
+
+Josephine stammered an assent.
+
+"NOW you may read his letter: Jacintha and all," said the baroness
+graciously.
+
+The letter circulated. Meantime, the baroness conversed with Aubertin in
+quite an undertone.
+
+"My friend, look at Josephine. That girl is ill, or else she is going to
+be ill."
+
+"Neither the one nor the other, madame," said Aubertin, looking her
+coolly in the face.
+
+"But I say she is. Is a doctor's eye keener than a mother's?"
+
+"Considerably," replied the doctor with cool and enviable effrontery.
+
+The baroness rose. "Now, children, for our evening walk. We shall enjoy
+it now."
+
+"I trust you may: but for all that I must forbid the evening air to one
+of the party--to Madame Raynal."
+
+The baroness came to him and whispered, "That is right. Thank you. See
+what is the matter with her, and tell me." And she carried off the rest
+of the party.
+
+At the same time Jacintha asked permission to pass the rest of the
+evening with her relations in the village. But why that swift, quivering
+glance of intelligence between Jacintha and Rose de Beaurepaire when the
+baroness said, "Yes, certainly"?
+
+Time will show.
+
+Josephine and the doctor were left alone. Now Josephine had noticed the
+old people whisper and her mother glance her way, and the whole woman
+was on her guard. She assumed a languid complacency, and by way of
+shield, if necessary, took some work, and bent her eyes and apparently
+her attention on it.
+
+The doctor was silent and ill at ease.
+
+She saw he had something weighty on his mind. "The air would have done
+me no harm," said she.
+
+"Neither will a few words with me."
+
+"Oh, no, dear friend. Only I think I should have liked a little walk
+this evening."
+
+"Josephine," said the doctor quietly, "when you were a child I saved
+your life."
+
+"I have often heard my mother speak of it. I was choked by the croup,
+and you had the courage to lance my windpipe."
+
+"Had I?" said the doctor, with a smile. He added gravely, "It seems then
+that to be cruel is sometimes kindness. It is the nature of men to love
+those whose life they save."
+
+"And they love you."
+
+"Well, our affection is not perfect. I don't know which is most to
+blame, but after all these years I have failed to inspire you with
+confidence." The doctor's voice was sad, and Josephine's bosom panted.
+
+"Pray do not say so," she cried. "I would trust you with my life."
+
+"But not with your secret."
+
+"My secret! What secret? I have no secrets."
+
+"Josephine, you have now for full twelve months suffered in body and
+mind, yet you have never come to me for counsel, for comfort, for an old
+man's experience and advice, nor even for medical aid."
+
+"But, dear friend, I assure you"--
+
+"We DO NOT deceive our friend. We CANNOT deceive our doctor."
+
+Josephine trembled, but defended herself after the manner of her sex.
+"Dear doctor," said she, "I love you all the better for this. Your
+regard for me has for once blinded your science. I am not so robust as
+you have known me, but there is nothing serious the matter with me. Let
+us talk of something else. Besides, it is not interesting to talk about
+one's self."
+
+"Very well; since there is nothing serious or interesting in your case,
+we will talk about something that is both serious and interesting."
+
+"With all my heart;" and she smiled with a sense of relief.
+
+But the doctor leaned over the table to her, and said in a cautious and
+most emphatic whisper, "We will talk about YOUR CHILD."
+
+The work dropped from Josephine's hands: she turned her face wildly on
+Aubertin, and faltered out, "M--my child?"
+
+"My words are plain," replied he gravely. "YOUR CHILD."
+
+When the doctor repeated these words, when Josephine looking in his face
+saw he spoke from knowledge, however acquired, and not from guess, she
+glided down slowly off the sofa and clasped his knees as he stood before
+her, and hid her face in an agony of shame and terror on his knees.
+
+"Forgive me," she sobbed. "Pray do not expose me! Do not destroy me."
+
+"Unhappy young lady," said he, "did you think you had deceived me, or
+that you are fit to deceive any but the blind? Your face, your anguish
+after Colonel Dujardin's departure, your languor, and then your sudden
+robustness, your appetite, your caprices, your strange sojourn at
+Frejus, your changed looks and loss of health on your return! Josephine,
+your old friend has passed many an hour thinking of you, divining your
+folly, following your trouble step by step. Yet you never invited him to
+aid you."
+
+Josephine faltered out a lame excuse. If she had revered him less she
+could have borne to confess to him. She added it would be a relief to
+her to confide in him.
+
+"Then tell me all," said he.
+
+She consented almost eagerly, and told him--nearly all. The old man was
+deeply affected. He murmured in a broken voice, "Your story is the story
+of your sex, self-sacrifice, first to your mother, then to Camille, now
+to your husband."
+
+"And he is well worthy of any sacrifice I can make," said Josephine.
+"But oh, how hard it is to live!"
+
+"I hope to make it less hard to you ere long," said the doctor quietly.
+He then congratulated himself on having forced Josephine to confide in
+him. "For," said he, "you never needed an experienced friend more than
+at this moment. Your mother will not always be so blind as of late.
+Edouard is suspicious. Jacintha is a shrewd young woman, and very
+inquisitive."
+
+Josephine was not at the end of her concealments: she was ashamed to let
+him know she had made a confidant of Jacintha and not of him. She held
+her peace.
+
+"Then," continued Aubertin, "there is the terrible chance of Raynal's
+return. But ere I take on me to advise you, what are your own plans?"
+
+"I don't know," said Josephine helplessly.
+
+"You--don't--know!" cried the doctor, looking at her in utter amazement.
+
+"It is the answer of a mad woman, is it not? Doctor, I am little better.
+My foot has slipped on the edge of a precipice. I close my eyes, and let
+myself glide down it. What will become of me?"
+
+"All shall be well," said Aubertin, "provided you do not still love that
+man."
+
+Josephine did not immediately reply: her thoughts turned inwards. The
+good doctor was proceeding to congratulate her on being cured of a fatal
+passion, when she stopped him with wonder in her face. "Not love him!
+How can I help loving him? I was his betrothed. I wronged him in my
+thoughts. War, prison, anguish, could not kill him; he loved me so. He
+struggled bleeding to my feet; and could I let him die, after all? Could
+I be crueller than prison, and torture, and despair?"
+
+The doctor sighed deeply; but, arming himself with the necessary
+resolution, he sternly replied, "A woman of your name cannot vacillate
+between love and honor; such vacillations have but one end. I will not
+let you drift a moral wreck between passion and virtue; and that is what
+it will come to if you hesitate now."
+
+"Hesitate! Who can say I have hesitated where my honor was concerned?
+You can read our bodies then, but not our hearts. What! you see me so
+pale, forlorn, and dead, and that does not tell you I have bid Camille
+farewell forever? That we might be safer still I have not even told him
+he is a father: was ever woman so cruel as I am? I have written him but
+one letter, and in that I must deceive him. I told him I thought I might
+one day be happy, if I could hear that he did not give way to despair. I
+told him we must never meet again in this world. So now come what will:
+show me my duty and I will do it. This endless deceit burns my heart.
+Shall I tell my husband? It will be but one pang more, one blush more
+for me. But my mother!" and, thus appealed to, Dr. Aubertin felt, for
+the first time, all the difficulty of the situation he had undertaken to
+cure. He hesitated, he was embarrassed.
+
+"Ah," said Josephine, "you see." Then, after a short silence, she said
+despairingly, "This is my only hope: that poor Raynal will be long
+absent, and that ere he returns mamma will lie safe from sorrow and
+shame in the little chapel. Doctor, when a woman of my age forms
+such wishes as these, I think you might pity her, and forgive her
+ill-treatment of you, for she cannot be very happy. Ah me! ah me! ah
+me!"
+
+"Courage, poor soul! All is now in my hands, and I will save you," said
+the doctor, his voice trembling in spite of him. "Guilt lies in the
+intention. A more innocent woman than you does not breathe. Two courses
+lay open to you: to leave this house with Camille Dujardin, or to
+dismiss him, and live for your hard duty till it shall please Heaven to
+make that duty easy (no middle course was tenable for a day); of these
+two paths you chose the right one, and, having chosen, I really think
+you are not called on to reveal your misfortune, and make those unhappy
+to whose happiness you have sacrificed your own for years to come."
+
+"Forever," said Josephine quietly.
+
+"The young use that word lightly. The old have almost ceased to use it.
+They have seen how few earthly things can conquer time."
+
+He resumed, "You think only of others, Josephine, but I shall think
+of you as well. I shall not allow your life to be wasted in a needless
+struggle against nature." Then turning to Rose, who had glided into the
+room, and stood amazed, "Her griefs were as many before her child was
+born, yet her health stood firm. Why? because nature was on her side.
+Now she is sinking into the grave. Why? because she is defying nature.
+Nature intended her to be pressing her child to her bosom day and night;
+instead of that, a peasant woman at Frejus nurses the child, and the
+mother pines at Beaurepaire."
+
+At this, Josephine leaned her face on her hands on the doctor's
+shoulder. In this attitude she murmured to him, "I have never seen him
+since I left Frejus." Dr. Aubertin sighed for her. Emboldened by this,
+she announced her intention of going to Frejus the very next day to
+see her little Henri. But to this Dr. Aubertin demurred. "What,
+another journey to Frejus?" said he, "when the first has already roused
+Edouard's suspicions; I can never consent to that."
+
+Then Josephine surprised them both. She dropped her coaxing voice and
+pecked the doctor like an irritated pigeon. "Take care," said she,
+"don't be too cruel to me. You see I am obedient, resigned. I have given
+up all I lived for: but if I am never to have my little boy's arms round
+me to console me, then--why torment me any longer? Why not say to me,
+'Josephine, you have offended Heaven; pray for pardon, and die'?"
+
+Then the doctor was angry in his turn. "Oh, go then," said he, "go to
+Frejus; you will have Edouard Riviere for a companion this time. Your
+first visit roused his suspicions. So before you go tell your mother
+all; for since she is sure to find it out, she had better hear it from
+you than from another."
+
+"Doctor, have pity on me," said Josephine.
+
+"You have no heart," said Rose. "She shall see him though, in spite of
+you."
+
+"Oh, yes! he has a heart," said Josephine: "he is my best friend. He
+will let me see my boy."
+
+All this, and the tearful eyes and coaxing yet trembling voice, was
+hard to resist. But Aubertin saw clearly, and stood firm. He put his
+handkerchief to his eyes a moment: then took the pining young mother's
+hand. "And, do you think," said he, "I do not pity you and love your
+boy? Ah! he will never want a father whilst I live; and from this moment
+he is under my care. I will go to see him; I will bring you news, and
+all in good time; I will place him where you shall visit him without
+imprudence; but, for the present, trust a wiser head than yours or
+Rose's; and give me your sacred promise not to go to Frejus."
+
+Weighed down by his good-sense and kindness, Josephine resisted no
+longer in words. She just lifted her hands in despair and began to cry.
+It was so piteous, Aubertin was ready to yield in turn, and consent to
+any imprudence, when he met with an unexpected ally.
+
+"Promise," said Rose, doggedly.
+
+Josephine looked at her calmly through her tears.
+
+"Promise, dear," repeated Rose, and this time with an intonation so
+fine that it attracted Josephine's notice, but not the doctor's. It was
+followed by a glance equally subtle.
+
+"I promise," said Josephine, with her eye fixed inquiringly on her
+sister.
+
+For once she could not make the telegraph out: but she could see it was
+playing, and that was enough. She did what Rose bid her; she promised
+not to go to Frejus without leave.
+
+Finding her so submissive all of a sudden, he went on to suggest that
+she must not go kissing every child she saw. "Edouard tells me he saw
+you kissing a beggar's brat. The young rogue was going to quiz you about
+it at the dinner-table; luckily, he told me his intention, and I
+would not let him. I said the baroness would be annoyed with you
+for descending from your dignity--and exposing a noble family to
+fleas--hush! here he is."
+
+"Tiresome!" muttered Rose, "just when"--
+
+Edouard came forward with a half-vexed face.
+
+However, he turned it off into play. "What have you been saying to her,
+monsieur, to interest her so? Give me a leaf out of your book. I need
+it."
+
+The doctor was taken aback for a moment, but at last he said slyly, "I
+have been proposing to her to name the day. She says she must consult
+you before she decides that."
+
+"Oh, you wicked doctor!--and consult HIM of all people!"
+
+"So be off, both of you, and don't reappear before me till it is
+settled."
+
+Edouard's eyes sparkled. Rose went out with a face as red as fire.
+
+It was a balmy evening. Edouard was to leave them for a week the next
+day. They were alone: Rose was determined he should go away quite happy.
+Everything was in Edouard's favor: he pleaded his cause warmly: she
+listened tenderly: this happy evening her piquancy and archness seemed
+to dissolve into tenderness as she and Edouard walked hand in hand under
+the moon: a tenderness all the more heavenly to her devoted lover, that
+she was not one of those angels who cloy a man by invariable sweetness.
+
+For a little while she forgot everything but her companion. In that soft
+hour he won her to name the day, after her fashion.
+
+"Josephine goes to Paris with the doctor in about three weeks," murmured
+she.
+
+"And you will stay behind, all alone?"
+
+"Alone? that shall depend on you, monsieur."
+
+On this Edouard caught her for the first time in his arms.
+
+She made a faint resistance.
+
+"Seal me that promise, sweet one!"
+
+"No! no!--there!"
+
+He pressed a delicious first kiss upon two velvet lips that in their
+innocence scarcely shunned the sweet attack.
+
+For all that, the bond was no sooner sealed after this fashion, than the
+lady's cheek began to burn.
+
+"Suppose we go in NOW?" said she, dryly.
+
+"Ah, not yet."
+
+"It is late, dear Edouard."
+
+And with these words something returned to her mind with its full force:
+something that Edouard had actually made her forget. She wanted to get
+rid of him now.
+
+"Edouard," said she, "can you get up early in the morning? If you can,
+meet me here to-morrow before any of them are up; then we can talk
+without interruption."
+
+Edouard was delighted.
+
+"Eight o'clock?"
+
+"Sooner if you like. Mamma bade me come and read to her in her room
+to-night. She will be waiting for me. Is it not tiresome?"
+
+"Yes, it is."
+
+"Well, we must not mind that, dear; in three weeks' time we are to have
+too much of one another, you know, instead of too little."
+
+"Too much! I shall never have enough of you. I shall hate the night
+which will rob me of the sight of you for so many hours in the
+twenty-four."
+
+"If you can't see me, perhaps you may hear me; my tongue runs by night
+as well as by day."
+
+"Well, that is a comfort," said Edouard, gravely. "Yes, little quizzer,
+I would rather hear you scold than an angel sing. Judge, then, what
+music it is when you say you love me!"
+
+"I love you, Edouard."
+
+Edouard kissed her hand warmly, and then looked irresolutely at her
+face.
+
+"No, no!" said she, laughing and blushing. "How rude you are. Next time
+we meet."
+
+"That is a bargain. But I won't go till you say you love me again.
+
+"Edouard, don't be silly. I am ashamed of saying the same thing so
+often--I won't say it any more. What is the use? You know I love you.
+There, I HAVE said it: how stupid!"
+
+"Adieu, then, my wife that is to be."
+
+"Adieu! dear Edouard."
+
+"My hus--go on--my hus--"
+
+"My huswife that shall be."
+
+Then they walked very slowly towards the house, and once more Rose left
+quizzing, and was all tenderness.
+
+"Will you not come in, and bid them 'good-night'?"
+
+"No, my own; I am in heaven. Common faces--common voices would bring me
+down to earth. Let me be alone;--your sweet words ringing in my ear. I
+will dilute you with nothing meaner than the stars. See how bright they
+shine in heaven; but not so bright as you shine in my heart."
+
+"Dear Edouard, you flatter me, you spoil me. Alas! why am I not more
+worthy of your love?"
+
+"More worthy! How can that be?"
+
+Rose sighed.
+
+"But I will atone for all. I will make you a better--(here she
+substituted a full stop for a substantive)--than you expect. You will
+see else."
+
+She lingered at the door: a proof that if Edouard, at that particular
+moment, had seized another kiss, there would have been no very violent
+opposition or offence.
+
+But he was not so impudent as some. He had been told to wait till
+the next meeting for that. He prayed Heaven to bless her, and so the
+affianced lovers parted for the night.
+
+It was about nine o'clock. Edouard, instead of returning to his
+lodgings, started down towards the town, to conclude a bargain with the
+innkeeper for an English mare he was in treaty for. He wanted her
+for to-morrow's work; so that decided him to make the purchase. In
+purchases, as in other matters, a feather turns the balanced scale. He
+sauntered leisurely down. It was a very clear night; the full moon and
+the stars shining silvery and vivid. Edouard's heart swelled with joy.
+He was loved after all, deeply loved; and in three short weeks he was
+actually to be Rose's husband: her lord and master. How like a heavenly
+dream it all seemed--the first hopeless courtship, and now the wedding
+fixed! But it was no dream; he felt her soft words still murmur music at
+his heart, and the shadow of her velvet lips slept upon his own.
+
+He had strolled about a league when he heard the ring of a horse's hoofs
+coming towards him, accompanied by a clanking noise; it came nearer and
+nearer, till it reached a hill that lay a little ahead of Edouard; then
+the sounds ceased; the cavalier was walking his horse up the hill.
+
+Presently, as if they had started from the earth, up popped between
+Edouard and the sky, first a cocked hat that seemed in that light to be
+cut with a razor out of flint; then the wearer, phosphorescent here and
+there; so brightly the keen moonlight played on his epaulets and steel
+scabbard. A step or two nearer, and Edouard gave a great shout; it was
+Colonel Raynal.
+
+After the first warm greeting, and questions and answers, Raynal told
+him he was on his way to the Rhine with despatches.
+
+"To the Rhine?"
+
+"I am allowed six days to get there. I made a calculation, and found I
+could give Beaurepaire half a day. I shall have to make up for it by
+hard riding. You know me; always in a hurry. It is Bonaparte's fault
+this time. He is always in a hurry too."
+
+"Why, colonel," said Edouard, "let us make haste then. Mind they go
+early to rest at the chateau."
+
+"But you are not coming my way, youngster?"
+
+"Not coming your way? Yes, but I am. Yours is a face I don't see every
+day, colonel; besides I would not miss THEIR faces, especially the
+baroness's and Madame Raynal's, at sight of you; and, besides,"--and the
+young gentleman chuckled to himself, and thought of Rose's words, "the
+next time we meet;" well, this will be the next time. "May I jump up
+behind?"
+
+Colonel Raynal nodded assent. Edouard took a run, and lighted like a
+monkey on the horse's crupper. He pranced and kicked at this unexpected
+addition; but the spur being promptly applied to his flanks, he bounded
+off with a snort that betrayed more astonishment than satisfaction, and
+away they cantered to Beaurepaire, without drawing rein.
+
+"There," said Edouard, "I was afraid they would be gone to bed; and they
+are. The very house seems asleep--fancy--at half-past ten."
+
+"That is a pity," said Raynal, "for this chateau is the stronghold of
+etiquette. They will be two hours dressing before they will come out and
+shake hands. I must put my horse into the stable. Go you and give the
+alarm."
+
+"I will, colonel. Stop, first let me see whether none of them are up,
+after all."
+
+And Edouard walked round the chateau, and soon discovered a light at one
+window, the window of the tapestried room. Running round the other
+way he came slap upon another light: this one was nearer the ground. A
+narrow but massive door, which he had always seen not only locked but
+screwed up, was wide open; and through the aperture the light of a
+candle streamed out and met the moonlight streaming in.
+
+"Hallo!" cried Edouard.
+
+He stopped, turned, and looked in.
+
+"Hallo!" he cried again much louder.
+
+A young woman was sleeping with her feet in the silvery moonlight, and
+her head in the orange-colored blaze of a flat candle, which rested on
+the next step above of a fine stone staircase, whose existence was now
+first revealed to the inquisitive Edouard.
+
+Coming plump upon all this so unexpectedly, he quite started.
+
+"Why, Jacintha!"
+
+He touched her on the shoulder to wake her. No. Jacintha was sleeping as
+only tired domestics can sleep. He might have taken the candle and burnt
+her gown off her back. She had found a step that fitted into the small
+of her back, and another that supported her head, and there she was fast
+as a door.
+
+At this moment Raynal's voice was heard calling him.
+
+"There is a light in that bedroom."
+
+"It is not a bedroom, colonel; it is our sitting-room now. We shall find
+them all there, or at least the young ladies; and perhaps the doctor.
+The baroness goes to bed early. Meantime I can show you one of our
+dramatis personae, and an important one too. She rules the roost."
+
+He took him mysteriously and showed him Jacintha.
+
+Moonlight by itself seems white, and candlelight by itself seems yellow;
+but when the two come into close contrast at night, candle turns a
+reddish flame, and moonlight a bluish gleam.
+
+So Jacintha, with her shoes in this celestial sheen, and her face in
+that demoniacal glare, was enough to knock the gazer's eye out.
+
+"Make a good sentinel--this one," said Raynal--"an outlying picket for
+instance, on rough ground, in front of the enemy's riflemen."
+
+"Ha! ha! colonel! Let us see where this staircase leads. I have an idea
+it will prove a short cut."
+
+"Where to?"
+
+"To the saloon, or somewhere, or else to some of Jacintha's haunts.
+Serve her right for going to sleep at the mouth of her den."
+
+"Forward then--no, halt! Suppose it leads to the bedrooms? Mind this
+is a thundering place for ceremony. We shall get drummed out of the
+barracks if we don't mind our etiquette."
+
+At this they hesitated; and Edouard himself thought, on the whole, it
+would be better to go and hammer at the front door.
+
+Now while they hesitated, a soft delicious harmony of female voices
+suddenly rose, and seemed to come and run round the walls. The men
+looked at one another in astonishment; for the effect was magical. The
+staircase being enclosed on all sides with stone walls and floored with
+stone, they were like flies inside a violoncello; the voices rang above,
+below, and on every side of the vibrating walls. In some epochs spirits
+as hardy as Raynal's, and wits as quick as Riviere's, would have fled
+then and there to the nearest public, and told over cups how they had
+heard the dames of Beaurepaire, long since dead, holding their revel,
+and the conscious old devil's nest of a chateau quivering to the ghostly
+strains.
+
+But this was an incredulous age. They listened, and listened, and
+decided the sounds came from up-stairs.
+
+"Let us mount, and surprise these singing witches," said Edouard.
+
+"Surprise them! what for? It is not the enemy--for once. What is the
+good of surprising our friends?"
+
+Storming parties and surprises were no novelty and therefore no treat to
+Raynal.
+
+"It will be so delightful to see their faces at first sight of you. O
+colonel, for my sake! Don't spoil it by going tamely in at the front
+door, after coming at night from Egypt for half an hour."
+
+Raynal grumbled something about its being a childish trick; but to
+please Edouard consented at last; only stipulated for a light: "or
+else," said he, "we shall surprise ourselves instead with a broken neck,
+going over ground we don't know to surprise the natives--our skirmishers
+got nicked that way now and then in Egypt."
+
+"Yes, colonel, I will go first with Jacintha's candle." Edouard mounted
+the stairs on tiptoe. Raynal followed. The solid stone steps did not
+prate. The men had mounted a considerable way, when puff a blast of wind
+came through a hole, and out went Edouard's candle. He turned sharply
+round to Raynal. "Peste!" said he in a vicious whisper. But the other
+laid his hand on his shoulder and whispered, "Look to the front." He
+looked, and, his own candle being out, saw a glimmer on ahead. He
+crept towards it. It was a taper shooting a feeble light across a small
+aperture. They caught a glimpse of what seemed to be a small apartment.
+Yet Edouard recognized the carpet of the tapestried room--which was a
+very large room. Creeping a yard nearer, he discovered that it was the
+tapestried room, and that what had seemed the further wall was only the
+screen, behind which were lights, and two women singing a duet.
+
+He whispered to Raynal, "It is the tapestried room."
+
+"Is it a sitting-room?" whispered Raynal.
+
+"Yes! yes! Mind and not knock your foot against the wood."
+
+And Raynal went softly up and put his foot quietly through the aperture,
+which he now saw was made by a panel drawn back close to the ground;
+and stood in the tapestried chamber. The carpet was thick; the voices
+favored the stealthy advance; the floor of the old house was like a
+rock; and Edouard put his face through the aperture, glowing all over
+with anticipation of the little scream of joy that would welcome his
+friend dropping in so nice and suddenly from Egypt.
+
+The feeling was rendered still more piquant by a sharp curiosity that
+had been growing on him for some minutes past. For why was this passage
+opened to-night?--he had never seen it opened before. And why was
+Jacintha lying sentinel at the foot of the stairs?
+
+But this was not all. Now that they were in the room both men became
+conscious of another sound besides the ladies' voices--a very peculiar
+sound. It also came from behind the screen. They both heard it, and
+showed, by the puzzled looks they cast at one another, that neither
+could make out what on earth it was. It consisted of a succession of
+little rustles, followed by little thumps on the floor.
+
+But what was curious, too, this rustle, thump--rustle, thump--fell
+exactly into the time of the music; so that, clearly, either the rustle
+thump was being played to the tune, or the tune sung to the rustle
+thump.
+
+This last touch of mystery inflamed Edouard's impatience beyond bearing:
+he pointed eagerly and merrily to the corner of the screen. Raynal
+obeyed, and stepped very slowly and cautiously towards it.
+
+Rustle, thump! rustle, thump! rustle, thump! with the rhythm of
+harmonious voices.
+
+Edouard got his head and foot into the room without taking his eye off
+Raynal.
+
+Rustle, thump! rustle, thump! rustle, thump!
+
+Raynal was now at the screen, and quietly put his head round it, and his
+hand upon it.
+
+Edouard was bursting with expectation.
+
+No result. What is this? Don't they see him? Why does he not speak to
+them? He seems transfixed.
+
+Rustle, thump! rustle, thump; accompanied now for a few notes by one
+voice only, Rose's.
+
+Suddenly there burst a shriek from Josephine, so loud, so fearful, that
+it made even Raynal stagger back a step, the screen in his hand.
+
+Then another scream of terror and anguish from Rose. Then a fainter cry,
+and the heavy helpless fall of a human body.
+
+Raynal sprang forward whirling the screen to the earth in terrible
+agitation, and Edouard bounded over it as it fell at his feet. He did
+not take a second step. The scene that caught his eye stupefied and
+paralyzed him in full career, and froze him to the spot with amazement
+and strange misgivings.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX.
+
+
+To return for a moment to Rose. She parted from Edouard, and went in at
+the front door: but the next moment she opened it softly and watched her
+lover unseen. "Dear Edouard!" she murmured: and then she thought, "how
+sad it is that I must deceive him, even to-night: must make up an excuse
+to get him from me, when we were so happy together. Ah! he little knows
+how I shall welcome our wedding-day. When once I can see my poor martyr
+on the road to peace and content under the good doctor's care. And oh!
+the happiness of having no more secrets from him I love! Dear Edouard!
+when once we are married, I never, never, will have a secret from you
+again--I swear it."
+
+As a comment on these words she now stepped cautiously out, and peered
+in every direction.
+
+"St--st!" she whispered. No answer came to this signal.
+
+Rose returned into the house and bolted the door inside. She went up
+to the tapestried room, and found the doctor in the act of wishing
+Josephine good-night. The baroness, fatigued a little by her walk, had
+mounted no higher than her own bedroom, which was on the first floor
+just under the tapestried room. Rose followed the doctor out. "Dear
+friend, one word. Josephine talked of telling Raynal. You have not
+encouraged her to do that?"
+
+"Certainly not, while he is in Egypt."
+
+"Still less on his return. Doctor, you don't know that man. Josephine
+does not know him. But I do. He would kill her if he knew. He would kill
+her that minute. He would not wait: he would not listen to excuses: he
+is a man of iron. Or if he spared her he would kill Camille: and that
+would destroy her by the cruellest of all deaths! My friend, I am a
+wicked, miserable girl. I am the cause of all this misery!"
+
+She then told Aubertin all about the anonymous letter, and what Raynal
+had said to her in consequence.
+
+"He never would have married her had he known she loved another. He
+asked me was it so. I told him a falsehood. At least I equivocated, and
+to equivocate with one so loyal and simple was to deceive him. I am the
+only sinner: that sweet angel is the only sufferer. Is this the justice
+of Heaven? Doctor, my remorse is great. No one knows what I feel when I
+look at my work. Edouard thinks I love her so much better than I do
+him. He is wrong: it is not love only, it is pity: it is remorse for the
+sorrow I have brought on her, and the wrong I have done poor Raynal."
+
+The high-spirited girl was greatly agitated: and Aubertin, though he did
+not acquit her of all blame, soothed her, and made excuses for her.
+
+"We must not always judge by results," said he. "Things turned
+unfortunately. You did for the best. I forgive you for one. That is, I
+will forgive you if you promise not to act again without my advice."
+
+"Oh, never! never!"
+
+"And, above all, no imprudence about that child. In three little weeks
+they will be together without risk of discovery. Well, you don't answer
+me."
+
+Rose's blood turned cold. "Dear friend," she stammered, "I quite agree
+with you."
+
+"Promise, then."
+
+"Not to let Josephine go to Frejus?" said Rose hastily. "Oh, yes! I
+promise."
+
+"You are a good girl," said Aubertin. "You have a will of your own. But
+you can submit to age and experience." The doctor then kissed her, and
+bade her farewell.
+
+"I leave for Paris at six in the morning," he said. "I will not try your
+patience or hers unnecessarily. Perhaps it will not be three weeks ere
+she sees her child under her friend's roof."
+
+The moment Rose was alone, she sat down and sighed bitterly. "There
+is no end to it," she sobbed despairingly. "It is like a spider's web:
+every struggle to be free but multiplies the fine yet irresistible
+thread that seems to bind me. And to-night I thought to be so happy;
+instead of that, he has left me scarce the heart to do what I have to
+do."
+
+She went back to the room, opened a window, and put out a white
+handkerchief, then closed the window down on it.
+
+Then she went to Josephine's bedroom-door: it opened on the tapestried
+room.
+
+"Josephine," she cried, "don't go to bed just yet."
+
+"No, love. What are you doing? I want to talk to you. Why did you say
+promise? and what did you mean by looking at me so? Shall I come out to
+you?"
+
+"Not just yet," said Rose; she then glided into the corridor, and passed
+her mother's room and the doctor's, and listened to see if all was
+quiet. While she was gone Josephine opened her door; but not seeing Rose
+in the sitting-room, retired again.
+
+Rose returned softly, and sat down with her head in her hand, in a calm
+attitude belied by her glancing eye, and the quick tapping of her other
+hand upon the table.
+
+Presently she raised her head quickly; a sound had reached her ear,--a
+sound so slight that none but a high-strung ear could have caught it. It
+was like a mouse giving a single scratch against a stone wall.
+
+Rose coughed slightly.
+
+On this a clearer sound was heard, as of a person scratching wood with
+the finger-nail. Rose darted to the side of the room, pressed against
+the wall, and at the same time put her other hand against the rim of one
+of the panels and pushed it laterally; it yielded, and at the opening
+stood Jacintha in her cloak and bonnet.
+
+"Yes," said Jacintha, "under my cloak--look!"
+
+"Ah! you found the things on the steps?"
+
+"Yes! I nearly tumbled over them. Have you locked that door?"
+
+"No, but I will." And Rose glided to the door and locked it. Then she
+put the screen up between Josephine's room and the open panel: then she
+and Jacintha were wonderfully busy on the other side the screen, but
+presently Rose said, "This is imprudent; you must go down to the foot of
+the stairs and wait till I call you."
+
+Jacintha pleaded hard against this arrangement, and represented that
+there was no earthly chance of any one coming to that part of the
+chateau.
+
+"No matter; I will be guarded on every side."
+
+"Mustn't I stop and just see her happy for once?"
+
+"No, my poor Jacintha, you must hear it from my lips."
+
+Jacintha retired to keep watch as she was bid. Rose went to Josephine's
+room, and threw her arms round her neck and kissed her vehemently.
+Josephine returned her embrace, then held her out at arm's length and
+looked at her.
+
+"Your eyes are red, yet your little face is full of joy. There, you
+smile."
+
+"I can't help that; I am so happy."
+
+"I am glad of it. Are you coming to bed?"
+
+"Not yet. I invite you to take a little walk with me first. Come!"
+and she led the way slowly, looking back with infinite archness and
+tenderness.
+
+"You almost frighten me," said Josephine; "it is not like you to be all
+joy when I am sad. Three whole weeks more!"
+
+"That is it. Why are you sad? because the doctor would not let you go to
+Frejus. And why am I not sad? because I had already thought of a way to
+let you see Edouard without going so far."
+
+"Rose! O Rose! O Rose!"
+
+"This way--come!" and she smiled and beckoned with her finger, while
+Josephine followed like one under a spell, her bosom heaving, her eye
+glancing on every side, hoping some strange joy, yet scarce daring to
+hope.
+
+Rose drew back the screen, and there was a sweet little berceau that had
+once been Josephine's own, and in it, sunk deep in snow-white lawn, was
+a sleeping child, that lay there looking as a rose might look could it
+fall upon new-fallen snow.
+
+At sight of it Josephine uttered a little cry, not loud but deep--ay, a
+cry to bring tears into the eye of the hearer, and she stood trembling
+from head to foot, her hands clasped, and her eye fascinated and fixed
+on the cradle.
+
+"My child under this roof! What have you done?" but her eye, fascinated
+and fixed, never left the cradle.
+
+"I saw you languishing, dying, for want of him."
+
+"Oh, if anybody should come?" But her eye never stirred an inch from the
+cradle.
+
+"No, no, no! the door is locked. Jacintha watches below; there is no
+dan--Ah, oh, poor sister!"
+
+For, as Rose was speaking, the young mother sprang silently upon her
+child. You would have thought she was going to kill him; her head reared
+itself again and again like a crested snake's, and again and again and
+again and again plunged down upon the child, and she kissed his little
+body from head to foot with soft violence, and murmured, through her
+streaming tears, "My child! my darling! my angel! oh, my poor boy! my
+child! my child!"
+
+I will ask my female readers of every degree to tell their brothers and
+husbands all the young noble did: how she sat on the floor, and had her
+child on her bosom; how she smiled over it through her tears; how she
+purred over it; how she, the stately one, lisped and prattled over it;
+and how life came pouring into her heart from it.
+
+Before she had had it in her arms five minutes, her pale cheek was as
+red as a rose, and her eyes brighter than diamonds.
+
+"Bless you, Rose! bless you! bless you! in one moment you have made me
+forget all I ever suffered in my life."
+
+"There is a cold draught," cried she presently, with maternal anxiety;
+"close the panel, Rose."
+
+"No, dear; or I could not call to Jacintha, or she to me; but I will
+shift the screen round between him and the draught. There, now, come to
+his aunt--a darling!"
+
+Then Rose sat on the floor too, and Josephine put her boy on aunt's
+lap, and took a distant view of him. But she could not bear so vast a
+separation long. She must have him to her bosom again.
+
+Presently my lord, finding himself hugged, opened his eyes, and, as a
+natural consequence, his mouth.
+
+"Oh, that will never do," cried Rose, and they put him back in the
+cradle with all expedition, and began to rock it. Young master was
+not to be altogether appeased even by that. So Rose began singing an
+old-fashioned Breton chant or lullaby.
+
+Josephine sang with her, and, singing, watched with a smile her boy drop
+off by degrees to sleep under the gentle motion and the lulling song.
+They sang and rocked till the lids came creeping down, and hid the
+great blue eyes; but still they sang and rocked, lulling the boy, and
+gladdening their own hearts; for the quaint old Breton ditty was tunable
+as the lark that carols over the green wheat in April; and the words so
+simple and motherly, that a nation had taken them to heart. Such songs
+bind ages together and make the lofty and the low akin by the great ties
+of music and the heart. Many a Breton peasant's bosom in the olden time
+had gushed over her sleeping boy as the young dame's of Beaurepaire
+gushed now--in this quaint, tuneful lullaby.
+
+Now, as they kneeled over the cradle, one on each side, and rocked it,
+and sang that ancient chant, Josephine, who was opposite the screen,
+happening to raise her eyes, saw a strange thing.
+
+There was the face of a man set close against the side of the screen,
+and peeping and peering out of the gloom. The light of her candle fell
+full on this face; it glared at her, set pale, wonder-struck, and vivid
+in the surrounding gloom.
+
+Horror! It was her husband's face.
+
+At first she was quite stupefied, and looked at it with soul and senses
+benumbed. Then she trembled, and put her hand to her eyes; for she
+thought it a phantom or a delusion of the mind. No: there it glared
+still. Then she trembled violently, and held out her left hand, the
+fingers working convulsively, to Rose, who was still singing.
+
+But, at the same moment, the mouth of this face suddenly opened in a
+long-drawn breath. At this, Josephine uttered a violent shriek, and
+sprang to her feet, with her right hand quivering and pointing at that
+pale face set in the dark.
+
+Rose started up, and, wheeling her head round, saw Raynal's gloomy
+face looking over her shoulder. She fell screaming upon her knees, and,
+almost out of her senses, began to pray wildly and piteously for mercy.
+
+Josephine uttered one more cry, but this was the faint cry of nature,
+sinking under the shock of terror. She swooned dead away, and fell
+senseless on the floor ere Raynal could debarrass himself of the screen,
+and get to her.
+
+This, then, was the scene that met Edouard's eyes. His affianced bride
+on her knees, white as a ghost, trembling, and screaming, rather than
+crying, for mercy. And Raynal standing over his wife, showing by the
+working of his iron features that he doubted whether she was worthy he
+should raise her.
+
+One would have thought nothing could add to the terror of this scene.
+Yet it was added to. The baroness rang her bell violently in the room
+below. She had heard Josephine's scream and fall.
+
+At the ringing of this shrill bell Rose shuddered like a maniac, and
+grovelled on her knees to Raynal, and seized his very knees and implored
+him to show some pity.
+
+"O sir! kill us! we are culpable"--
+
+Dring! dring! dring! dring! dring! pealed the baroness's bell again.
+
+"But do not tell our mother. Oh, if you are a man! do not! do not! Show
+us some pity. We are but women. Mercy! mercy! mercy!"
+
+"Speak out then," groaned Raynal. "What does this mean? Why has my wife
+swooned at sight of me?--whose is this child?"
+
+"Whose?" stammered Rose. Till he said that, she never thought there
+COULD be a doubt whose child.
+
+Dring! dring! dring! dring! dring!
+
+"Oh, my God!" cried the poor girl, and her scared eyes glanced every way
+like some wild creature looking for a hole, however small, to escape by.
+
+Edouard, seeing her hesitation, came down on her other side. "Whose is
+the child, Rose?" said he sternly.
+
+"You, too? Why were we born? mercy! oh! pray let me go to my sister."
+
+Dring! dring! dring! dring! dring! went the terrible bell.
+
+The men were excited to fury by Rose's hesitation; they each seized an
+arm, and tore her screaming with fear at their violence, from her knees
+up to her feet between them with a single gesture.
+
+"Whose is the child?"
+
+"You hurt me!" said she bitterly to Edouard, and she left crying and was
+terribly calm and sullen all in a moment.
+
+"Whose is the child?" roared Edouard and Raynal, in one raging breath.
+"Whose is the child?"
+
+"It is mine."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX.
+
+
+These were not words; they were electric shocks.
+
+The two arms that gripped Rose's arms were paralyzed, and dropped off
+them; and there was silence.
+
+Then first the thought of all she had done with those three words
+began to rise and grow and surge over her. She stood, her eyes turned
+downwards, yet inwards, and dilating with horror.
+
+Silence.
+
+Now a mist began to spread over her eyes, and in it she saw indistinctly
+the figure of Raynal darting to her sister's side, and raising her head.
+
+She dared not look round on the other side. She heard feet stagger on
+the floor. She heard a groan, too; but not a word.
+
+Horrible silence.
+
+With nerves strung to frenzy, and quivering ears, that magnified every
+sound, she waited for a reproach, a curse; either would have been some
+little relief. But no! a silence far more terrible.
+
+Then a step wavered across the room. Her soul was in her ear. She could
+hear and feel the step totter, and it shook her as it went. All sounds
+were trebled to her. Then it struck on the stone step of the staircase,
+not like a step, but a knell; another step, another and another; down to
+the very bottom. Each slow step made her head ring and her heart freeze.
+
+At last she heard no more. Then a scream of anguish and recall rose
+to her lips. She fought it down, for Josephine and Raynal. Edouard
+was gone. She had but her sister now, the sister she loved better than
+herself; the sister to save whose life and honor she had this moment
+sacrificed her own, and all a woman lives for.
+
+She turned, with a wild cry of love and pity, to that sister's side to
+help her; and when she kneeled down beside her, an iron arm was promptly
+thrust out between the beloved one and her.
+
+"This is my care, madame," said Raynal, coldly.
+
+There was no mistaking his manner. The stained one was not to touch his
+wife.
+
+She looked at him in piteous amazement at his ingratitude. "It is well,"
+said she. "It is just. I deserve this from you."
+
+She said no more, but drooped gently down beside the cradle, and hid her
+forehead in the clothes beside the child that had brought all this woe,
+and sobbed bitterly.
+
+Then honest Raynal began to be sorry for her, in spite of himself. But
+there was no time for this. Josephine stirred; and, at the same moment,
+a violent knocking came at the door of the apartment, and the new
+servant's voice, crying, "Ladies, for Heaven's sake, what is the matter?
+The baroness heard a fall--she is getting up--she will be here. What
+shall I tell her is the matter?"
+
+Raynal was going to answer, but Rose, who had started up at the
+knocking, put her hand in a moment right before his mouth, and ran to
+the door. "There is nothing the matter; tell mamma I am coming down to
+her directly." She flew back to Raynal in an excitement little short of
+frenzy. "Help me carry her into her own room," cried she imperiously.
+Raynal obeyed by instinct; for the fiery girl spoke like a general,
+giving the word of command, with the enemy in front. He carried the true
+culprit in his arms, and laid her gently on her bed.
+
+"Now put IT out of sight--take this, quick, man! quick!" cried Rose.
+
+Raynal went to the cradle. "Ah! my poor girl," said he, as he lifted it
+in his arms, "this is a sorry business; to have to hide your own child
+from your own mother!"
+
+"Colonel Raynal," said Rose, "do not insult a poor, despairing girl.
+C'est lache."
+
+"I am silent, young woman," said Raynal, sternly. "What is to be done?"
+
+"Take it down the steps, and give it to Jacintha. Stay, here is a
+candle; I go to tell mamma you are come; and, Colonel Raynal, I never
+injured YOU: if you tell my mother you will stab her to the heart, and
+me, and may the curse of cowards light on you!--may"--
+
+"Enough!" said Raynal, sternly. "Do you take me for a babbling girl? I
+love your mother better than you do, or this brat of yours would not be
+here. I shall not bring her gray hairs down with sorrow to the grave. I
+shall speak of this villany to but one person; and to him I shall talk
+with this, and not with the idle tongue." And he tapped his sword-hilt
+with a sombre look of terrible significance.
+
+He carried out the cradle. The child slept sweetly through it all.
+
+Rose darted into Josephine's room, took the key from the inside to the
+outside, locked the door, put the key in her pocket, and ran down to her
+mother's room; her knees trembled under her as she went.
+
+Meantime, Jacintha, sleeping tranquilly, suddenly felt her throat
+griped, and heard a loud voice ring in her ear; then she was lifted, and
+wrenched, and dropped. She found herself lying clear of the steps in the
+moonlight; her head was where her feet had been, and her candle out.
+
+She uttered shriek upon shriek, and was too frightened to get up. She
+thought it was supernatural; some old De Beaurepaire had served her thus
+for sleeping on her post. A struggle took place between her fidelity and
+her superstitious fears. Fidelity conquered. Quaking in every limb, she
+groped up the staircase for her candle.
+
+It was gone.
+
+Then a still more sickening fear came over her.
+
+What if this was no spirit's work, but a human arm--a strong one--some
+man's arm?
+
+Her first impulse was to dart up the stairs, and make sure that no
+calamity had befallen through her mistimed drowsiness. But, when she
+came to try, her dread of the supernatural revived. She could not
+venture without a light up those stairs, thronged perhaps with angry
+spirits. She ran to the kitchen. She found the tinderbox, and with
+trembling hands struck a light. She came back shading it with her shaky
+hands; and, committing her soul to the care of Heaven, she crept quaking
+up the stairs. Then she heard voices above, and that restored her more;
+she mounted more steadily. Presently she stopped, for a heavy step was
+coming down. It did not sound like a woman's step. It came further down;
+she turned to fly.
+
+"Jacintha!" said a deep voice, that in this stone cylinder rang like
+thunder from a tomb.
+
+"Oh! saints and angels save me!" yelled Jacintha; and fell on her knees,
+and hid her head for security; and down went her candlestick clattering
+on the stone.
+
+"Don't be a fool!" said the iron voice. "Get up and take this."
+
+She raised her head by slow degrees, shuddering. A man was holding out a
+cradle to her; the candle he carried lighted up his face; it was Colonel
+Raynal.
+
+She stared at him stupidly, but never moved from her knees, and the
+candle began to shake violently in her hand, as she herself trembled
+from head to foot.
+
+Then Raynal concluded she was in the plot; but, scorning to reproach a
+servant, he merely said, "Well, what do you kneel there for, gaping at
+me like that? Take this, I tell you, and carry it out of the house."
+
+He shoved the cradle roughly down into her hands, then turned on his
+heel without a word.
+
+Jacintha collapsed on the stairs, and the cradle beside her, for all
+the power was driven out of her body; she could hardly support her own
+weight, much less the cradle.
+
+She rocked herself, and moaned out, "Oh, what's this? oh, what's this?"
+
+A cold perspiration came over her whole frame.
+
+"What could this mean? What on earth had happened?"
+
+She took up the candle, for it was lying burning and guttering on the
+stairs; scraped up the grease with the snuffers, and by force of habit
+tried to polish it clean with a bit of paper that shook between her
+fingers; she did not know what she was doing. When she recovered her
+wits, she took the child out of the cradle, and wrapped it carefully in
+her shawl; then went slowly down the stairs; and holding him close to
+her bosom, with a furtive eye, and brain confused, and a heart like
+lead, stole away to the tenantless cottage, where Madame Jouvenel
+awaited her.
+
+Meantime, Rose, with quaking heart, had encountered the baroness. She
+found her pale and agitated, and her first question was, "What is the
+matter? what have you been all doing over my head?"
+
+"Darling mother," replied Rose, evasively, "something has happened that
+will rejoice your heart. Somebody has come home."
+
+"My son? eh, no! impossible! We cannot be so happy."
+
+"He will be with you directly."
+
+The old lady now trembled with joyful agitation.
+
+"In five minutes I will bring him to you. Shall you be dressed? I will
+ring for the girl to help you."
+
+"But, Rose, the scream, and that terrible fall. Ah! where is Josephine?"
+
+"Can't you guess, mamma? Oh, the fall was only the screen; they stumbled
+over it in the dark."
+
+"They! who?"
+
+"Colonel Raynal, and--and Edouard. I will tell you, mamma, but don't be
+angry, or even mention it; they wanted to surprise us. They saw a light
+burning, and they crept on tiptoe up to the tapestried room, where
+Josephine and I were, and they did give us a great fright."
+
+"What madness!" cried the baroness, angrily; "and in Josephine's weak
+state! Such a surprise might have driven her into a fit."
+
+"Yes, it was foolish, but let it pass, mamma. Don't speak of it, for he
+is so sorry about it."
+
+Then Rose slipped out, ordered a fire in the salon, and not in the
+tapestried room, and the next minute was at her sister's door. There she
+found Raynal knocking, and asking Josephine how she was.
+
+"Pray leave her to me a moment," said she. "I will bring her down to
+you. Mamma is waiting for you in the salon."
+
+Raynal went down. Rose unlocked the bedroom-door, went in, and, to her
+horror, found Josephine lying on the floor. She dashed water in her
+face, and applied every remedy; and at last she came back to life, and
+its terrors.
+
+"Save me, Rose! save me--he is coming to kill me--I heard him at the
+door," and she clung trembling piteously to Rose.
+
+Then Rose, seeing her terror, was almost glad at the suicidal falsehood
+she had told. She comforted and encouraged Josephine and--deceived her.
+(This was the climax.)
+
+"All is well, my poor coward," she cried; "your fears are all imaginary;
+another has owned the child, and the story is believed."
+
+"Another! impossible! He would not believe it."
+
+"He does believe it--he shall believe it."
+
+Rose then, feeling by no means sure that Josephine, terrified as she
+was, would consent to let her sister come to shame to screen her, told
+her boldly that Jacintha had owned herself the mother of the child, and
+that Raynal's only feeling towards HER was pity, and regret at having
+so foolishly frightened her, weakened as she was by illness. "I told him
+you had been ill, dear. But how came you on the ground?"
+
+"I had come to myself; I was on my knees praying. He tapped. I heard his
+voice. I remember no more. I must have fainted again directly."
+
+Rose had hard work to make her believe that her guilt, as she called
+it, was not known; and even then she could not prevail on her to come
+down-stairs, until she said, "If you don't, he will come to you." On
+that Josephine consented eagerly, and with trembling fingers began to
+adjust her hair and her dress for the interview.
+
+All this terrible night Rose fought for her sister. She took her
+down-stairs to the salon; she put her on the sofa; she sat by her and
+pressed her hand constantly to give her courage. She told the story of
+the surprise her own way, before the whole party, including the doctor,
+to prevent Raynal from being called on to tell it his way. She laughed
+at Josephine's absurdity, but excused it on account of her feeble
+health. In short, she threw more and more dust in all their eyes.
+
+But by the time when the rising sun came faintly in and lighted the
+haggard party, where the deceived were happy, the deceivers wretched,
+the supernatural strength this young girl had shown was almost
+exhausted. She felt an hysterical impulse to scream and weep: each
+minute it became more and more ungovernable. Then came an unexpected
+turn. Raynal after a long and tiring talk with his mother, as he called
+her, looked at his watch, and in a characteristic way coolly announced
+his immediate departure, this being the first hint he had given them
+that he was not come back for good.
+
+The baroness was thunderstruck.
+
+Rose and Josephine pressed one another's hands, and had much ado not to
+utter a loud cry of joy.
+
+Raynal explained that he was the bearer of despatches. "I must be off:
+not an hour to lose. Don't fret, mother, I shall soon be back again, if
+I am not knocked on the head."
+
+Raynal took leave of them all. When it came to Rose's turn, he drew her
+aside and whispered into her ear, "Who is the man?"
+
+She started, and seemed dumfounded.
+
+"Tell me, or I ask my wife."
+
+"She has promised me not to betray me: I made her swear. Spare me now,
+brother; I will tell you all when you come back."
+
+"That is a bargain: now hear ME swear: he shall marry you, or he shall
+die by my hand."
+
+He confirmed this by a tremendous oath.
+
+Rose shuddered, but said nothing, only she thought to herself, "I am
+forewarned. Never shall you know who is the father of that child."
+
+He was no sooner gone than the baroness insisted on knowing what this
+private communication between him and Rose was about.
+
+"Oh," said Rose, "he was only telling me to keep up your courage and
+Josephine's till he comes back."
+
+This was the last lie the poor entangled wretch had to tell that
+morning. The next minute the sisters, exhausted by their terrible
+struggle, went feebly, with downcast eyes, along the corridor and up the
+staircase to Josephine's room.
+
+They went hand in hand. They sank down, dressed as they were, on
+Josephine's bed, and clung to one another and trembled together, till
+their exhausted natures sank into uneasy slumbers, from which each in
+turn would wake ever and anon with a convulsive start, and clasp her
+sister tighter to her breast.
+
+Theirs was a marvellous love. Even a course of deceit had not yet
+prevailed to separate or chill their sister bosoms. But still in this
+deep and wonderful love there were degrees: one went a shade deeper than
+the other now--ay, since last night. Which? why, she who had sacrificed
+herself for the other, and dared not tell her, lest the sacrifice should
+be refused.
+
+
+It was the gray of the morning, and foggy, when Raynal, after taking
+leave, went to the stable for his horse. At the stable-door he came upon
+a man sitting doubled up on the very stones of the yard, with his head
+on his knees. The figure lifted his head, and showed him the face of
+Edouard Riviere, white and ghastly: his hair lank with the mist, his
+teeth chattering with cold and misery. The poor wretch had walked
+frantically all night round and round the chateau, waiting till Raynal
+should come out. He told him so.
+
+"But why didn't you?--Ah! I see. No! you could not go into the house
+after that. My poor fellow, there is but one thing for you to do. Turn
+your back on her, and forget she ever lived; she is dead to you."
+
+"There is something to be done besides that," said Edouard, gloomily.
+
+"What?"
+
+"Vengeance."
+
+"That is my affair, young man. When I come back from the Rhine, she will
+tell me who her seducer is. She has promised."
+
+"And don't you see through that?" said Edouard, gnashing his teeth;
+"that is only to gain time: she will never tell you. She is young in
+years, but old in treachery."
+
+He groaned and was silent a moment, then laying his hand on Raynal's arm
+said grimly, "Thank Heaven, we don't depend on her for information! I
+know the villain."
+
+Raynal's eyes flashed: "Ah! then tell me this moment."
+
+"It is that scoundrel Dujardin."
+
+"Dujardin! What do you mean?"
+
+"I mean that, while you were fighting for France, your house was turned
+into a hospital for wounded soldiers."
+
+"And pray, sir, to what more honorable use could they put it?"
+
+"Well, this Dujardin was housed by you, was nursed by your wife and all
+the family; and in return has seduced your sister, my affianced."
+
+"I can hardly believe that. Camille Dujardin was always a man of honor,
+and a good soldier."
+
+"Colonel, there has been no man near the place but this Dujardin. I tell
+you it is he. Don't make me tear my bleeding heart out: must I tell you
+how often I caught them together, how I suspected, and how she gulled
+me? blind fool that I was, to believe a woman's words before my own
+eyes. I swear to you he is the villain; the only question is, which of
+us two is to kill him."
+
+"Where is the man?"
+
+"In the army of the Rhine."
+
+"Ah! all the better."
+
+"Covered with glory and honor. Curse him! oh, curse him! curse him!"
+
+"I am in luck. I am going to the Rhine."
+
+"I know it. That is why I waited here all through this night of misery.
+Yes, you are in luck. But you will send me a line when you have killed
+him; will you not? Then I shall know joy again. Should he escape you, he
+shall not escape me."
+
+"Young man," said Raynal, with dignity, "this rage is unmanly. Besides,
+we have not heard his side of the story. He is a good soldier; perhaps
+he is not all to blame: or perhaps passion has betrayed him into a sin
+that his conscience and honor disapprove: if so, he must not die. You
+think only of your wrong: it is natural: but I am the girl's brother;
+guardian of her honor and my own. His life is precious as gold. I shall
+make him marry her."
+
+"What! reward him for his villany?" cried Edouard, frantically.
+
+"A mighty reward," replied Raynal, with a sneer.
+
+"You leave one thing out of the calculation, monsieur," said Edouard,
+trembling with anger, "that I will kill your brother-in-law at the
+altar, before her eyes."
+
+"YOU leave one thing out of the calculation: that you will first have to
+cross swords, at the altar, with me."
+
+"So be it. I will not draw on my old commandant. I could not; but be
+sure I will catch him and her alone some day, and the bride shall be a
+widow in her honeymoon."
+
+"As you please," said Raynal, coolly. "That is all fair, as you have
+been wronged. I shall make her an honest wife, and then you may make
+her an honest widow. (This is what they call LOVE, and sneer at me for
+keeping clear of it.) But neither he nor you shall keep MY SISTER what
+she is now, a ----," and he used a word out of camp.
+
+Edouard winced and groaned. "Oh! don't call her by such a name. There
+is some mystery. She loved me once. There must have been some strange
+seduction."
+
+"Now you deceive yourself," said Raynal. "I never saw a girl that could
+take her own part better than she can; she is not like her sister at
+all in character. Not that I excuse him; it was a dishonorable act, an
+ungrateful act to my wife and my mother."
+
+"And to you."
+
+"Now listen to me: in four days I shall stand before him. I shall not
+go into a pet like you; I am in earnest. I shall just say to him,
+'Dujardin, I know all!' Then if he is guilty his face will show it
+directly. Then I shall say, 'Comrade, you must marry her whom you have
+dishonored.'"
+
+"He will not. He is a libertine, a rascal."
+
+"You are speaking of a man you don't know. He WILL marry her and repair
+the wrong he has done."
+
+"Suppose he refuses?"
+
+"Why should he refuse? The girl is not ugly nor old, and if she has done
+a folly, he was her partner in it."
+
+"But SUPPOSE he refuses?"
+
+Raynal ground his teeth. "Refuse? If he does, I'll run my sword through
+his carcass then and there, and the hussy shall go into a convent."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI.
+
+
+The French army lay before a fortified place near the Rhine, which we
+will call Philipsburg.
+
+This army knew Bonaparte by report only; it was commanded by generals of
+the old school.
+
+Philipsburg was defended on three sides by the nature of the ground; but
+on the side that faced the French line of march there was only a zigzag
+wall, pierced, and a low tower or two at each of the salient angles.
+
+There were evidences of a tardy attempt to improve the defences. In
+particular there was a large round bastion, about three times the height
+of the wall; but the masonry was new, and the very embrasures were not
+yet cut.
+
+Young blood was for assaulting these equivocal fortifications at the end
+of the day's march that brought the French advanced guard in sight of
+the place; but the old generals would not hear of it; the soldiers'
+lives must not be flung away assaulting a place that could be reduced in
+twenty-one days with mathematical certainty. For at this epoch a siege
+was looked on as a process with a certain result, the only problem was
+in how many days would the place be taken; and even this they used to
+settle to a day or two on paper by arithmetic; so many feet of wall, and
+so many guns on the one side; so many guns, so many men, and such and
+such a soil to cut the trenches in on the other: result, two figures
+varying from fourteen to forty. These two figures represented the
+duration of the siege.
+
+For all that, siege arithmetic, right in general, has often been
+terribly disturbed by one little incident, that occurs from time to
+time; viz., Genius INside. And, indeed, this is one of the sins of
+genius; it goes and puts out calculations that have stood the brunt of
+years. Archimedes and Todleben were, no doubt, clever men in their way
+and good citizens, yet one characteristic of delicate men's minds they
+lacked--veneration; they showed a sad disrespect for the wisdom of the
+ancients, deranged the calculations which so much learning and patient
+thought had hallowed, disturbed the minds of white-haired veterans, took
+sieges out of the grasp of science, and plunged them back into the field
+of wild conjecture.
+
+Our generals then sat down at fourteen hundred yards' distance, and
+planned the trenches artistically, and directed them to be cut at
+artful angles, and so creep nearer and nearer the devoted town. Then the
+Prussians, whose hearts had been in their shoes at first sight of the
+French shakos, plucked up, and turned not the garrison only but the
+population of the town into engineers and masons. Their fortifications
+grew almost as fast as the French trenches.
+
+The first day of the siege, a young but distinguished brigadier in the
+French army rode to the quarters of General Raimbaut, who commanded
+his division, and was his personal friend, and respectfully but firmly
+entreated the general to represent to the commander-in-chief the
+propriety of assaulting that new bastion before it should become
+dangerous. "My brigade shall carry it in fifteen minutes, general," said
+he.
+
+"What! cross all that open under fire? One-half your brigade would never
+reach the bastion."
+
+"But the other half would take it."
+
+"That is not so certain."
+
+General Raimbaut refused to forward the young colonel's proposal to
+headquarters. "I will not subject you to TWO refusals in one matter,"
+said he, kindly.
+
+The young colonel lingered. He said, respectfully, "One question,
+general, when that bastion cuts its teeth will it be any easier to take
+than now?"
+
+"Certainly; it will always be easier to take it from the sap than to
+cross the open under fire to it, and take it. Come, colonel, to your
+trenches; and if your friend should cut its teeth, you shall have a
+battery in your attack that will set its teeth on edge. Ha! ha!"
+
+The young colonel did not echo his chief's humor; he saluted gravely,
+and returned to the trenches.
+
+The next morning three fresh tiers of embrasures grinned one above
+another at the besiegers. The besieged had been up all night, and not
+idle. In half these apertures black muzzles showed themselves.
+
+The bastion had cut its front teeth.
+
+Thirteenth day of the siege.
+
+The trenches were within four hundred yards of the enemy's guns, and
+it was hot work in them. The enemy had three tiers of guns in the round
+bastion, and on the top they had got a long 48-pounder, which they
+worked with a swivel joint, or the like, and threw a great roaring shot
+into any part of the French lines.
+
+As to the commander-in-chief and his generals, they were dotted about
+a long way in the rear, and no shot came as far as them; but in the
+trenches the men began now to fall fast, especially on the left attack,
+which faced the round bastion. Our young colonel had got his heavy
+battery, and every now and then he would divert the general efforts
+of the bastion, and compel it to concentrate its attention on him, by
+pounding away at it till it was all in sore places. But he meant it
+worse mischief than that. Still, as heretofore, regarding it as the key
+to Philipsburg, he had got a large force of engineers at work driving a
+mine towards it, and to this he trusted more than to breaching it; for
+the bigger holes he made in it by day were all stopped at night by the
+townspeople.
+
+This colonel was not a favorite in the division to which his brigade
+belonged. He was a good soldier, but a dull companion. He was also
+accused of hauteur and of an unsoldierly reserve with his brother
+officers.
+
+Some loose-tongued ones even called him a milk-sop, because he was
+constantly seen conversing with the priest--he who had nothing to say to
+an honest soldier.
+
+Others said, "No, hang it, he is not a milk-sop: he is a tried soldier:
+he is a sulky beggar all the same." Those under his immediate command
+were divided in opinion about him. There was something about him they
+could not understand. Why was his sallow face so stern, so sad? and why
+with all that was his voice so gentle? somehow the few words that did
+fall from his mouth were prized. One old soldier used to say, "I would
+rather have a word from our brigadier than from the commander-in-chief."
+Others thought he must at some part of his career have pillaged a
+church, taken the altar-piece, and sold it to a picture-dealer in Paris,
+or whipped the earrings out of the Madonna's ears, or admitted the
+female enemy to quarter upon ungenerous conditions: this, or some such
+crime to which we poor soldiers are liable: and now was committing the
+mistake of remording himself about it. "Always alongside the chaplain,
+you see!"
+
+This cold and silent man had won the heart of the most talkative
+sergeant in the French army. Sergeant La Croix protested with many oaths
+that all the best generals of the day had commanded him in turn, and
+that his present colonel was the first that had succeeded in inspiring
+him with unlimited confidence. "He knows every point of war--this
+one," said La Croix, "I heard him beg and pray for leave to storm this
+thundering bastion before it was armed: but no, the old muffs would be
+wiser than our colonel. So now here we are kept at bay by a place that
+Julius Caesar and Cannibal wouldn't have made two bites at apiece; no
+more would I if I was the old boy out there behind the hill." In such
+terms do sergeants denote commanders-in-chief--at a distance. A voluble
+sergeant has more influence with the men than the minister of war is
+perhaps aware: on the whole, the 24th brigade would have followed its
+gloomy colonel to grim death and a foot farther. One thing gave these
+men a touch of superstitious reverence for their commander. He seemed
+to them free from physical weakness. He never SAT DOWN to dinner, and
+seemed never to sleep. At no hour of the day or night were the sentries
+safe from his visits.
+
+Very annoying. But, after awhile, it led to keen watchfulness: the more
+so that the sad and gloomy colonel showed by his manner he appreciated
+it. Indeed, one night he even opened his marble jaws, and told Sergeant
+La Croix that a watchful sentry was an important soldier, not to his
+brigade only, but to the whole army. Judge whether the maxim and the
+implied encomium did not circulate next morning, with additions.
+
+Sixteenth day of the siege. The round bastion opened fire at eight
+o'clock, not on the opposing battery, but on the right of the French
+attack. Its advanced position enabled a portion of its guns to rake
+these trenches slant-wise: and depressing its guns it made the round
+shot strike the ground first and ricochet over.
+
+On this our colonel opened on them with all his guns: one of these
+he served himself. Among his other warlike accomplishments, he was
+a wonderful shot with a cannon. He showed them capital practice this
+morning: drove two embrasures into one, and knocked about a ton of
+masonry off the parapet. Then taking advantage of this, he served two of
+his guns with grape, and swept the enemy off the top of the bastion,
+and kept it clear. He made it so hot they could not work the upper guns.
+Then they turned the other two tiers all upon him, and at it both
+sides went ding, dong, till the guns were too hot to be worked. So then
+Sergeant La Croix popped his head up from the battery, and showed
+the enemy a great white plate. This was meant to convey to them an
+invitation to dine with the French army: the other side of the table of
+course.
+
+To the credit of Prussian intelligence be it recorded, that this
+pantomimic hint was at once taken and both sides went to dinner.
+
+The fighting colonel, however, remained in the battery, and kept a
+detachment of his gunners employed cooling the guns and repairing the
+touch-holes. He ordered his two cutlets and his glass of water into the
+battery.
+
+Meantime, the enemy fired a single gun at long intervals, as much as to
+say, "We had the last word."
+
+Let trenches be cut ever so artfully, there will be a little space
+exposed here and there at the angles. These spaces the men are ordered
+to avoid, or whip quickly across them into cover.
+
+Now the enemy had just got the range of one of these places with their
+solitary gun, and had already dropped a couple of shot right on to it.
+A camp follower with a tray, two cutlets, and a glass of water, came to
+this open space just as a puff of white smoke burst from the bastion.
+Instead of instantly seeking shelter till the shot had struck, he, in
+his inexperience, thought the shot must have struck, and all danger be
+over. He stayed there mooning instead of pelting under cover: the
+shot (eighteen-pound) struck him right on the breast, knocked him into
+spilikins, and sent the mutton cutlets flying.
+
+The human fragments lay quiet, ten yards off. But a soldier that was
+eating his dinner kicked it over, and jumped up at the side of "Death's
+Alley" (as it was christened next minute), and danced and yelled with
+pain.
+
+"Haw! haw! haw!" roared a soldier from the other side of the alley.
+
+"What is that?" cried Sergeant La Croix. "What do you laugh at, Private
+Cadel?" said he sternly, for, though he was too far in the trench to
+see, he had heard that horrible sound a soldier knows from every other,
+the "thud" of a round shot striking man or horse.
+
+"Sergeant," said Cadel, respectfully, "I laugh to see Private Dard, that
+got the wind of the shot, dance and sing, when the man that got the shot
+itself does not say a word."
+
+"The wind of the shot, you rascal!" roared Private Dard: "look here!"
+and he showed the blood running down his face.
+
+The shot had actually driven a splinter of bone out of the sutler into
+Dard's temple.
+
+"I am the unluckiest fellow in the army," remonstrated Dard: and he
+stamped in a circle.
+
+"Seems to me you are only the second unluckiest this time," said a young
+soldier with his mouth full; and, with a certain dry humor, he pointed
+vaguely over his shoulder with the fork towards the corpse.
+
+The trenches laughed and assented.
+
+This want of sympathy and justice irritated Dard. "You cursed fools!"
+cried he. "He is gone where we must all go--without any trouble. But
+look at me. I am always getting barked. Dogs of Prussians! they pick me
+out among a thousand. I shall have a headache all the afternoon, you see
+else."
+
+Some of our heads would never have ached again: but Dard had a good
+thick skull.
+
+Dard pulled out his spilikin savagely.
+
+"I'll wrap it up in paper for Jacintha," said he. "Then that will learn
+her what a poor soldier has to go through."
+
+Even this consolation was denied Private Dard.
+
+Corporal Coriolanus Gand, a bit of an infidel from Lyons, who sometimes
+amused himself with the Breton's superstition, told him with a grave
+face, that the splinter belonged not to him, but to the sutler, and,
+though so small, was doubtless a necessary part of his frame.
+
+"If you keep that, it will be a bone of contention between you two,"
+said he; "especially at midnight. HE WILL BE ALWAYS COMING BACK TO YOU
+FOR IT."
+
+"There, take it away!" said the Breton hastily, "and bury it with the
+poor fellow."
+
+Sergeant La Croix presented himself before the colonel with a rueful
+face and saluted him and said, "Colonel, I beg a thousand pardons; your
+dinner has been spilt--a shot from the bastion."
+
+"No matter," said the colonel. "Give me a piece of bread instead."
+
+La Croix went for it himself, and on his return found Cadel sitting on
+one side of Death's Alley, and Dard with his head bound up on the other.
+They had got a bottle which each put up in turn wherever he fancied
+the next round shot would strike, and they were betting their afternoon
+rations which would get the Prussians to hit the bottle first.
+
+La Croix pulled both their ears playfully.
+
+"Time is up for playing marbles," said he. "Be off, and play at duty,"
+and he bundled them into the battery.
+
+
+It was an hour past midnight: a cloudy night. The moon was up, but seen
+only by fitful gleams. A calm, peaceful silence reigned.
+
+Dard was sentinel in the battery.
+
+An officer going his rounds found the said sentinel flat instead of
+vertical. He stirred him with his scabbard, and up jumped Dard.
+
+"It's all right, sergeant. O Lord! it's the colonel. I wasn't asleep,
+colonel."
+
+"I have not accused you. But you will explain what you were doing."
+
+"Colonel," said Dard, all in a flutter, "I was taking a squint at them,
+because I saw something. The beggars are building a wall, now."
+
+"Where?"
+
+"Between us and the bastion."
+
+"Show me."
+
+"I can't, colonel; the moon has gone in; but I did see it."
+
+"How long was it?"
+
+"About a hundred yards."
+
+"How high?"
+
+"Colonel, it was ten feet high if it was an inch."
+
+"Have you good sight?"
+
+"La! colonel, wasn't I a bit of a poacher before I took to the bayonet?"
+
+"Good! Now reflect. If you persist in this statement, I turn out the
+brigade on your information."
+
+"I'll stand the fire of a corporal's guard at break of day if I make a
+mistake now," said Dard.
+
+The colonel glided away, called his captain and first lieutenants, and
+said two words in each ear, that made them spring off their backs.
+
+Dard, marching to an fro, musket on shoulder, found himself suddenly
+surrounded by grim, silent, but deadly eager soldiers, that came pouring
+like bees into the open space behind the battery. The officers came
+round the colonel.
+
+"Attend to two things," said he to the captains. "Don't fire till they
+are within ten yards: and don't follow them unless I lead you."
+
+The men were then told off by companies, some to the battery, some to
+the trenches, some were kept on each side Death's Alley, ready for a
+rush.
+
+They were not all of them in position, when those behind the parapet
+saw, as it were, something deepen the gloom of night, some fourscore
+yards to the front: it was like a line of black ink suddenly drawn upon
+a sheet covered with Indian ink.
+
+It seems quite stationary. The novices wondered what it was. The
+veterans muttered--"Three deep."
+
+Though it looked stationary, it got blacker and blacker. The soldiers of
+the 24th brigade griped their muskets hard, and set their teeth, and the
+sergeants had much ado to keep them quiet.
+
+All of a sudden, a loud yell on the right of the brigade, two or three
+single shots from the trenches in that direction, followed by a volley,
+the cries of wounded men, and the fierce hurrahs of an attacking party.
+
+Our colonel knew too well those sounds: the next parallel had been
+surprised, and the Prussian bayonet was now silently at work.
+
+Disguise was now impossible. At the first shot, a guttural voice in
+front of Dujardin's men was heard to give a word of command. There was
+a sharp rattle and in a moment the thick black line was tipped with
+glittering steel.
+
+A roar and a rush, and the Prussian line three deep came furiously like
+a huge steel-pointed wave, at the French lines. A tremendous wave of
+fire rushed out to meet that wave of steel: a crash of two hundred
+muskets, and all was still. Then you could see through the black
+steel-tipped line in a hundred frightful gaps, and the ground sparkled
+with bayonets and the air rang with the cries of the wounded.
+
+A tremendous cheer from the brigade, and the colonel charged at the head
+of his column, out by Death's Alley.
+
+The broken wall was melting away into the night. The colonel wheeled
+his men to the right: one company, led by the impetuous young Captain
+Jullien, followed the flying enemy.
+
+The other attack had been only too successful. They shot the sentries,
+and bayoneted many of the soldiers in their tents: others escaped by
+running to the rear, and some into the next parallel.
+
+Several, half dressed, snatched up their muskets, killed one Prussian,
+and fell riddled like sieves.
+
+A gallant officer got a company together into the place of arms and
+formed in line.
+
+Half the Prussian force went at them, the rest swept the trenches: the
+French company delivered a deadly volley, and the next moment clash
+the two forces crossed bayonets, and a silent deadly stabbing match was
+played: the final result of which was inevitable. The Prussians were
+five to one. The gallant officer and the poor fellows who did their duty
+so stoutly, had no thought left but to die hard, when suddenly a roaring
+cheer seemed to come from the rear rank of the enemy. "France! France!"
+Half the 24th brigade came leaping and swarming over the trenches in the
+Prussian rear. The Prussians wavered. "France!" cried the little party
+that were being overpowered, and charged in their turn with such fury
+that in two seconds the two French corps went through the enemy's centre
+like paper, and their very bayonets clashed together in more than one
+Prussian body.
+
+Broken thus in two fragments the Prussian corps ceased to exist as a
+military force. The men fled each his own way back to the fort, and many
+flung away their muskets, for French soldiers were swarming in from all
+quarters. At this moment, bang! bang! bang! from the bastion.
+
+"They are firing on my brigade," said our colonel. "Who has led his
+company there against my orders? Captain Neville, into the battery, and
+fire twenty rounds at the bastion! Aim at the flashes from their middle
+tier."
+
+"Yes, colonel."
+
+The battery opened with all its guns on the bastion. The right attack
+followed suit. The town answered, and a furious cannonade roared and
+blazed all down both lines till daybreak. Hell seemed broken loose.
+
+Captain Jullien had followed the flying foe: but could not come up with
+them: and, as the enemy had prepared for every contingency, the
+fatal bastion, after first throwing a rocket or two to discover their
+position, poured showers of grape into them, killed many, and would have
+killed more but that Captain Neville and his gunners happened by mere
+accident to dismount one gun and to kill a couple of gunners at the
+others. This gave the remains of the company time to disperse and run
+back. When the men were mustered, Captain Jullien and twenty-five of
+his company did not answer to their names. At daybreak they were visible
+from the trenches lying all by themselves within eighty yards of the
+bastion.
+
+A flag of truce came from the fort: the dead were removed on both sides
+and buried. Some Prussian officers strolled into the French lines.
+Civilities and cigars exchanged: "Bon jour," "Gooten daeg:" then at it
+again, ding dong all down the line blazing and roaring.
+
+At twelve o'clock the besieged had got a man on horseback, on top of a
+hill, with colored flags in his hand, making signals.
+
+"What are you up to now?" inquired Dard.
+
+"You will see," said La Croix, affecting mystery; he knew no more than
+the other.
+
+Presently off went Long Tom on the top of the bastion, and the shot came
+roaring over the heads of the speakers.
+
+The flags were changed, and off went Long Tom again at an elevation.
+
+Ten seconds had scarcely elapsed when a tremendous explosion took place
+on the French right. Long Tom was throwing red-hot shot; one had fallen
+on a powder wagon, and blown it to pieces, and killed two poor fellows
+and a horse, and turned an artillery man at some distance into a seeming
+nigger, but did him no great harm; only took him three days to get the
+powder out of his clothes with pipe clay, and off his face with raw
+potato-peel.
+
+When the tumbril exploded, the Prussians could be heard to cheer, and
+they turned to and fired every iron spout they owned. Long Tom worked
+all day.
+
+They got into a corner where the guns of the battery could not hit
+them or him, and there was his long muzzle looking towards the sky, and
+sending half a hundredweight of iron up into the clouds, and plunging
+down a mile off into the French lines.
+
+And, at every shot, the man on horseback made signals to let the gunners
+know where the shot fell.
+
+At last, about four in the afternoon, they threw a forty-eight-pound
+shot slap into the commander-in-chief's tent, a mile and a half behind
+trenches.
+
+Down comes a glittering aide-de-camp as hard as he can gallop.
+
+"Colonel Dujardin, what are you about, sir? YOUR BASTION has thrown a
+round shot into the commander-in-chief's tent."
+
+The colonel did not appear so staggered as the aide-de-camp expected.
+
+"Ah, indeed!" said he quietly. "I observed they were trying distances."
+
+"Must not happen again, colonel. You must drive them from the gun."
+
+"How?"
+
+"Why, where is the difficulty?"
+
+"If you will do me the honor to step into the battery, I will show you,"
+said the colonel.
+
+"If you please," said the aide-de-camp stiffly.
+
+Colonel Dujardin took him to the parapet, and began, in a calm,
+painstaking way, to show him how and why none of his guns could be
+brought to bear upon Long Tom.
+
+In the middle of the explanation a melodious sound was heard in the air
+above them, like a swarm of Brobdingnag bees.
+
+"What is that?" inquired the aide-de-camp.
+
+"What? I see nothing."
+
+"That humming noise."
+
+"Oh, that? Prussian bullets. Ah, by-the-by, it is a compliment to your
+uniform, monsieur; they take you for some one of importance. Well, as I
+was observing"--
+
+"Your explanation is sufficient, colonel; let us get out of this. Ha,
+ha! you are a cool hand, colonel, I must say. But your battery is a warm
+place enough: I shall report it so at headquarters."
+
+The grim colonel relaxed.
+
+"Captain," said he politely, "you shall not have ridden to my post in
+vain. Will you lend me your horse for ten minutes?"
+
+"Certainly; and I will inspect your trenches meantime."
+
+"Do so; oblige me by avoiding that angle; it is exposed, and the enemy
+have got the range to an inch."
+
+Colonel Dujardin slipped into his quarters; off with his half-dress
+jacket and his dirty boots, and presently out he came full fig,
+glittering brighter than the other, with one French and two foreign
+orders shining on his breast, mounted the aide-de-camp's horse, and away
+full pelt.
+
+Admitted, after some delay, into the generalissimo's tent, Dujardin
+found the old gentleman surrounded by his staff and wroth: nor was the
+danger to which he had been exposed his sole cause of ire.
+
+The shot had burst through his canvas, struck a table on which was a
+large inkstand, and had squirted the whole contents over the despatches
+he was writing for Paris.
+
+Now this old gentleman prided himself upon the neatness of his
+despatches: a blot on his paper darkened his soul.
+
+Colonel Dujardin expressed his profound regret. The commander, however,
+continued to remonstrate. "I have a great deal of writing to do,"
+said he, "as you must be aware; and, when I am writing, I expect to be
+quiet."
+
+Colonel Dujardin assented respectfully to the justice of this. He then
+explained at full length why he could not bring a gun in the battery to
+silence "Long Tom," and quietly asked to be permitted to run a gun out
+of the trenches, and take a shot at the offender.
+
+"It is a point-blank distance, and I have a new gun, with which a man
+ought to be able to hit his own ball at three hundred yards."
+
+The commander hesitated.
+
+"I cannot have the men exposed."
+
+"I engage not to lose a man--except him who fires the gun. HE must take
+his chance."
+
+"Well, colonel, it must be done by volunteers. The men must not be
+ORDERED out on such a service as that."
+
+Colonel Dujardin bowed, and retired.
+
+
+"Volunteers to go out of the trenches!" cried Sergeant La Croix, in
+a stentorian voice, standing erect as a poker, and swelling with
+importance.
+
+There were fifty offers in less than as many seconds.
+
+"Only twelve allowed to go," said the sergeant; "and I am one," added
+he, adroitly inserting himself.
+
+A gun was taken down, placed on a carriage, and posted near Death's
+Alley, but out of the line of fire.
+
+The colonel himself superintended the loading of this gun; and to the
+surprise of the men had the shot weighed first, and then weighed out the
+powder himself.
+
+He then waited quietly a long time till the bastion pitched one of its
+periodical shots into Death's Alley, but no sooner had the shot struck,
+and sent the sand flying past the two lanes of curious noses, than
+Colonel Dujardin jumped upon the gun and waved his cocked hat. At this
+preconcerted signal, his battery opened fire on the bastion, and the
+battery to his right opened on the wall that fronted them; and the
+colonel gave the word to run the gun out of the trenches. They ran it
+out into the cloud of smoke their own guns were belching forth, unseen
+by the enemy; but they had no sooner twisted it into the line of Long
+Tom, than the smoke was gone, and there they were, a fair mark.
+
+"Back into the trenches, all but one!" roared Dujardin.
+
+And in they ran like rabbits.
+
+"Quick! the elevation."
+
+Colonel Dujardin and La Croix raised the muzzle to the mark--hoo, hoo,
+hoo! ping, ping, ping! came the bullets about their ears.
+
+"Away with you!" cried the colonel, taking the linstock from him.
+
+Then Colonel Dujardin, fifteen yards from the trenches, in full blazing
+uniform, showed two armies what one intrepid soldier can do. He kneeled
+down and adjusted his gun, just as he would have done in a practising
+ground. He had a pot shot to take, and a pot shot he would take. He
+ignored three hundred muskets that were levelled at him. He looked
+along his gun, adjusted it, and re-adjusted it to a hair's breadth. The
+enemy's bullets pattered upon it: still he adjusted it delicately. His
+men were groaning and tearing their hair inside at his danger.
+
+At last it was levelled to his mind, and then his movements were as
+quick as they had hitherto been slow. In a moment he stood erect in the
+half-fencing attitude of a gunner, and his linstock at the touch-hole:
+a huge tongue of flame, a volume of smoke, a roar, and the iron
+thunderbolt was on its way, and the colonel walked haughtily but rapidly
+back to the trenches; for in all this no bravado. He was there to make a
+shot; not to throw a chance of life away watching the effect.
+
+Ten thousand eyes did that for him.
+
+Both French and Prussians risked their own lives craning out to see
+what a colonel in full uniform was doing under fire from a whole line
+of forts, and what would be his fate; but when he fired the gun their
+curiosity left the man and followed the iron thunderbolt.
+
+For two seconds all was uncertain; the ball was travelling.
+
+Tom gave a rear like a wild horse, his protruding muzzle went up
+sky-high, then was seen no more, and a ring of old iron and a clatter of
+fragments was heard on the top of the bastion. Long Tom was dismounted.
+Oh! the roar of laughter and triumph from one end to another of the
+trenches; and the clapping of forty thousand hands that went on for full
+five minutes; then the Prussians, either through a burst of generous
+praise for an act so chivalrous and so brilliant, or because they would
+not be crowed over, clapped their tea thousand hands as loudly, and thus
+thundering, heart-thrilling salvo of applause answered salvo on both
+sides that terrible arena.
+
+That evening came a courteous and flattering message from the
+commander-in-chief to Colonel Dujardin; and several officers visited his
+quarters to look at him; they went back disappointed. The cry was, "What
+a miserable, melancholy dog! I expected to see a fine, dashing fellow."
+
+
+The trenches neared the town. Colonel Dujardin's mine was far advanced;
+the end of the chamber was within a few yards of the bastion. Of late,
+the colonel had often visited this mine in person. He seemed a little
+uneasy about something in that quarter; but no one knew what: he was a
+silent man. The third evening, after he dismounted Long Tom, he received
+private notice that an order was coming down from the commander-in-chief
+to assault the bastion. He shrugged his shoulders, but said nothing.
+That same night the colonel and one of his lieutenants stole out of the
+trenches, and by the help of a pitch-dark, windy night, got under the
+bastion unperceived, and crept round it, and made their observations,
+and got safe back. About noon down came General Raimbaut.
+
+"Well, colonel, you are to have your way at last. Your bastion is to
+be stormed this afternoon previous to the general assault. Why, how is
+this? you don't seem enchanted?"
+
+"I am not."
+
+"Why, it was you who pressed for the assault."
+
+"At the right time, general, not the wrong. In five days I undertake to
+blow that bastion into the air. To assault it now would be to waste our
+men."
+
+General Raimbaut thought this excess of caution a great piece
+of perversity in Achilles. They were alone, and he said a little
+peevishly,--
+
+"Is not this to blow hot and cold on the same thing?"
+
+"No, general," was the calm reply. "Not on the same thing. I blew hot
+upon timorous counsels; I blow cold on rash ones. General, last night
+Lieutenant Fleming and I were under that bastion; and all round it."
+
+"Ah! my prudent colonel, I thought we should not talk long without your
+coming out in your true light. If ever a man secretly enjoyed risking
+his life, it is you."
+
+"No, general," said Dujardin looking gloomily down; "I enjoy neither
+that nor anything else. Live or die, it is all one to me; but to the
+lives of my soldiers I am not indifferent, and never will be while I
+live. My apparent rashness of last night was pure prudence."
+
+Raimbaut's eye twinkled with suppressed irony. "No doubt!" said he; "no
+doubt!"
+
+The impassive colonel would not notice the other's irony; he went calmly
+on:--
+
+"I suspected something; I went to confute, or confirm that suspicion. I
+confirmed it."
+
+Rat! tat! tat! tat! tat! tat! tat! was heard a drum. Relieving guard in
+the mine.
+
+Colonel Dujardin interrupted himself.
+
+"That comes apropos," said he. "I expect one proof more from that
+quarter. Sergeant, send me the sentinel they are relieving."
+
+Sergeant La Croix soon came back, as pompous as a hen with one chick,
+predominating with a grand military air over a droll figure that
+chattered with cold, and held its musket in hands clothed in great
+mittens. Dard.
+
+La Croix marched him up as if he had been a file; halted him like a
+file, sang out to him as to a file, stentorian and unintelligible, after
+the manner of sergeants.
+
+"Private No. 4."
+
+DARD. P-p-p-present!
+
+LA CROIX. Advance to the word of command, and speak to the colonel.
+
+The shivering figure became an upright statue directly, and carried one
+of his mittens to his forehead. Then, suddenly recognizing the rank of
+the gray-haired officer, he was morally shaken, but remained physically
+erect, and stammered,--
+
+"Colonel!--general!--colonel!"
+
+"Don't be frightened, my lad. But look at the general and answer me."
+
+"Yes! general! colonel!" and he levelled his eye dead at the general, as
+he would a bayonet at a foe, being so commanded.
+
+"Now answer in as few syllables as you can."
+
+"Yes! general--colonel."
+
+"You have been on guard in the mine."
+
+"Yes, general."
+
+"What did you see there?"
+
+"Nothing; it was night down there."
+
+"What did you feel?"
+
+"Cold! I--was--in--water--hugh!"
+
+"Did you hear nothing, then?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"What?"
+
+"Bum! bum! bum!"
+
+"Are you sure you did not hear particles of earth fall at the end of the
+trench?"
+
+"I think it did, and this (touching his musket) sounded of its own
+accord."
+
+"Good! you have answered well; go."
+
+"Sergeant, I did not miss a word," cried Dard, exulting. He thought
+he had passed a sort of military college examination. The sergeant was
+awe-struck and disgusted at his familiarity, speaking to him before the
+great: he pushed Private Dard hastily out of the presence, and bundled
+him into the trenches.
+
+"Are you countermined, then?" asked General Raimbaut.
+
+"I think not, general; but the whole bastion is. And we found it had
+been opened in the rear, and lately half a dozen broad roads cut through
+the masonry."
+
+"To let in re-enforcements?"
+
+"Or to let the men run out in ease of an assault. I have seen from the
+first an able hand behind that part of the defences. If we assault the
+bastion, they will pick off as many of us as they can with their muskets
+then they will run for it, and fire a train, and blow it and us into the
+air."
+
+"Colonel, this is serious. Are you prepared to lay this statement before
+the commander-in-chief?"
+
+"I am, and I do so through you, the general of my division. I even beg
+you to say, as from me, that the assault will be mere suicide--bloody
+and useless."
+
+General Raimbaut went off to headquarters in some haste, a thorough
+convert to Colonel Dujardin's opinion. Meantime the colonel went
+slowly to his tent. At the mouth of it a corporal, who was also his
+body-servant, met him, saluted, and asked respectfully if there were any
+orders.
+
+"A few minutes' repose, Francois, that is all. Do not let me be
+disturbed for an hour."
+
+"Attention!" cried Francois. "Colonel wants to sleep."
+
+The tent was sentinelled, and Dujardin was alone with the past.
+
+Then had the fools, that took (as fools will do) deep sorrow for
+sullenness, seen the fiery soldier droop, and his wan face fall into
+haggard lines, and his martial figure shrink, and heard his stout heart
+sigh! He took a letter from his bosom: it was almost worn to pieces. He
+had read it a thousand times, yet he read it again. A part of the sweet
+sad words ran thus:--
+
+
+"We must bow. We can never be happy together on earth; let us make
+Heaven our friend. This is still left us,--not to blush for our love; to
+do our duty, and to die."
+
+
+"How tender, but how firm," thought Camille. "I might agitate, taunt,
+grieve her I love, but I could not shake her. No! God and the saints to
+my aid! they saved me from a crime I now shudder at. And they have given
+me the good chaplain: he prays with me, he weeps for me. His prayers
+still my beating heart. Yes, poor suffering angel! I read your will in
+these tender, but bitter, words: you prefer duty to love. And one day
+you will forget me; not yet awhile, but it will be so. It wounds me when
+I think of it, but I must bow. Your will is sacred. I must rise to your
+level, not drag you to mine."
+
+Then the soldier that had stood between two armies in a hail of bullets,
+and fired a master-shot, took a little book of offices in one hand,--the
+chaplain had given it him,--and fixed his eyes upon the pious words,
+and clung like a child to the pious words, and kissed his lost wife's
+letter, and tried hard to be like her he loved: patient, very patient,
+till the end should come.
+
+"Qui vive?" cried the sentinel outside to a strange officer.
+
+"France," was his reply. He then asked the sentinel, "Where is the
+colonel commanding the brigade?"
+
+The sentinel lowered his voice, "Asleep, my officer," said he; for the
+new-comer carried two epaulets.
+
+"Wake him," said the officer in a tone of a man used to command on a
+large scale.
+
+Dujardin heard, and did not choose a stranger should think he was
+asleep in broad day. He came hastily out of the tent, therefore, with
+Josephine's letter in his hand, and, in the very act of conveying it to
+his bosom, found himself face to face with--her husband.
+
+Did you ever see two duellists cross rapiers?
+
+How unlike a theatrical duel! How smooth and quiet the bright blades
+are! they glide into contact. They are polished and slippery, yet they
+hold each other. So these two men's eyes met, and fastened: neither
+spoke: each searched the other's face keenly. Raynal's countenance,
+prepared as he was for this meeting, was like a stern statue's. The
+other's face flushed, and his heart raged and sickened at sight of the
+man, that, once his comrade and benefactor, was now possessor of the
+woman he loved. But the figures of both stood alike haughty, erect, and
+immovable, face to face.
+
+Colonel Raynal saluted Colonel Dujardin ceremoniously. Colonel Dujardin
+returned the salute in the same style.
+
+"You thought I was in Egypt," said Raynal with grim significance
+that caught Dujardin's attention, though he did not know quite how to
+interpret it.
+
+He answered mechanically, "Yes, I did."
+
+"I am sent here by General Bonaparte to take a command," explained
+Raynal.
+
+"You are welcome. What command?"
+
+"Yours."
+
+"Mine?" cried Dujardin, his forehead flushing with mortification and
+anger. "What, is it not enough that you take my"--He stopped then.
+
+"Come, colonel," said the other calmly, "do not be unjust to an old
+comrade. I take your demi-brigade; but you are promoted to Raimbaut's
+brigade. The exchange is to be made to-morrow."
+
+"Was it then to announce to me my promotion you came to my quarters?"
+and Camille looked with a strange mixture of feelings at his old
+comrade.
+
+"That was the first thing, being duty, you know."
+
+"What? have you anything else to say to me, then?"
+
+"I have."
+
+"Is it important? for my own duties will soon demand me."
+
+"It is so important that, command or no command, I should have come
+further than the Rhine to say it to you."
+
+Let a man be as bold as a lion, a certain awe still waits upon doubt
+and mystery; and some of this vague awe crept over Camille Dujardin at
+Raynal's mysterious speech, and his grave, quiet, significant manner.
+
+Had he discovered something, and what? For Josephine's sake, more than
+his own, Camille was on his guard directly.
+
+Raynal looked at him in silence a moment.
+
+"What?" said he with a slight sneer, "has it never occurred to you
+that I MUST have a serious word to say to you? First, let me put you
+a question: did they treat you well at my house? at the chateau de
+Beaurepaire?"
+
+"Yes," faltered Camille.
+
+"You met, I trust, all the kindness and care due to a wounded soldier
+and an officer of merit. It would annoy me greatly if I thought you were
+not treated like a brother in my house."
+
+Colonel Dujardin writhed inwardly at this view of matters. He could not
+reply in few words. This made him hesitate.
+
+His inquisitor waited, but, receiving no reply, went on, "Well, colonel,
+have you shown the sense of gratitude we had a right to look for in
+return? In a word, when you left Beaurepaire, had your conscience
+nothing to reproach you with?"
+
+Dujardin still hesitated. He scarcely knew what to think or what to say.
+But he thought to himself, "Who has told him? does he know all?"
+
+"Colonel Dujardin, I am the husband of Josephine, the son of Madame de
+Beaurepaire, and the brother of Rose. You know very well what brings me
+here. Your answer?"
+
+"Colonel Raynal, between men of honor, placed as you and I are, few
+words should pass, for words are idle. You will never prove to me that
+I have wronged you: I shall never convince you that I have not. Let us
+therefore close this painful interview in the way it is sure to close. I
+am at your service, at any hour and place you please."
+
+"And pray is that all the answer you can think of?" asked Raynal
+somewhat scornfully.
+
+"Why, what other answer can I give you?"
+
+"A more sensible, a more honest, and a less boyish one. Who doubts that
+you can fight, you silly fellow? haven't I seen you? I want you to show
+me a much higher sort of courage: the courage to repair a wrong, not the
+paltry valor to defend one."
+
+"I really do not understand you, sir. How can I undo what is done?"
+
+"Why, of course you cannot. And therefore I stand here ready to forgive
+all that is past; not without a struggle, which you don't seem to
+appreciate."
+
+Camille was now utterly mystified. Raynal continued, "But of course it
+is upon condition that you consent to heal the wound you have made. If
+you refuse--hum! but you will not refuse."
+
+"But what is it you require of me?" inquired Camille impatiently.
+
+"Only a little common honesty. This is the case: you have seduced a
+young lady."
+
+"Sir!" cried Camille angrily.
+
+"What is the matter? The word is not so bad as the crime, I take it. You
+have seduced her, and under circumstances--But we won't speak of them,
+because I am resolved to keep cool. Well, sir, as you said just now,
+it's no use crying over spilled milk; you can't unseduce the little
+fool; so you must marry her."
+
+"M--m--marry her?" and Dujardin flushed all over, and his heart beat,
+and he stared in Raynal's face.
+
+"Why, what is the matter again? If she has played the fool, it was with
+you, and no other man: it is not as if she was depraved. Come, my lad,
+show a little generosity! Take the consequences of your own act--or your
+share of it--don't throw it all on the poor feeble woman. If she has
+loved you too much, you are the man of all others that should forgive
+her. Come, what do you say?"
+
+This was too much for Camille; that Raynal should come and demand of him
+to marry his own wife, for so he understood the proposal. He stared at
+Raynal in silence ever so long, and even when he spoke it was only to
+mutter, "Are you out of your senses, or am I?"
+
+At this it cost Raynal a considerable effort to restrain his wrath.
+However, he showed himself worthy of the office he had undertaken. He
+contained himself, and submitted to argue the matter. "Why, colonel,"
+said he, "is it such a misfortune to marry poor Rose? She is young,
+she is lovely, she has many good qualities, and she would have walked
+straight to the end of her days but for you."
+
+Now here was another surprise for Dujardin, another mystification.
+
+"Rose de Beaurepaire?" said he, putting his hand to his head, as if to
+see whether his reason was still there.
+
+"Yes, Rose de Beaurepaire--Rose Dujardin that ought to be, and that is
+to be, if you please."
+
+"One word, monsieur: is it of Rose we have been talking all this time?"
+
+Raynal nearly lost his temper at this question, and the cold,
+contemptuous tone with which it was put; but he gulped down his ire.
+
+"It is," said he.
+
+"One question more. Did she tell you I had--I had"--
+
+"Why, as to that, she was in no condition to deny she had fallen, poor
+girl; the evidence was too strong. She did not reveal her seducer's
+name; but I had not far to go for that."
+
+"One question more," said Dujardin, with a face of anguish. "Is it
+Jos--is it Madame Raynal's wish I should marry her sister?"
+
+"Why, of course," said Raynal, in all sincerity, assuming that naturally
+enough as a matter of course; "if you have any respect for HER feelings,
+look on me as her envoy in this matter."
+
+At this Camille turned sick with disgust; then rage and bitterness
+swelled his heart. A furious impulse seized him to expose Josephine on
+the spot. He overcame that, however, and merely said, "She wishes me to
+marry her sister, does she? very well then, I decline."
+
+Raynal was shocked. "Oh," said he, sorrowfully, "I cannot believe this
+of you; such heartlessness as this is not written in your face; it is
+contradicted by your past actions."
+
+"I refuse," said Dujardin, hastily; and to tell the truth, not sorry to
+inflict some pain on the honest soldier who had unintentionally driven
+the iron so deep into his own soul.
+
+"And I," said Raynal, losing his temper, "insist, in the name of my dear
+Josephine"--
+
+"Perdition!" snarled Dujardin, losing his self-command in turn.
+
+"And of the whole family."
+
+"And I tell you I will never marry her. Upon my honor, never."
+
+"Your honor! you have none. The only question is would you rather marry
+her--or die."
+
+"Die, to be sure."
+
+"Then die you shall."
+
+"Ah!" said Dujardin; "did I not tell you we were wasting time?
+
+"Let us waste no more then. WHEN and WHERE?"
+
+"At the rear of the commander-in-chief's tent; when you like."
+
+"This afternoon, then--at five."
+
+"At five."
+
+"Seconds?"
+
+"What for?"
+
+"You are right. They are only in the way of men who carry sabres; and
+besides the less gossip the better. Good-by, till five," and the two
+saluted one another with grim ceremony; and Raynal turned on his heel.
+
+Camille stood transfixed; a fierce, guilty joy throbbed in his heart.
+His rival had quarrelled with him, had insulted him, had challenged him.
+It was not his fault. The sun shone bright now upon his cold despair.
+An hour ago life offered nothing. A few hours more, and then joy beyond
+expression, or an end of all. Death or Josephine! Then he remembered
+that this very Josephine wished to marry him to Rose. Then he remembered
+Raynal had saved his life. Cold chills crossed his breaking heart.
+Of all that could happen to him death alone seemed a blessing without
+alloy.
+
+He stood there so torn with conflicting passions, that he noted neither
+the passing hours nor the flying bullets.
+
+He was only awakened from his miserable trance by the even tread of
+soldiers marching towards him; he looked up and there were several
+officers coming along the edge of the trench, escorted by a corporal's
+guard.
+
+He took a step or two to meet them. After the usual salutes, one of the
+three colonels delivered a large paper, with a large seal, to Dujardin.
+He read it out to his captains and lieutenants, who had assembled at
+sight of the cocked hats and full uniforms.
+
+
+"Attack by the army to-morrow upon all the lines. Attack of the bastion
+St. Andre this evening. The 22d, the 24th, and 12th brigades will
+furnish the contingents; the operation will be conducted by one of the
+colonels of the second division, to be appointed by General Raimbaut."
+
+
+"Aha!" sounded a voice like a trombone at the reader's elbow. "I am just
+in the nick of time. When, colonel, when?"
+
+"At five this evening, Colonel Raynal."
+
+"There," said Raynal, in a half-whisper, to Dujardin; "could they choose
+no hour but that?"
+
+"Do not be uneasy," replied Dujardin, under his breath. He explained
+aloud--"the assault will not take place, gentlemen; the bastion is
+mined."
+
+"What of that? half of them are mined. We will take our engineers in
+with us," said Raynal.
+
+"Such an assault will be a useless massacre," resumed Dujardin. "I
+reconnoitred the bastion last night, and saw their preparations for
+blowing us to the devil; and General Raimbaut, at my request, is even
+now presenting my remarks to the commander-in-chief, and enforcing them.
+There will be no assault. In a day or two we shall blow the bastion,
+mines, and all into the air."
+
+At this moment Raynal caught sight of a gray-haired officer coming at
+some distance. "There IS General Raimbaut," said he. "I will go and
+pay my respects to him." General Raimbaut shook his hand warmly, and
+welcomed him to the army. They were old and warm friends. "And you are
+come at the right time," said he. "It will soon be as hot here as in
+Egypt."
+
+Raynal laughed and said all the better.
+
+General Raimbaut now joined the group of officers, and entered at once
+in the business which had brought him. Addressing himself to
+Colonel Dujardin, first he informs that officer he had presented his
+observations to the commander-in-chief, who had given them the attention
+they merited.
+
+Colonel Dujardin bowed.
+
+"But," continued General Raimbaut, "they are overruled by imperious
+circumstances, some of which he did not reveal; they remain in his
+own breast. However, on the eve of a general attack, which he cannot
+postpone, that bastion must be disarmed, otherwise it would be too fatal
+to all the storming parties. It is a painful necessity." He added, "Tell
+Colonel Dujardin I count greatly on the courage and discipline of his
+brigade, and on his own wise measures."
+
+Colonel Dujardin bowed. Then he whispered in the other's ear, "Both will
+alike be wasted."
+
+The other colonels waved their hats in triumph at the
+commander-in-chief's decision, and Raynal's face showed he looked on
+Dujardin as a sort of spoil-sport happily defeated.
+
+"Well, then, gentlemen," said General Raimbaut, "we begin by settling
+the contingents to be furnished by your several brigades. Say, an equal
+number from each. The sum total shall be settled by Colonel Dujardin,
+who has so long and ably baffled the bastion at this post."
+
+Colonel Dujardin bowed stiffly and not very graciously. In his heart he
+despised these old fogies, compounds of timidity and rashness.
+
+"So, how many men in all, colonel?" asked General Raimbaut.
+
+"The fewer the better," replied the other solemnly, "since"--and then
+discipline tied his tongue.
+
+"I understand you," said the old man. "Shall we say eight hundred men?"
+
+"I should prefer three hundred. They have made a back door to the
+bastion, and the means of flight at hand will put flight into their
+heads. They will pick off some of our men as we go at them. When the
+rest jump in they will jump out, and"--He paused.
+
+"Why, he knows all about it before it comes," said one of the colonels
+naively.
+
+"I do. I see the whole operation and its result before me, as I see this
+hand. Three hundred men will do."
+
+"But, general," objected Raynal, "you are not beginning at the
+beginning. The first thing in these cases is to choose the officer to
+command the storming party."
+
+"Yes, Raynal, unquestionably; but you must be aware that is a painful
+and embarrassing part of my duty, especially after Colonel Dujardin's
+remarks."
+
+"Ah, bah!" cried Raynal. "He is prejudiced. He has been digging a
+thundering long mine here, and now you are going to make his child
+useless. We none of us like that. But when he gets the colors in his
+hand, and the storming column at his back, his misgivings will all go to
+the wind, and the enemy after them, unless he has been committing some
+crime, and is very much changed from what I knew him four years ago."
+
+"Colonel Raynal," said one of the other colonels, politely but firmly,
+"pray do not assume that Colonel Dujardin is to lead the column; there
+are three other claimants. General Raimbaut is to select from us four."
+
+"Yes, gentlemen, and in a service of this kind I would feel grateful to
+you all if you would relieve me of that painful duty."
+
+"Gentlemen," said Dujardin, with an imperceptible sneer, "the general
+means to say this: the operation is so glorious that he could hardly
+without partiality assign the command to either of us four claimants.
+Well, then, let us cast lots."
+
+The proposal was received by acclamation.
+
+"The general will mark a black cross on one lot, and he who draws it
+wins the command."
+
+The young colonels prepared their lots with almost boyish eagerness.
+These fiery spirits were sick to death of lying and skulking in the
+trenches. They flung their lots into the hat. After them, who
+should approach the hat, lot in hand, but Raynal. Dujardin instantly
+interfered, and held his arm as he was in the act of dropping in his
+lot.
+
+"What is the matter?" said Raynal, sharply.
+
+"This is our affair, Colonel Raynal. You have no command in this army."
+
+"I beg your pardon, sir, I have yours."
+
+"Not till to-morrow."
+
+"Why, you would not take such a pettifogging advantage of an old comrade
+as that."
+
+"Tell him the day ends at twelve o'clock," said one of the colonels
+interested by this strange strife.
+
+"Ah!" cried Raynal, triumphantly; "but no," said he, altering his tone,
+"let us leave that sort of argument to lawyers. I have come a good many
+miles to fight with you, general; and now you must decide to pay me this
+little compliment on my arrival, or put a bitter affront on me--choose!"
+
+While the old general hesitated, Camille replied, "Since you take that
+tone there can be but one answer. You are too great a credit to the
+French army for even an apparent slight to be put on you here. The
+rule, I think, is, that one of the privates shall hold the hat.--Hallo!
+Private Dard, come here--there--hold this hat."
+
+"Yes, colonel.--Lord, here is my young mistress's husband!"
+
+"Silence!"
+
+And they began to draw, and, in the act of drawing, a change of manner
+was first visible in these gay and ardent spirits.
+
+"It is not I," said one, throwing away his lot.
+
+"Nor I."
+
+"It is I," said Raynal; then with sudden gravity, "I am the lucky one."
+
+And now that the honor and the danger no longer floated vaguely over
+four heads, but had fixed on one, a sudden silence and solemnity took
+the place of eager voices.
+
+It was first broken by Private Dard saying, with foolish triumph, "And I
+held the hat for you, colonel."
+
+"Ah, Raynal!" said General Raimbaut, sorrowfully, "it was not worth
+while to come from Egypt for this."
+
+Raynal made no reply to this. He drew out his watch, and said calmly, he
+had no time to lose; he must inspect the detachments he was to command.
+"Besides," said he, "I have some domestic arrangements to make. Hitherto
+on these occasions I was a bachelor, now I am married." General Raimbaut
+could not help sighing. Raynal read this aright, and turned to him, "A
+droll marriage, my old friend; I'll tell you all about it if ever I
+have the time. It began with a purchase, general, and ends with--with a
+bequest, which I might as well write now, and so have nothing to think
+of but duty afterwards. Where can I write?"
+
+"Colonel Dujardin will lend you his tent, I am sure."
+
+"Certainly."
+
+"And, messieurs," said Raynal, "if I waste time you need not. You can
+pick me my men from your brigades. Give me a strong spice of old hands."
+
+The colonels withdrew on this, and General Raimbaut walked sadly and
+thoughtfully towards the battery. Dujardin and Raynal were left alone.
+
+"This postpones our affair, sir."
+
+"Yes, Raynal."
+
+"Have you writing materials in your tent?"
+
+"Yes; on the table."
+
+"You are quite sure the bastion is mined, comrade?"
+
+This unexpected word and Raynal's gentle appeal touched Dujardin deeply.
+It was in a broken voice he replied that he was unfortunately too sure
+of it.
+
+Raynal received this reply as a sentence of death, and without another
+word walked slowly into Dujardin's tent.
+
+Dujardin's generosity was up in arms; he followed Raynal, and said
+eagerly, "Raynal, for Heaven's sake resign this command!"
+
+"Allow me to write to my wife, colonel," was the cold reply.
+
+Camille winced at this affront, and drew back a moment; but his nobler
+part prevailed. He seized Raynal by the wrist. "You shall not affront
+me, you cannot affront me. You go to certain death I tell you, if you
+attack that bastion."
+
+"Don't be a fool, colonel," said Raynal: "somebody must lead the men."
+
+"Yes; but not you. Who has so good a right to lead them as I, their
+colonel?"
+
+"And be killed in my place, eh?"
+
+"I know the ground better than you," said Camille. "Besides, who cares
+for me? I have no friends, no family. But you are married--and so many
+will mourn if you"--
+
+Raynal interrupted him sternly. "You forget, sir, that Rose de
+Beaurepaire is my sister, when you tell me you have no tie to life."
+He added, with wonderful dignity and sobriety, "Allow me to write to
+my wife, sir; and, while I write, reflect that you can embitter an old
+comrade's last moments by persisting in your refusal to restore his
+sister the honor you have robbed her of."
+
+And leaving the other staggered and confused by this sudden blow, he
+retired into Dujardin's tent, and finding writing materials on a little
+table that was there, sat down to pen a line to Josephine.
+
+Camille knew to whom he was writing, and a jealous pang passed through
+him.
+
+What he wrote ran thus,--
+
+
+"A bastion is to be attacked at five. I command. Colonel Dujardin
+proposed we should draw lots, and I lost. The service is honorable,
+but the result may, I fear, give you some pain. My dear wife, it is our
+fate. I was not to have time to make you know, and perhaps love me. God
+bless you."
+
+
+In writing these simple words, Raynal's hard face worked, and his
+mustache quivered, and once he had to clear his eye with his hand to
+form the letters. He, the man of iron.
+
+He who stood there, leaning on his scabbard and watching the writer, saw
+this, and it stirred all that was great and good in that grand though
+passionate heart of his.
+
+"Poor Raynal!" thought he, "you were never like that before on going
+into action. He is loath to die. Ay, and it is a coward's trick to let
+him die. I shall have her, but shall I have her esteem? What will the
+army say? What will my conscience say? Oh! I feel already it will gnaw
+my heart to death; the ghost of that brave fellow--once my dear friend,
+my rival now, by no fault of his--will rise between her and me, and
+reproach me with my bloody inheritance. The heart never deceives; I feel
+it now whispering in my ear: 'Skulking captain, white-livered soldier,
+that stand behind a parapet while a better man does your work! you
+assassinate the husband, but the rival conquers you.' There, he puts his
+hand to his eyes. What shall I do?"
+
+"Colonel," said a low voice, and at the same time a hand was laid on his
+shoulder.
+
+It was General Raimbaut. The general looked pale and distressed.
+
+"Come apart, colonel, for Heaven's sake! One word, while he is writing.
+Ah! that was an unlucky idea of yours."
+
+"Of mine, general?"
+
+"'Twas you proposed to cast lots."
+
+"Good God! so it was."
+
+"I thought of course it was to be managed so that Raynal should not be
+the one. Between ourselves, what honorable excuse can we make?"
+
+"None, general."
+
+"The whole division will be disgraced, and forgive me if I say a portion
+of the discredit will fall on you."
+
+"Help me to avert that shame then," cried Camille, eagerly.
+
+"Ah! that I will: but how?"
+
+"Take your pencil and write--'I authorize Colonel Dujardin to save the
+honor of the colonels of the second division.'"
+
+The general hesitated. He had never seen an order so worded. But at
+last he took out his pencil and wrote the required order, after his own
+fashion; i.e., in milk and water:--
+
+
+On account of the singular ability and courage with which Colonel
+Dujardin has conducted the operations against the Bastion St. Andre, a
+discretionary power is given him at the moment of assault to carry
+into effect such measures, as, without interfering with the
+commander-in-chief's order, may sustain his own credit, and that of the
+other colonels of the second division.
+
+RAIMBAUT, General of Division.
+
+
+Camille put the paper into his bosom.
+
+"Now, general, you may leave all to me. I swear to you, Raynal shall not
+die--shall not lead this assault."
+
+"Your hand, colonel. You are an honor to the French armies. How will you
+do it?"
+
+"Leave it to me, general, it shall be done."
+
+"I feel it will, my noble fellow: but, alas! I fear not without risking
+some valuable life or other, most likely your own. Tell me!"
+
+"General, I decline."
+
+"You refuse me, sir?"
+
+"Yes; this order gives me a discretionary power. I will hand back the
+order at your command; but modify it I will not. Come, sir, you veteran
+generals have been unjust to me, and listened to me too little all
+through this siege, but at last you have honored me. This order is the
+greatest honor that was ever done me since I wore a sword.".
+
+"My poor colonel!"
+
+"Let me wear it intact, and carry it to my grave."
+
+"Say no more! One word--Is there anything on earth I can do for you, my
+brave soldier?"
+
+"Yes, general. Be so kind as to retire to your quarters; there are
+reasons why you ought not to be near this post in half an hour."
+
+"I go. Is there NOTHING else?"
+
+"Well, general, ask the good priest Ambrose, to pray for all those who
+shall die doing their duty to their country this afternoon."
+
+They parted. General Raimbaut looked back more than once at the firm,
+intrepid figure that stood there unflinching, on the edge of the grave.
+But HE never took his eye off Raynal. The next minute the sad letter was
+finished, and Raynal walked out of the tent, and confronted the man he
+had challenged to single combat.
+
+I have mentioned elsewhere that Colonel Dujardin had eyes strangely
+compounded of battle and love, of the dove and the hawk. And these,
+softened by a noble act he meditated, now rested on Raynal with a
+strange expression of warmth and goodness. This strange gaze struck
+Raynal, so far at least as this; he saw it was no hostile eye. He was
+glad of that, for his own heart was calmed and softened by the solemn
+prospect before him.
+
+"We, too, have a little account to settle before I order out the men,"
+said he, calmly, "and I can't give you a long credit. I am pressed for
+time."
+
+"Our quarrel is at an end. When duty sounds the recall, a soldier's
+heart leaves private feuds. See! I come to you without anger and
+ill-will. Just now my voice was loud, my manner, I dare say, offensive,
+and menacing even, and that always tempts a brave fellow like you to
+resist. But now, you see, I am harmless as a woman. We are alone. Humbug
+to the winds! I know that you are the only man in this army fit to
+command a division. I know that when you say the assault of that bastion
+is death, death it is. To the point then; now that my manner is no
+longer irritating, now that I am going to die, Camille Dujardin, my old
+comrade, have you the heart to refuse me? am I to die unhappy?"
+
+"No; no: I will do whatever you like."
+
+"You will marry that poor girl, then?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Aha! did not I always say he was a good fellow? Clench the nail; give
+me your honor."
+
+"I give you my honor to marry her, if I live."
+
+"You take a load off me; may Heaven reward you. In one hour those poor
+women, whose support I had promised to be, will lose their protector;
+but I give them another in you. We shall not leave that family in tears,
+Rose in shame, and your child without a name."
+
+Dujardin stared at the speaker. What new and devilish deception was
+this?
+
+"My child!" he faltered. "What child?"
+
+"Ah," said Raynal, "what a fool I was! That is the first thing I ought
+to have told you. Poor little fellow! I surprised him in his cradle; his
+mother and Josephine were rocking him, and singing over him. Oh! it was
+a scene, I can tell you. My poor wife had been ill for some time, and
+was so weakened by it, that I frightened her into a fit, stealing a
+march on her that way. She fainted away. Perhaps it is as well she did;
+for I--I did not know what to think; it looked ugly; but while she lay
+at our feet insensible, I forced the truth from Rose; she owned the boy
+was hers."
+
+While Raynal told him this strange story, Camille turned hot and cold.
+First came a thrill of glowing joy; he had some clew to all this: he was
+a father; that child was Josephine's and his; the next moment he froze
+within. So Josephine had not only gulled her husband, but him, too; she
+had refused him the sad consolation of knowing he had a child. Cruelty,
+calculation, and baseness unexampled! Here was a creature who could
+sacrifice anything and anybody to her comfort, to the peace and sordid
+smoothness of her domestic life. She stood between two men--a thing.
+Between two truths--a double lie.
+
+His heart, in one moment, turned against her like a stone. A
+musket-bullet through the body does not turn life to death quicker than
+Raynal turned his rival's love to despair and scorn: that love which
+neither wounds, absence, prison, nor even her want of constancy had
+prevailed to shake.
+
+"Out of my bosom!" he cried--"out of it, in this world and the next!"
+
+He forgot, in his lofty rage, who stood beside him.
+
+"What?--what?" cried Raynal.
+
+"No matter," said Camille; "only I esteem YOU, Raynal. You are truth;
+you are a man, and deserve a better lot."
+
+"Don't say that," replied Raynal, quite misunderstanding him. "It is a
+soldier's end: I never desired nor hoped a better: only, of course, I
+feel sad. You are a happy fellow, to have a child and to live to see it,
+and her you love."
+
+"Oh, yes, I am very happy," replied the poor fellow, his lip quivering.
+
+"Watch over all those poor women, comrade, and sometimes speak to them
+of me. It is foolish, but we like to be remembered."
+
+"Yes! but do not let us speak of that. Raynal, you and I were
+lieutenants together; do you remember saving my life in the Arno?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Then promise me, if you should live, to remember not our quarrel of
+to-day, nor anything; but only those early days, AND THIS AFTERNOON."
+
+"I do."
+
+"Your hand, comrade."
+
+"There, comrade, there."
+
+They wrung one another's hands, and turned away and hid their faces from
+each other, for their eyes were moist.
+
+"This won't do, comrade, I must go. I shall attack from your position.
+So I shall go down the line, and bring the men up. Meantime, pick me
+your detachment. Give me a good spice of veterans. I shall get one word
+with you before we go out. God bless you!"
+
+"God bless you, Raynal!"
+
+The moment Raynal was gone, Camille beckoned a lieutenant to him,
+and ordered half the brigade to form in a strong column on both sides
+Death's Alley.
+
+His eye fell upon private Dard, as luck would have it. "Come here," said
+he. Dard came and saluted.
+
+"Have you anybody at Beaurepaire that would be sorry if you were
+killed?"
+
+"Yes, colonel! Jacintha, that used to make your broth, colonel."
+
+"Take this line to Colonel Raynal. You will find him with the 12th
+brigade."
+
+He wrote a few lines in pencil, folded them, and Dard went off with
+them, little dreaming that the colonel of his brigade was taking the
+trouble to save his life, because he came from Beaurepaire. Colonel
+Dujardin then went into his tent, and closed the aperture, and took the
+good book the priest had given him, and prayed humbly, and forgave all
+the world.
+
+Then he sat down, his head in his hands, and thought of his child, and
+how hard it was he must die and never see him. Then he lighted a candle,
+and sealed up his orders of valor, and wrote a line, begging that they
+might be sent to his sister. He also sealed up his purse, and left a
+memorandum that the contents should be given to disabled soldiers of his
+brigade upon their being invalided.
+
+Then he took out Josephine's letter. "Poor coward," he said, "let me not
+be unkind. See, I burn your letter, lest it should be found, and disturb
+the peace you prize so highly. I, too, shall soon be at peace." He
+lighted the letter, and dropped it on the ground: it burned slowly away.
+He eyed it, despairingly. "Ay," said he, "you perish, last record of an
+unhappy love: and even so pass away my life; my hopes of glory, and my
+dreams of love; it all ends to-day: at nine and twenty."
+
+He put his white handkerchief to his eyes. Josephine had given it him.
+He cried a little.
+
+When he had done crying, he put his white handkerchief in his bosom, and
+the whole man was transformed beyond language to express. Powder does
+not change more when it catches fire. He rose that moment and went like
+a flash of lightning out of the tent. The next, he came down between the
+lines of the strong column that stood awaiting orders in Death's Alley.
+
+"Attention!" cried the sergeants; "the colonel!"
+
+There was a dead silence, for the bare sight of that erect and inspired
+figure made the men's bosoms thrill with the certainty of great deeds to
+come: the light of battle was in his eye. No longer the moody colonel,
+but a thunderbolt of war, red-hot, and waiting to be launched.
+
+"Officers, sergeants, soldiers, a word with you!"
+
+La Croix. Attention!
+
+"Do you know what passed here five minutes ago?"
+
+"The attack of the bastion was settled!" cried a captain.
+
+"It was; and who was to lead the assault? do you know that?"
+
+"No."
+
+"A colonel FROM EGYPT."
+
+At that there was a groan from the men.
+
+"With detachments from the other brigades."
+
+"AH!" an angry roar.
+
+Colonel Dujardin walked quickly down between the two lines, looking with
+his fiery eye into the men's eyes on his right. Then he came back on the
+other side, and, as he went, he lighted those men's eyes with his own.
+It was a torch passing along a line of ready gas-lights.
+
+"The work to us!" he cried in a voice like a clarion (it fired the
+hearts as his eye had fired the eyes)--"The triumph to strangers! Our
+fatigues and our losses have not gained the brigade the honor of going
+out at those fellows that have killed so many of our comrades."
+
+A fierce groan broke from the men.
+
+"What! shall the colors of another brigade and not ours fly from that
+bastion this afternoon?"
+
+"No! no!" in a roar like thunder.
+
+"Ah! you are of my mind. Attention! the attack is fixed for five
+o'clock. Suppose you and I were to carry the bastion ten minutes before
+the colonel from Egypt can bring his men upon the ground."
+
+At this there was a fierce burst of joy and laughter; the strange
+laughter of veterans and born invincibles. Then a yell of exulting
+assent, accompanied by the thunder of impatient drums, and the rattle of
+fixing bayonets.
+
+The colonel told off a party to the battery.
+
+"Level the guns at the top tier. Fire at my signal, and keep firing over
+our heads, till you see our colors on the place."
+
+He then darted to the head of the column, which instantly formed behind
+him in the centre of Death's Alley.
+
+"The colors! No hand but mine shall hold them to-day."
+
+They were instantly brought him: his left hand shook them free in the
+afternoon sun.
+
+A deep murmur of joy rolled out from the old hands at the now unwonted
+sight. Out flashed the colonel's sword like steel lightning. He pointed
+to the battery.
+
+Bang! bang! bang! bang! went his cannon, and the smoke rolled over
+the trenches. At the same moment up went the colors waving, and the
+colonel's clarion voice pealed high above all:--
+
+"Twenty-fourth brigade--FORWARD!"
+
+They went so swiftly out of the trenches that they were not seen through
+their own smoke until they had run some sixty yards. As soon as they
+were seen, coming on like devils through their own smoke, two thousand
+muskets were levelled at them from the Prussian line. It was not a
+rattle of small arms--it was a crash, and the men fell fast: but in a
+moment they were seen to spread out like a fan, and to offer less mark,
+and when the fan closed again, it half encircled the bastion. It was a
+French attack: part swarmed at it in front like bees, part swept round
+the glacis and flanked it. They were seen to fall in numbers, shot down
+from the embrasures. But the living took the place of the dead: and the
+fight ranged evenly there. Where are the colors? Towards the rear
+there. The colonel and a hundred men are fighting hand to hand with
+the Prussians, who have charged out at the back doors of the bastion.
+Success there, and the bastion must fall--both sides know this.
+
+The colors disappeared. There was a groan from the French lines. The
+colors reappeared, and close under the bastion.
+
+And now in front the attack was so hot, that often the Prussian gunners
+were seen to jump down, driven from their posts; and the next moment
+a fierce hurrah from the rear told that the French had won some great
+advantage there. The fire slackening told a similar tale and presently
+down came the Prussian flag-staff. That might be an accident. A few
+moments of thirsting expectation, and up went the colors of the 24th
+brigade upon the Bastion St. Andre.
+
+The French army raised a shout that rent the sky, and their cannon began
+to play on the Prussian lines and between the bastion and the nearest
+fort, to prevent a recapture.
+
+Sudden there shot from the bastion a cubic acre of fire: it carried up a
+heavy mountain of red and black smoke that looked solid as marble. There
+was a heavy, sullen, tremendous explosion that snuffed out the sound of
+the cannon, and paralyzed the French and Prussian gunners' hands, and
+checked the very beating of their hearts. Thirty thousand pounds of
+gunpowder were in that awful explosion. War itself held its breath,
+and both armies, like peaceable spectators, gazed wonder-struck,
+terror-struck. Great hell seemed to burst through the earth's crust,
+and to be rushing at heaven. Huge stones, cannons, corpses, and limbs of
+soldiers, were seen driven or falling through the smoke. Some of these
+last came quite clear of the ruins, ay, into the French and Prussian
+lines, that even the veterans put their hands to their eyes. Raynal felt
+something patter on him from the sky--it was blood--a comrade's perhaps.
+
+
+The smoke cleared. Where, a moment before, the great bastion stood and
+fought, was a monstrous pile of blackened, bloody stones and timbers,
+with dismounted cannon sticking up here and there.
+
+And, rent and crushed to atoms beneath the smoking mass, lay the relics
+of the gallant brigade, and their victorious colors.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII.
+
+
+A few wounded soldiers of the brigade lay still till dusk. Then they
+crept back to the trenches. These had all been struck down or disabled
+short of the bastion. Of those that had taken the place no one came
+home.
+
+Raynal, after the first stupefaction, pressed hard and even angrily for
+an immediate assault on the whole Prussian line. Not they. It was on
+paper that the assault should be at daybreak to-morrow. Such leaders as
+they were cannot IMPROVISE.
+
+Rage and grief in his heart, Raynal waited chafing in the trenches till
+five minutes past midnight. He then became commander of the brigade,
+gave his orders, and took thirty men out to creep up to the wreck of the
+bastion, and find the late colonel's body.
+
+Going for so pious a purpose, he was rewarded by an important discovery.
+The whole Prussian lines had been abandoned since sunset, and, mounting
+cautiously on the ramparts, Raynal saw the town too was evacuated, and
+lights and other indications on a rising ground behind it convinced
+him that the Prussians were in full retreat, probably to effect that
+junction with other forces which the assault he had recommended would
+have rendered impossible.
+
+They now lighted lanterns, and searched all over and round the bastion
+for the poor colonel, in the rear of the bastion they found many French
+soldiers, most of whom had died by the bayonet. The Prussian dead had
+all been carried off.
+
+Here they found the talkative Sergeant La Croix. The poor fellow was
+silent enough now. A terrible sabre-cut on the skull. The colonel was
+not there. Raynal groaned, and led the way on to the bastion. The ruins
+still smoked. Seven or eight bodies were discovered by an arm or a foot
+protruding through the masses of masonry. Of these some were Prussians;
+a proof that some devoted hand had fired the train, and destroyed both
+friend and foe.
+
+They found the tube of Long Tom sticking up, just as he had shown over
+the battlements that glorious day, with this exception, that a great
+piece was knocked off his lip, and the slice ended in a long, broad
+crack.
+
+The soldiers looked at this. "That is our bullet's work," said they.
+Then one old veteran touched his cap, and told Raynal gravely, he knew
+where their beloved colonel was. "Dig here, to the bottom," said he. "HE
+LIES BENEATH HIS WORK."
+
+Improbable and superstitious as this was, the hearts of the soldiers
+assented to it.
+
+Presently there was a joyful cry outside the bastion. A rush was made
+thither. But it proved to be only Dard, who had discovered that Sergeant
+La Croix's heart still beat. They took him up carefully, and carried him
+gently into camp. To Dard's delight the surgeon pronounced him curable.
+For all that, he was three days insensible, and after that unfit for
+duty. So they sent him home invalided, with a hundred francs out of the
+poor colonel's purse.
+
+Raynal reported the evacuation of the place, and that Colonel Dujardin
+was buried under the bastion, and soon after rode out of the camp.
+
+The words Camille had scratched with a pencil, and sent him from the
+edge of the grave, were few but striking.
+
+
+"A dead man takes you once more by the hand. My last thought, thank God,
+is France. For her sake and mine, Raynal. GO FOR GENERAL BONAPARTE. Tell
+him, from a dying soldier, the Rhine is a river to these generals, but
+to him a field of glory. He will lay out our lives, not waste them."
+
+
+There was nothing to hinder Raynal from carrying out this sacred
+request: for the 24th brigade had ceased to exist: already thinned by
+hard service, it was reduced to a file or two by the fatal bastion. It
+was incorporated with the 12th; and Raynal rode heavy at heart to Paris,
+with a black scarf across his breast.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII.
+
+
+You see now into what a fatal entanglement two high-minded young ladies
+were led, step by step, through yielding to the natural foible of their
+sex--the desire to hide everything painful from those they love, even at
+the expense of truth.
+
+A nice mess they made of it with their amiable dishonesty. And pray take
+notice that after the first White Lie or two, circumstances overpowered
+them, and drove them on against their will. It was no small part of all
+their misery that they longed to get back to truth and could not.
+
+We shall see presently how far they succeeded in that pious object, for
+the sake of which they first entered on concealments. But first a word
+is due about one of the victims of their amiable, self-sacrificing
+lubricity. Edouard Riviere fell in one night, from happiness and
+confidence, such as till that night he had never enjoyed, to deep and
+hopeless misery.
+
+He lost that which, to every heart capable of really loving, is the
+greatest earthly blessing, the woman he adored. But worse than that,
+he lost those prime treasures of the masculine soul, belief in human
+goodness, and in female purity. To him no more could there be in nature
+a candid eye, a virtuous ready-mantling cheek: for frailty and treachery
+had put on these signs of virtue and nobility. Henceforth, let him live
+a hundred years, whom could he trust or believe in?
+
+Here was a creature whose virtues seemed to make frailty impossible:
+treachery, doubly impossible: a creature whose very faults--for faults
+she had--had seemed as opposite to treachery as her very virtues were.
+Yet she was all frailty and falsehood.
+
+He passed in that one night of anguish from youth to age. He went about
+his business like a leaden thing. His food turned tasteless. His life
+seemed ended. Nothing appeared what it had been. The very landscape
+seemed cut in stone, and he a stone in the middle of it, and his heart
+a stone in him. At times, across that heavy heart came gushes of furious
+rage and bitter mortification; his heart was broken, and his faith was
+gone, for his vanity had been stabbed as fiercely as his love. "Georges
+Dandin!" he would cry, "curse her! curse her!" But love and misery
+overpowered these heats, and froze him to stone again.
+
+The poor boy pined and pined. His clothes hung loose about him; his
+face was so drawn with suffering, you would not have known him. He hated
+company. The things he was expected to talk about!--he with his crushed
+heart. He could not. He would not. He shunned all the world; he went
+alone like a wounded deer. The good doctor, on his return from Paris,
+called on him to see if he was ill: since he had not come for days to
+the chateau. He saw the doctor coming and bade the servant say he was
+not in the village.
+
+He drew down the blind, that he might never see the chateau again. He
+drew it up again: he could not exist without seeing it. "She will be
+miserable, too," he cried, gnashing his teeth. "She will see whether she
+has chosen well." At other times, all his courage, and his hatred, and
+his wounded vanity, were drowned in his love and its despair, and then
+he bowed his head, and sobbed and cried as if his heart would burst. One
+morning he was so sobbing with his head on the table, when his landlady
+tapped at his door. He started up and turned his head away from the
+door.
+
+"A young woman from Beaurepaire, monsieur."
+
+"From Beaurepaire?" his heart gave a furious leap. "Show her in."
+
+He wiped his eyes and seated himself at a table, and, all in a flutter,
+pretended to be the state's.
+
+It was not Jacintha, as he expected, but the other servant. She made a
+low reverence, cast a look of admiration on him, and gave him a letter.
+His eye darted on it: his hand trembled as he took it. He turned away
+again to open it. He forced himself to say, in a tolerably calm voice,
+"I will send an answer."
+
+The letter was apparently from the baroness de Beaurepaire; a mere line
+inviting him to pay her a visit. It was written in a tremulous hand.
+Edouard examined the writing, and saw directly it was written by Rose.
+
+Being now, naturally enough, full of suspicion, he set this down as an
+attempt to disguise her hand. "So," said he, to himself, "this is the
+game. The old woman is to be drawn into it, too. She is to help to make
+Georges Dandin of me. I will go. I will baffle them all. I will expose
+this nest of depravity, all ceremony on the surface, and voluptuousness
+and treachery below. O God! who could believe that creature never loved
+me! They shall none of them see my weakness. Their benefactor shall
+be still their superior. They shall see me cold as ice, and bitter as
+gall."
+
+But to follow him farther just now, would be to run too far in advance
+of the main story. I must, therefore, return to Beaurepaire, and show,
+amongst other things, how this very letter came to be written.
+
+
+When Josephine and Rose awoke from that startled slumber that followed
+the exhaustion of that troubled night, Rose was the more wretched of the
+two. She had not only dishonored herself, but stabbed the man she loved.
+
+Josephine, on the other hand, was exhausted, but calm. The fearful
+escape she had had softened down by contrast her more distant terrors.
+
+She began to shut her eyes again, and let herself drift. Above all, the
+doctor's promise comforted her: that she should go to Paris with him,
+and have her boy.
+
+This deceitful calm of the heart lasted three days.
+
+Carefully encouraged by Rose, it was destroyed by Jacintha.
+
+Jacintha, conscious that she had betrayed her trust, was almost
+heart-broken. She was ashamed to appear before her young mistress, and,
+coward-like, wanted to avoid knowing even how much harm she had done.
+
+She pretended toothache, bound up her face, and never stirred from the
+kitchen. But she was not to escape: the other servant came down with a
+message: "Madame Raynal wanted to see her directly."
+
+She came quaking, and found Josephine all alone.
+
+Josephine rose to meet her, and casting a furtive glance round the room
+first, threw her arms round Jacintha's neck, and embraced her with many
+tears.
+
+"Was ever fidelity like yours? how COULD you do it, Jacintha? and how
+can I ever repay it? But, no; it is too base of me to accept such a
+sacrifice from any woman."
+
+Jacintha was so confounded she did not know what to say. But it was a
+mystification that could not endure long between two women, who were
+both deceived by a third. Between them they soon discovered that it must
+have been Rose who had sacrificed herself.
+
+"And Edouard has never been here since," said Josephine.
+
+"And never will, madame."
+
+"Yes, he shall! there must be some limit even to my feebleness, and my
+sister's devotion. You shall take a line to him from me. I will write it
+this moment."
+
+The letter was written. But it was never sent. Rose found Josephine and
+Jacintha together; saw a letter was being written, asked to see it; on
+Josephine's hesitating, snatched it out of her hand, read it, tore it to
+pieces, and told Jacintha to leave the room. She hated the sight of
+poor Jacintha, who had slept at the very moment when all depended on her
+watchfulness.
+
+"So you were going to send to HIM, unknown to me."
+
+"Forgive me, Rose." Rose burst out crying.
+
+"O Josephine! is it come to this? Would you deceive ME?"
+
+"You have deceived ME! Yes! it has come to that. I know all. Twill not
+consent to destroy ALL I love."
+
+She then begged hard for leave to send the letter.
+
+Rose gave an impetuous refusal. "What could you say to him? foolish
+thing, don't you know him, and his vanity? When you had exposed yourself
+to him, and showed him I had insulted him for you, do you think he would
+forgive me? No! this is to make light of my love--to make me waste the
+sacrifice I have made. I feel that sacrifice as much as you do, more
+perhaps, and I would rather die in a convent than waste that night of
+shame and agony. Come, promise me, no more attempts of that kind, or we
+are sisters no more, friends no more, one heart and one blood no more."
+
+The weaker nature, weakened still more by ill-health and grief, was
+terrified into submission, or rather temporized. "Kiss me then," said
+Josephine, "and love me to the end. Ah, if I was only in my grave!"
+
+Rose kissed her with many sighs, but Josephine smiled. Rose eyed her
+with suspicion. That deep smile; what did it mean? She had formed some
+resolution. "She is going to deceive me somehow," thought Rose.
+
+From that day she watched Josephine like a spy. Confidence was gone
+between them. Suspicion took its place.
+
+Rose was right in her misgivings. The moment Josephine saw that
+Edouard's happiness and Rose's were to be sacrificed for her whom
+nothing could make happy, the poor thing said to herself, "I CAN DIE."
+
+And that was the happy thought that made her smile.
+
+The doctor gave her laudanum: he found she could not sleep: and he
+thought it all-important that she should sleep.
+
+Josephine, instead of taking these small doses, saved them all up,
+secreted them in a phial, and so, from the sleep of a dozen nights,
+collected the sleep of death: and now she was tranquil. This young
+creature that could not bear to give pain to any one else, prepared her
+own death with a calm resolution the heroes of our sex have not often
+equalled. It was so little a thing to her to strike Josephine. Death
+would save her honor, would spare her the frightful alternative of
+deceiving her husband, or of telling him she was another's. "Poor
+Raynal," said she to herself, "it is so cruel to tie him to a woman
+who can never be to him what he deserves. Rose would then prove her
+innocence to Edouard. A few tears for a weak, loving soul, and they
+would all be happy and forget her."
+
+
+One day the baroness, finding herself alone with Rose and Dr. Aubertin,
+asked the latter what he thought of Josephine's state.
+
+"Oh, she was better: had slept last night without her usual narcotic."
+
+The baroness laid down her knitting and said, with much meaning, "And
+I tell you, you will never cure her body till you can cure her mind. My
+poor child has some secret sorrow."
+
+"Sorrow!" said Aubertin, stoutly concealing the uneasiness these words
+created, "what sorrow?"
+
+"Oh, she has some deep sorrow. And so have you, Rose."
+
+"Me, mamma! what DO you mean?"
+
+The baroness's pale cheek flushed a little. "I mean," said she, "that
+my patience is worn out at last; I cannot live surrounded by secrets.
+Raynal's gloomy looks when he left us, after staying but one hour;
+Josephine ill from that day, and bursting into tears at every word;
+yourself pale and changed, hiding an unaccountable sadness under forced
+smiles--Now, don't interrupt me. Edouard, who was almost like a son,
+gone off, without a word, and never comes near us now."
+
+"Really you are ingenious in tormenting yourself. Josephine is ill!
+Well, is it so very strange? Have you never been ill? Rose is pale! you
+ARE pale, my dear; but she has nursed her sister for a month; is it a
+wonder she has lost color? Edouard is gone a journey, to inherit his
+uncle's property: a million francs. But don't you go and fall ill, like
+Josephine; turn pale, like Rose; and make journeys in the region of
+fancy, after Edouard Riviere, who is tramping along on the vulgar high
+road."
+
+This tirade came from Aubertin, and very clever he thought himself.
+But he had to do with a shrewd old lady, whose suspicions had long
+smouldered; and now burst out. She said quietly, "Oh, then Edouard is
+not in this part of the world. That alters the case: where IS he?"
+
+"In Normandy, probably," said Rose, blushing.
+
+The baroness looked inquiringly towards Aubertin. He put on an innocent
+face and said nothing.
+
+"Very good," said the baroness. "It's plain I am to learn nothing from
+you two. But I know somebody who will be more communicative. Yes:
+this uncomfortable smiling, and unreasonable crying, and interminable
+whispering; these appearances of the absent, and disappearances of the
+present; I shall know this very day what they all mean."
+
+"Really, I do not understand you."
+
+"Oh, never mind; I am an old woman, and I am in my dotage. For all that,
+perhaps you will allow me two words alone with my daughter."
+
+"I retire, madame," and he disappeared with a bow to her, and an anxious
+look at Rose. She did not need this; she clenched her teeth, and braced
+herself up to stand a severe interrogatory.
+
+Mother and daughter looked at one another, as if to measure forces, and
+then, instead of questioning her as she had intended, the baroness sank
+back in her chair and wept aloud. Rose was all unprepared for this. She
+almost screamed in a voice of agony, "O mamma! mamma! O God! kill me
+where I stand for making my mother weep!"
+
+"My girl," said the baroness in a broken voice, and with the most
+touching dignity, "may you never know what a mother feels who finds
+herself shut out from her daughters' hearts. Sometimes I think it is my
+fault; I was born in a severer age. A mother nowadays seems to be a sort
+of elder sister. In my day she was something more. Yet I loved my mother
+as well, or better than I did my sisters. But it is not so with those I
+have borne in my bosom, and nursed upon my knee."
+
+At this Rose flung herself, sobbing and screaming, at her mother's
+knees. The baroness was alarmed. "Come, dearest, don't cry like that. It
+is not too late to take your poor old mother into your confidence. What
+is this mystery? and why this sorrow? How comes it I intercept at every
+instant glances that were not intended for me? Why is the very air
+loaded with signals and secrecy? (Rose replied only by sobs.) Is some
+deceit going on? (Rose sobbed.) Am I to have no reply but these sullen
+sobs? will you really tell me nothing?"
+
+"I've nothing to tell," sobbed Rose.
+
+"Well, then, will you do something for me?"
+
+Such a proposal was not only a relief, but a delight to the deceiving
+but loving daughter. She started up crying, "Oh, yes, mamma; anything,
+everything. Oh, thank you!" In the ardor of her gratitude, she wanted
+to kiss her mother; but the baroness declined the embrace politely, and
+said, coldly and bitterly, "I shall not ask much; I should not venture
+now to draw largely on your affection; it's only to write a few lines
+for me."
+
+Rose got paper and ink with great alacrity, and sat down all beaming,
+pen in hand.
+
+The baroness dictated the letter slowly, with an eye gimleting her
+daughter all the time.
+
+"Dear--Monsieur--Riviere."
+
+The pen fell from Rose's hand, and she turned red and then pale.
+
+"What! write to him?"
+
+"Not in your own name; in mine. But perhaps you prefer to give me the
+trouble."
+
+"Cruel! cruel!" sighed Rose, and wrote the words as requested.
+
+The baroness dictated again,--
+
+"Oblige me by coming here at your very earliest convenience."
+
+"But, mamma, if he is in Normandy," remonstrated Rose, fighting every
+inch of the ground.
+
+"Never you mind where he is," said the baroness. "Write as I request."
+
+"Yes, mamma," said Rose with sudden alacrity; for she had recovered her
+ready wit, and was prepared to write anything, being now fully resolved
+the letter should never go.
+
+"Now sign my name." Rose complied. "There; now fold it, and address it
+to his lodgings." Rose did so; and, rising with a cheerful air, said she
+would send Jacintha with it directly.
+
+She was half across the room when her mother called her quietly back.
+
+"No, mademoiselle," said she sternly. "You will give me the letter.
+I can trust neither the friend of twenty years, nor the servant that
+stayed by me in adversity, nor the daughter I suffered for and nursed.
+And why don't I trust you? Because YOU HAVE TOLD ME A LIE."
+
+At this word, which in its coarsest form she had never heard from those
+high-born lips till then, Rose cowered like a hare.
+
+"Ay, A LIE," said the baroness. "I saw Edouard Riviere in the park
+but yesterday. I saw him. My old eyes are feeble, but they are not
+deceitful. I saw him. Send my breakfast to my own room. I come of an
+ancient race: I could not sit with liars; I should forget courtesy;
+you would see in my face how thoroughly I scorn you all." And she went
+haughtily out with the letter in her hand.
+
+Rose for the first time, was prostrated. Vain had been all this deceit;
+her mother was not happy; was not blinded. Edouard might come and tell
+her his story. Then no power could keep Josephine silent. The plot was
+thickening; the fatal net was drawing closer and closer.
+
+She sank with a groan into a chair, and body and spirit alike succumbed.
+But that was only for a little while. To this prostration succeeded a
+feverish excitement. She could not, would not, look Edouard in the face.
+She would implore Josephine to be silent; and she herself would fly from
+the chateau. But, if Josephine would not be silent? Why, then she would
+go herself to Edouard, and throw herself upon his honor, and tell him
+the truth. With this, she ran wildly up the stairs, and burst into
+Josephine's room so suddenly, that she caught her, pale as death, on her
+knees, with a letter in one hand and a phial of laudanum in the other.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV.
+
+
+Josephine conveyed the phial into her bosom with wonderful rapidity
+and dexterity, and rose to her feet. But Rose just saw her conceal
+something, and resolved to find out quietly what it was. So she said
+nothing about it, but asked Josephine what on earth she was doing.
+
+"I was praying."
+
+"And what is that letter?"
+
+"A letter I have just received from Colonel Raynal."
+
+Rose took the letter and read it. Raynal had written from Paris. He was
+coming to Beaurepaire to stay a month, and was to arrive that very day.
+
+Then Rose forgot all about herself, and even what she had come for. She
+clung about her sister's neck, and implored her, for her sake, to try
+and love Raynal.
+
+Josephine shuddered, and clung weeping to her sister in turn. For in
+Rose's arms she realized more powerfully what that sister would suffer
+if she were to die. Now, while they clung together, Rose felt something
+hard, and contrived just to feel it with her cheek. It was the phial.
+
+A chill suspicion crossed the poor girl. The attitude in which she had
+found Josephine; the letter, the look of despair, and now this little
+bottle, which she had hidden. WHY HIDE IT? She resolved not to let
+Josephine out of her sight; at all events, until she had seen this
+little bottle, and got it away from her.
+
+She helped her to dress, and breakfasted with her in the tapestried
+room, and dissembled, and put on gayety, and made light of everything
+but Josephine's health.
+
+Her efforts were not quite in vain. Josephine became more composed; and
+Rose even drew from her a half promise that she would give Raynal and
+time a fair trial.
+
+And now Rose was relieved of her immediate apprehensions for Josephine,
+but the danger of another kind, from Edouard, remained. So she ran into
+her bedroom for her bonnet and shawl, determined to take the strong
+measure of visiting Edouard at once, or intercepting him. While she was
+making her little toilet, she heard her mother's voice in the room. This
+was unlucky; she must pass through that room to go out. She sat down
+and fretted at this delay. And then, as the baroness appeared to be
+very animated, Rose went to the keyhole, and listened. Their mother was
+telling Josephine how she had questioned Rose, and how Rose had told her
+an untruth, and how she had made that young lady write to Edouard, etc.;
+in short, the very thing Rose wanted to conceal from Josephine.
+
+Rose lost all patience, and determined to fly through the room and out
+before anybody could stop her. She heard Jacintha come in with some
+message, and thought that would be a good opportunity to slip out
+unmolested. So she opened the door softly. Jacintha, it seemed, had been
+volunteering some remark that was not well received, for the baroness
+was saying, sharply, "Your opinion is not asked. Go down directly, and
+bring him up here, to this room." Jacintha cast a look of dismay at
+Rose, and vanished.
+
+Rose gathered from that look, as much as from the words, who the visitor
+was. She made a dart after Jacintha. But the room was a long one, and
+the baroness intercepted her: "No," said she, gravely, "I cannot spare
+you."
+
+Rose stood pale and panting, but almost defiant. "Mamma," said she, "if
+it is Monsieur Riviere, I MUST ask your leave to retire. And you have
+neither love nor pity, nor respect for me, if you detain me."
+
+"Mademoiselle!" was the stern reply, "I FORBID you to move. Be good
+enough to sit there;" with which the baroness pointed imperiously to
+a sofa at the other side of the room. "Josephine, go to your room."
+Josephine retired, casting more than one anxious glance over her
+shoulder.
+
+Rose looked this way and that in despair and terror; but ended by
+sinking, more dead than alive, into the seat indicated; and even as she
+drooped, pale and trembling, on that sofa, Edouard Riviere, worn and
+agitated, entered the room, and bowed low to them all, without a word.
+
+The baroness looked at him, and then at her daughter, as much as to say,
+now I have got you; deceive me now if you can. "Rose, my dear," said
+this terrible old woman, affecting honeyed accents, "don't you see
+Monsieur Riviere?"
+
+The poor girl at this challenge rose with difficulty, and courtesied
+humbly to Edouard.
+
+He bowed to her, and stealing a rapid glance saw her pallor and
+distress; and that showed him she was not so hardened as he had thought.
+
+"You have not come to see us lately," said the baroness, quietly, "yet
+you have been in the neighborhood."
+
+These words puzzled Edouard. Was the old lady all in the dark, then? As
+a public man he had already learned to be on his guard; so he stammered
+out, "That he had been much occupied with public duties."
+
+Madame de Beaurepaire despised this threadbare excuse too much to notice
+it at all. She went on as if he had said nothing. "Intimate as you were
+with us, you must have some reason for deserting us so suddenly."
+
+"I have," said Edouard, gravely.
+
+"What is it?"
+
+"Excuse me," said Edouard, sullenly.
+
+"No, monsieur, I cannot. This neglect, succeeding to a somewhat ardent
+pursuit of my daughter, is almost an affront. You shall, of course,
+withdraw yourself altogether, if you choose. But not without an
+explanation. This much is due to me; and, if you are a gentleman, you
+will not withhold it from me."
+
+"If he is a gentleman!" cried Rose; "O mamma, do not you affront a
+gentleman, who never, never gave you nor me any ground of offence. Why
+affront the friends and benefactors we have lost by our own fault?"
+
+"Oh, then, it is all your fault," said the baroness. "I feared as much."
+
+"All my fault, all," said Rose; then putting her pretty palms together,
+and casting a look of abject supplication on Edouard, she murmured, "my
+temper!"
+
+"Do not you put words into his mouth," said the shrewd old lady. "Come,
+Monsieur Riviere, be a man, and tell me the truth. What has she said to
+you? What has she done?"
+
+By this time the abject state of terror the high-spirited Rose was in,
+and her piteous glances, had so disarmed Edouard, that he had not the
+heart to expose her to her mother.
+
+"Madame," said he, stiffly, taking Rose's hint, "my temper and
+mademoiselle's could not accord."
+
+"Why, her temper is charming: it is joyous, equal, and gentle."
+
+"You misunderstand me, madame; I do not reproach Mademoiselle Rose. It
+is I who am to blame."
+
+"For what?" inquired the baroness dryly.
+
+"For not being able to make her love me."
+
+"Oh! that is it! She did not love you?"
+
+"Ask herself, madame," said Edouard, bitterly.
+
+"Rose," said the baroness, her eye now beginning to twinkle, "were
+you really guilty of such a want of discrimination? Didn't you love
+monsieur?"
+
+Rose flung her arms round her mother's neck, and said, "No, mamma, I
+did not love Monsieur Edouard," in an exquisite tone of love, that to a
+female ear conveyed the exact opposite of the words.
+
+But Edouard had not that nice discriminating ear. He sighed deeply, and
+the baroness smiled. "You tell me that?" said she, "and you are crying!"
+
+"She is crying, madame?" said Edouard, inquiringly, and taking a step
+towards them.
+
+"Why, you see she is, you foolish boy. Come, I must put an end to this;"
+and she rose coolly from her seat, and begging Edouard to forgive her
+for leaving him a moment with his deadly enemy, went off with knowing
+little nods into Josephine's room; only, before she entered it, she
+turned, and with a maternal smile discharged this word at the pair.
+
+"Babies!"
+
+But between the alienated lovers was a long distressing silence. Neither
+knew what to say; and their situation was intolerable. At last Rose
+ventured in a timorous voice to say, "I thank you for your generosity.
+But I knew that you would not betray me."
+
+"Your secret is safe for me," sighed Edouard. "Is there anything else I
+can do for you?"
+
+Rose shook her head sadly.
+
+Edouard moved to the door.
+
+Rose bowed her head with a despairing moan. It took him by the heart and
+held him. He hesitated, then came towards her.
+
+"I see you are sorry for what you have done to me who loved you so; and
+you loved me. Oh! yes, do not deny it, Rose; there was a time you loved
+me. And that makes it worse: to have given me such sweet hopes, only to
+crush both them and me. And is not this cruel of you to weep so and let
+me see your penitence--when it is too late?"
+
+"Alas! how can I help my regrets? I have insulted so good a friend."
+
+There was a sad silence. Then as he looked at her, her looks belied the
+charge her own lips had made against herself.
+
+A light seemed to burst on Edouard from that high-minded,
+sorrow-stricken face.
+
+"Tell me it is false!" he cried.
+
+She hid her face in her hands--woman's instinct to avoid being read.
+
+"Tell me you were misled then, fascinated, perverted, but that your
+heart returned to me. Clear yourself of deliberate deceit, and I will
+believe and thank you on my knees."
+
+"Heaven have pity on us both!" cried poor Rose.
+
+"On us! Thank you for saying on us. See now, you have not gained
+happiness by destroying mine. One word--do you love that man?--that
+Dujardin?"
+
+"You know I do not."
+
+"I am glad of that; since his life is forfeited; if he escapes my friend
+Raynal, he shall not escape me."
+
+Rose uttered a cry of terror. "Hush! not so loud. The life of Camille!
+Oh! if he were to die, what would become of--oh, pray do not speak so
+loud."
+
+"Own then that you DO love him," yelled Edouard; "give me truth, if you
+have no love to give. Own that you love him, and he shall be safe. It is
+myself I will kill, for being such a slave as to love you still."
+
+Rose's fortitude gave way.
+
+"I cannot bear it," she cried despairingly; "it is beyond my strength;
+Edouard, swear to me you will keep what I tell you secret as the grave!"
+
+"Ah!" cried Edouard, all radiant with hope, "I swear."
+
+"Then you are under a delirium. I have deceived, but never wronged you;
+that unhappy child is not--Hush! HERE SHE COMES."
+
+The baroness came smiling out, and Josephine's wan, anxious face was
+seen behind her.
+
+"Well," said the baroness, "is the war at an end? What, are we still
+silent? Let me try then what I can do. Edouard, lend me your hand."
+
+While Edouard hesitated, Josephine clasped her hands and mutely
+supplicated him to consent. Her sad face, and the thought of how often
+she had stood his friend, shook his resolution. He held out his hand,
+but slowly and reluctantly.
+
+"There is my hand," he groaned.
+
+"And here is mine, mamma," said Rose, smiling to please her mother.
+
+Oh! the mixture of feeling, when her soft warm palm pressed his. How the
+delicious sense baffled and mystified the cold judgment.
+
+Josephine raised her eyes thankfully to heaven.
+
+While the young lovers yet thrilled at each other's touch, yet could not
+look one another in the face, a clatter of horses' feet was heard.
+
+"That is Colonel Raynal," said Josephine, with unnatural calmness. "I
+expected him to-day."
+
+The baroness was at the side window in a moment.
+
+"It is he!--it is he!"
+
+She hurried down to embrace her son.
+
+Josephine went without a word to her own room. Rose followed her the
+next minute. But in that one minute she worked magic.
+
+She glided up to Edouard, and looked him full in the face: not the sad,
+depressed, guilty-looking humble Rose of a moment before, but the old
+high-spirited, and some what imperious girl.
+
+"You have shown yourself noble this day. I am going to trust you as only
+the noble are trusted. Stay in the house till I can speak to you."
+
+She was gone, and something leaped within Edouard's bosom, and a flood
+of light seemed to burst in on him. Yet he saw no object clearly: but he
+saw light.
+
+Rose ran into Josephine's room, and once more surprised her on her
+knees, and in the very act of hiding something in her bosom.
+
+"What are you doing, Josephine, on your knees?" said she, sternly.
+
+"I have a great trial to go through," was the hesitating answer.
+
+Rose said nothing. She turned paler. She is deceiving me, thought she,
+and she sat down full of bitterness and terror, and, affecting not to
+watch Josephine, watched her.
+
+"Go and tell them I am coming, Rose."
+
+"No, Josephine, I will not leave you till this terrible meeting is over.
+We will encounter him hand in hand, as we used to go when our hearts
+were one, and we deceived others, but never each other."
+
+At this tender reproach Josephine fell upon her neck and wept.
+
+"I will not deceive you," she said. "I am worse than the poor doctor
+thinks me. My life is but a little candle that a breath may put out any
+day."
+
+Rose said nothing, but trembled and watched her keenly.
+
+"My little Henri," said Josephine imploringly, "what would you do with
+him--if anything should happen to me?"
+
+"What would I do with him? He is mine. I should be his mother. Oh! what
+words are these: my heart! my heart!"
+
+"No, dearest; some day you will be married, and owe all the mother to
+your children; and Henri is not ours only: he belongs to some one I have
+seemed unkind to. Perhaps he thinks me heartless. For I am a foolish
+woman; I don't know how to be virtuous, yet show a man my heart. But
+THEN he will understand me and forgive me. Rose, love, you will write
+to him. He will come to you. You will go together to the place where I
+shall be sleeping. You will show him my heart. You will tell him all my
+long love that lasted to the end. YOU need not blush to tell him all. I
+have no right. Then you will give him his poor Josephine's boy, and you
+will say to him, 'She never loved but you: she gives you all that
+is left of her, her child. She only prays you not to give him a bad
+mother.'"
+
+Poor soul! this was her one bit of little, gentle jealousy; but it made
+her eyes stream. She would have put out her hand from the tomb to keep
+her boy's father single all his life.
+
+"Oh! my Josephine, my darling sister," cried Rose, "why do you speak of
+death? Do you meditate a crime?"
+
+"No; but it was on my heart to say it: it has done me good."
+
+"At least, take me to your bosom, my well-beloved, that I may not SEE
+your tears."
+
+"There--tears? No, you have lightened my heart. Bless you! bless you!"
+
+The sisters twined their bosoms together in a long, gentle embrace. You
+might have taken them for two angels that flowed together in one love,
+but for their tears.
+
+A deep voice was now heard in the sitting-room.
+
+Josephine and Rose postponed the inevitable one moment more, by
+arranging their hair in the glass: then they opened the door, and
+entered the tapestried room.
+
+Raynal was sitting on the sofa, the baroness's hand in his. Edouard was
+not there.
+
+Colonel Raynal had given him a strange look, and said, "What, you here?"
+in a tone of voice that was intolerable.
+
+Raynal came to meet the sisters. He saluted Josephine on the brow.
+
+"You are pale, wife: and how cold her hand is."
+
+"She has been ill this month past," said Rose interposing.
+
+"You look ill, too, Mademoiselle Rose."
+
+"Never mind," cried the baroness joyously, "you will revive them both."
+
+Raynal made no reply to that.
+
+"How long do you stay this time, a day?"
+
+"A month, mother."
+
+The doctor now joined the party, and friendly greetings passed between
+him and Raynal.
+
+But ere long somehow all became conscious this was not a joyful meeting.
+The baroness could not alone sustain the spirits of the party, and soon
+even she began to notice that Raynal's replies were short, and that his
+manner was distrait and gloomy. The sisters saw this too, and trembled
+for what might be coming.
+
+At last Raynal said bluntly, "Josephine, I want to speak to you alone."
+
+The baroness gave the doctor a look, and made an excuse for going
+down-stairs to her own room. As she was going Josephine went to her and
+said calmly,--
+
+"Mother, you have not kissed me to-day."
+
+"There! Bless you, my darling!"
+
+Raynal looked at Rose. She saw she must go, but she lingered, and sought
+her sister's eye: it avoided her. At that Rose ran to the doctor, who
+was just going out of the door.
+
+"Oh! doctor," she whispered trembling, "don't go beyond the door. I
+found her praying. My mind misgives me. She is going to tell him--or
+something worse."
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+"I am afraid to say all I dread. She could not be so calm if she meant
+to live. Be near! as I shall. She has a phial hid in her bosom."
+
+She left the old man trembling, and went back.
+
+"Excuse me," said she to Raynal, "I only came to ask Josephine if she
+wants anything."
+
+"No!--yes!--a glass of eau sucree."
+
+Rose mixed it for her. While doing this she noticed that Josephine
+shunned her eye, but Raynal gazed gently and with an air of pity on her.
+
+She retired slowly into Josephine's bedroom, but did not quite close the
+door.
+
+Raynal had something to say so painful that he shrank from plunging into
+it. He therefore, like many others, tried to creep into it, beginning
+with something else.
+
+"Your health," said he, "alarms me. You seem sad, too. I don't
+understand that. You have no news from the Rhine, have you?"
+
+"Monsieur!" said Josephine scared.
+
+"Do not call me monsieur, nor look so frightened. Call me your friend. I
+am your sincere friend."
+
+"Oh, yes; you always were."
+
+"Thank you. You will give me a dearer title before we part this time."
+
+"Yes," said Josephine in a low whisper, and shuddered.
+
+"Have you forgiven me frightening you so that night?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"It was a shock to me, too, I can tell you. I like the boy. She
+professed to love him, and, to own the truth, I loathe all treachery
+and deceit. If I had done a murder, I would own it. A lie doubles every
+crime. But I took heart; we are all selfish, we men; of the two sisters
+one was all innocence and good faith; and she was the one I had chosen."
+
+At these words Josephine rose, like a statue moving, and took a phial
+from her bosom and poured the contents into the glass.
+
+But ere she could drink it, if such was her intention, Raynal, with his
+eyes gloomily lowered, said, in a voice full of strange solemnity,--
+
+"I went to the army of the Rhine."
+
+Josephine put down the glass directly, though without removing her hand
+from it.
+
+"I see you understand me, and approve. Yes, I saw that your sister would
+be dishonored, and I went to the army and saw her seducer."
+
+"You saw HIM. Oh, I hope you did not go and speak to him of--of this?"
+
+"Why, of course I did."
+
+Josephine resolved to know the worst at once. "May I ask," said she,
+"what you told him?"
+
+"Why, I told him all I had discovered, and pointed out the course he
+must take; he must marry your sister at once. He refused. I challenged
+him. But ere we met, I was ordered to lead a forlorn hope against a
+bastion. Then, seeing me go to certain death, the noble fellow pitied
+me. I mean this is how I understood it all at the time; at any rate, he
+promised to marry Rose if he should live."
+
+Josephine put out her hand, and with a horrible smile said, "I thank
+you; you have saved the honor of our family;" and with no more ado, she
+took the glass in her hand to drink the fatal contents.
+
+But Raynal's reply arrested her hand. He said solemnly, "No, I have
+not. Have you no inkling of the terrible truth? Do not fiddle with
+that glass: drink it, or leave it alone; for, indeed, I need all your
+attention."
+
+He took the glass out of her patient hand, and with a furtive look at
+the bedroom-door, drew her away to the other end of the room; "and,"
+said he, "I could not tell your mother, for she knows nothing of the
+girl's folly; still less Rose, for I see she loves him still, or why is
+she so pale? Advise me, now, whilst we are alone. Colonel Dujardin was
+COMPARATIVELY indifferent to YOU. Will you undertake the task? A rough
+soldier like me is not the person to break the terrible tidings to that
+poor girl."
+
+"What tidings? You confuse, you perplex me. Oh! what does this horrible
+preparation mean?"
+
+"It means he will never marry your sister; he will never see her more."
+
+Then Raynal walked the room in great agitation, which at once
+communicated itself to his hearer. But the loving heart is ingenious in
+avoiding its dire misgivings.
+
+"I see," said she; "he told you he would never visit Beaurepaire again.
+He was right."
+
+Raynal shook his head sorrowfully.
+
+"Ah, Josephine, you are far from the truth. I was to attack the bastion.
+It was mined by the enemy, and he knew it. He took advantage of my
+back being turned. He led his men out of the trenches; he assaulted the
+bastion at the head of his brigade. He took it."
+
+"Ah, it was noble; it was like him."
+
+"The enemy, retiring, blew the bastion into the air, and Dujardin--is
+dead."
+
+"Dead!" said Josephine, in stupefied tones, as if the word conveyed no
+meaning to her mind, benumbed and stunned by the blow.
+
+"Don't speak so loud," said Raynal; "I hear the poor girl at the door.
+Ay, he took my place, and is dead."
+
+"Dead!"
+
+"Swallowed up in smoke and flames, overwhelmed and crushed under the
+ruins."
+
+Josephine's whole body gave way, and heaved like a tree falling under
+the axe. She sank slowly to her knees, and low moans of agony broke from
+her at intervals. "Dead, dead, dead!"
+
+"Is it not terrible?" he cried.
+
+She did not see him nor hear him, but moaned out wildly, "Dead, dead,
+dead!" The bedroom-door was opened.
+
+She shrieked with sudden violence, "Dead! ah, pity! the glass! the
+composing draught." She stretched her hands out wildly. Raynal, with a
+face full of concern, ran to the table, and got the glass. She crawled
+on her knees to meet it; he brought it quickly to her hand.
+
+"There, my poor soul!"
+
+Even as their hands met, Rose threw herself on the cup, and snatched
+it with fury from them both. She was white as ashes, and her eyes,
+supernaturally large, glared on Raynal with terror. "Madman!" she cried,
+"would you kill her?"
+
+He glared back on her: what did this mean? Their eyes were fixed on each
+other like combatants for life and death; they did not see that the room
+was filling with people, that the doctor was only on the other side of
+the table, and that the baroness and Edouard were at the door, and all
+looking wonderstruck at this strange sight--Josephine on her knees,
+and those two facing each other, white, with dilating eyes, the glass
+between them.
+
+But what was that to the horror, when the next moment the patient
+Josephine started to her feet, and, standing in the midst, tore her hair
+by handfuls, out of her head.
+
+"Ah, you snatch the kind poison from me!"
+
+"Poison!"
+
+"Poison!"
+
+"Poison!" cried the others, horror-stricken.
+
+"Ah! you won't let me die. Curse you all! curse you! I never had my own
+way in anything. I was always a slave and a fool. I have murdered the
+man I love--I love. Yes, my husband, do you hear? the man I love."
+
+"Hush! daughter, respect my gray hairs."
+
+"Your gray hairs! You are not so old in years as I am in agony. So this
+is your love, Rose! Ah, you won't let me die--won't you? THEN I'LL DO
+WORSE--I'LL TELL."
+
+"He who is dead; you have murdered him amongst you, and I'll follow
+him in spite of you all--he was my betrothed. He struggled wounded,
+bleeding, to my feet. He found me married. News came of my husband's
+death; I married my betrothed."
+
+"Married him!" exclaimed the baroness.
+
+"Ah, my poor mother. And she kissed me so kindly just now--she will kiss
+me no more. Oh, I am not ashamed of marrying him. I am only ashamed
+of the cowardice that dared not do it in face of all the world. We had
+scarce been happy a fortnight, when a letter came from Colonel Raynal.
+He was alive. I drove my true husband away, wretch that I was. None
+but bad women have an atom of sense. I tried to do my duty to my legal
+husband. He was my benefactor. I thought it was my duty. Was it? I don't
+know: I have lost the sense of right and wrong. I turned from a living
+creature to a lie. He who had scattered benefits on me and all this
+house; he whom it was too little to love; he ought to have been adored:
+this man came here one night to wife proud, joyous, and warm-hearted. He
+found a cradle, and two women watching it. Now Edouard, now MONSIEUR, do
+you see that life is IMPOSSIBLE to me? One bravely accused herself: she
+was innocent. One swooned away like a guilty coward."
+
+Edouard uttered an exclamation.
+
+"Yes, Edouard, you shall not be miserable like me; she was guilty. You
+do not understand me yet, my poor mother--and she was so happy this
+morning--I was the liar, the coward, the double-faced wife, the
+miserable mother that denied her child. Now will you let me die? Now do
+you see that I can't and won't live upon shame and despair? Ah, Monsieur
+Raynal, my dear friend, you were always generous: you will pity and
+kill me. I have dishonored the name you gave me to keep: I am neither
+Beaurepaire nor Raynal. Do pray kill me, monsieur--Jean, do pray release
+me from my life!"
+
+And she crawled to his knees and embraced them, and kissed his hand, and
+pleaded more piteously for death, than others have begged for life.
+
+Raynal stood like a rock: he was pale, and drew his breath audibly,
+but not a word. Then came a sight scarce less terrible than Josephine's
+despair. The baroness, looking and moving twenty years older than an
+hour before, tottered across the room to Raynal.
+
+"Sir, you whom I have called my son, but whom I will never presume so
+to call again, I thought I had lived long enough never to have to blush
+again. I loved you, monsieur. I prayed every day for you. But she who
+WAS my daughter was not of my mind. Monsieur, I have never knelt but to
+God and to my king, and I kneel to you: forgive us, sir, forgive us!"
+
+She tried to go down on her knees. He raised her with his strong arm,
+but he could not speak. She turned on the others.
+
+"So this is the secret you were hiding from me! This secret has not
+killed you all. Oh! I shall not live under its shame so long as
+you have. Chateau of Beaurepaire--nest of treason, ingratitude, and
+immodesty--I loathe you as much as once I loved you. I will go and hide
+my head, and die elsewhere."
+
+"Stay, madame!" said he, in a voice whose depth and dignity was
+such that it seemed impossible to disobey it. "It was sudden--I was
+shaken--but I am myself again."
+
+"Oh, show some pity!" cried Rose.
+
+"I shall try to be just."
+
+There was a long, trembling silence; and during that silence and
+terrible agitation, one figure stood firm among those quaking, beating
+hearts, like a rock with the waves breaking round it--the MAN OF
+PRINCIPLE among the creatures of impulse.
+
+He raised Josephine from her knees, and placed her all limp and
+powerless in an arm-chair. To her frenzy had now succeeded a sickness
+and feebleness like unto death.
+
+"Widow Dujardin," said he, in a broken voice, "listen to me."
+
+She moaned a sort of assent.
+
+"Your mistake has been not trusting me. I was your friend, and not
+a selfish friend. I was not enough in love with you to destroy your
+happiness. Besides, I despise that sort of love. If you had told me all,
+I would have spared you this misery. By the present law, civil contracts
+of marriage can be dissolved by mutual consent."
+
+At this the baroness uttered some sign of surprise.
+
+"Ah!" continued Raynal, sadly, "you are aristocrats, and cannot keep
+pace with the times. This very day our mere contract shall be formally
+dissolved. Indeed, it ceases to exist since both parties are resolved
+to withdraw from it. So, if you married Dujardin in a church, you are
+Madame Dujardin at this moment, and his child is legitimate. What does
+she say?"
+
+This question was to Rose, for what Josephine uttered sounded like a
+mere articulate moan. But Rose's quick ear had caught words, and she
+replied, all in tears, "My poor sister is blessing you, sir. We all
+bless you."
+
+"She does not understand my position," said Raynal. He then walked up to
+Josephine, and leaning over her arm, and speaking rather loud, under the
+impression that her senses were blunted by grief, he said, "Look here:
+Colonel Dujardin, your husband, deliberately, and with his eyes open,
+sacrificed his life for me, and for his own heroic sense of honor. Now,
+it is my turn. If that hero stood here, and asked me for all the blood
+in my body, I would give it him. He is gone; but, dying for me, he has
+left me his widow and his child; they remain under my wing. To protect
+them is my pride, and my only consolation. I am going to the mayor to
+annul our unlucky contract in due form, and make us brother and sister
+instead. But," turning to the baroness, "don't you think to escape me
+as your daughter has done: no, no, old lady, once a mother, always a
+mother. Stir from your son's home if you dare!"
+
+And with these words, in speaking which his voice had recovered its iron
+firmness, he strode out at the door, superb in manhood and principle,
+and every eye turned with wonder and admiration after him. Even when he
+was gone they gazed at the door by which a creature so strangely noble
+had disappeared.
+
+The baroness was about to follow him without taking any notice of
+Josephine. But Rose caught her by the gown. "O mother, speak to poor
+Josephine: bid her live."
+
+The baroness only made a gesture of horror and disgust, and turned her
+back on them both.
+
+Josephine, who had tottered up from her seat at Rose's words, sank
+heavily down again, and murmured, "Ah! the grave holds all that love me
+now."
+
+Rose ran to her side. "Cruel Josephine! what, do not I love you? Mother,
+will you not help me persuade her to live? Oh! if she dies, I will die
+too; you will kill both your children."
+
+Stern and indignant as the baroness was, yet these words pierced her
+heart. She turned with a piteous, half apologetic air to Edouard and
+Aubertin. "Gentlemen," said she, "she has been foolish, not guilty.
+Heaven pardons the best of us. Surely a mother may forgive her child."
+And with this nature conquered utterly; and she held out her arms, wide,
+wide, as is a mother's heart. Her two erring children rushed sobbing
+violently into them; and there was not a dry eye in the room for a long
+time.
+
+After this, Josephine's heart almost ceased to beat. Fear and
+misgivings, and the heavy sense of deceit gnawing an honorable heart,
+were gone. Grief reigned alone in the pale, listless, bereaved widow.
+
+The marriage was annulled before the mayor; and, three days afterwards,
+Raynal, by his influence, got the consummated marriage formally allowed
+in Paris.
+
+With a delicacy for which one would hardly have given him credit, he
+never came near Beaurepaire till all this was settled; but he brought
+the document from Paris that made Josephine the widow Dujardin, and
+her boy the heir of Beaurepaire; and the moment she was really Madame
+Dujardin he avoided her no longer; and he became a comfort to her
+instead of a terror.
+
+The dissolution of the marriage was a great tie between them. So much
+that, seeing how much she looked up to Raynal, the doctor said one day
+to the baroness, "If I know anything of human nature, they will marry
+again, provided none of you give her a hint which way her heart is
+turning."
+
+They, who have habituated themselves to live for others, can suffer as
+well as do great things. Josephine kept alive. A passion such as hers,
+in a selfish nature, must have killed her.
+
+Even as it was, she often said, "It is hard to live."
+
+Then they used to talk to her of her boy. Would she leave him--Camille's
+boy--without a mother? And these words were never spoken to her quite in
+vain.
+
+Her mother forgave her entirely, and loved her as before. Who could be
+angry with her long? The air was no longer heavy with lies. Wretched as
+she was, she breathed lighter. Joy and hope were gone. Sorrowful peace
+was coming. When the heart comes to this, nothing but Time can cure; but
+what will not Time do? What wounds have I seen him heal! His cures are
+incredible.
+
+
+The little party sat one day, peaceful, but silent and sad, in the
+Pleasaunce, under the great oak.
+
+Two soldiers came to the gate. They walked feebly, for one was lame, and
+leaned upon the other, who was pale and weak, and leaned upon a stick.
+
+"Soldiers," said Raynal, "and invalided."
+
+"Give them food and wine," said Josephine.
+
+Rose went towards them; but she had scarcely taken three steps ere she
+cried out,--
+
+"It is Dard! it is poor Dard! Come in, Dard, come in."
+
+Dard limped towards them, leaning upon Sergeant La Croix. A bit of
+Dard's heel had been shot away, and of La Croix's head.
+
+Rose ran to the kitchen.
+
+"Jacintha, bring out a table into the Pleasaunce, and something for two
+guests to eat."
+
+The soldiers came slowly to the Pleasaunce, and were welcomed, and
+invited to sit down, and received with respect; for France even in that
+day honored the humblest of her brave.
+
+Soon Jacintha came out with a little round table in her hands, and
+affected a composure which was belied by her shaking hands and her
+glowing cheek.
+
+After a few words of homely welcome--not eloquent, but very sincere--she
+went off again with her apron to her eyes. She reappeared with the good
+cheer, and served the poor fellows with radiant zeal.
+
+"What regiment?" asked Raynal.
+
+Dard was about to answer, but his superior stopped him severely;
+then, rising with his hand to his forehead, he replied, with pride,
+"Twenty-fourth brigade, second company. We were cut up at Philipsburg,
+and incorporated with the 12th."
+
+Raynal instantly regretted his question; for Josephine's eye fixed on
+Sergeant La Croix with an expression words cannot paint. Yet she showed
+more composure, real or forced, than he expected.
+
+"Heaven sends him," said she. "My friend, tell me, were you--ah!"
+
+Colonel Raynal interfered hastily. "Think what you do. He can tell you
+nothing but what we know, not so much, in fact, as we know; for, now I
+look at him, I think this is the very sergeant we found lying insensible
+under the bastion. He must have been struck before the bastion was taken
+even."
+
+"I was, colonel, I was. I remember nothing but losing my senses, and
+feeling the colors go out of my hand."
+
+"There, you see, he knows nothing," said Raynal.
+
+"It was hot work, colonel, under that bastion, but it was hotter to the
+poor fellows that got in. I heard all about it from Private Dard here."
+
+"So, then, it was you who carried the colors?"
+
+"Yes, I was struck down with the colors of the brigade in my hand,"
+cried La Croix.
+
+"See how people blunder about, everything; they told me the colonel
+carried the colors."
+
+"Why, of course he did. You don't think our colonel, the fighting
+colonel, would let me hold the colors of the brigade so long as he was
+alive. No; he was struck by a Prussian bullet, and he had just time to
+hand the colors to me, and point with his sword to the bastion, and down
+he went. It was hot work, I can tell you. I did not hold them long, not
+thirty seconds, and if we could know their history, they passed through
+more hands than that before they got to the Prussian flag-staff."
+
+Raynal suddenly rose, and walked rapidly to and fro, with his hands
+behind him.
+
+"Poor colonel!" continued La Croix. "Well, I love to think he died like
+a soldier, and not like some of my poor comrades, hashed to atoms, and
+not a volley fired over him. I hope they put a stone over him, for he
+was the best soldier and the best general in the army."
+
+"O sir!" cried Josephine, "there is no stone even to mark the spot where
+he fell," and she sobbed despairingly.
+
+"Why, how is this, Private Dard?" inquired La Croix, sternly.
+
+Dard apologized for his comrade, and touching his own head significantly
+told them that since his wound the sergeant's memory was defective.
+
+"Now, sergeant, didn't I tell you the colonel must have got the better
+of his wound, and got into the battery?"
+
+"It's false, Private Dard; don't I know our colonel better than that?
+Would ever he have let those colors out of his hand, if there had been
+an ounce of life left in him?"
+
+"He died at the foot of the battery, I tell you."
+
+"Then why didn't we find him?"
+
+Here Jacintha put in a word with the quiet subdued meaning of her class.
+"I can't find that anybody ever saw the colonel dead."
+
+"They did not find him, because they did not look for him," said
+Sergeant La Croix.
+
+"God forgive you, sergeant!" said Dard, with some feeling. "Not look
+for OUR COLONEL! We turned over every body that lay there,--full thirty
+there were,--and you were one of them."
+
+"Only thirty! Why, we settled more Prussians than that, I'll swear."
+
+"Oh! they carried off their dead."
+
+"Ay! but I don't see why they should carry our colonel off. His epaulets
+was all the thieves could do any good with. Stop! yet I do, Private
+Dard; I have a horrible suspicion. No, I have not; it is a certainty.
+What! don't you see, ye ninny? Thunder and thousands of devils, here's a
+disgrace. Dogs of Prussians! they have got our colonel, they have taken
+him prisoner."
+
+"O God bless them!" cried Josephine; "O God bless the mouth that tells
+me so! O sir, I am his wife, his poor heart-broken wife. You would not
+be so cruel as to mock my despair. Say again that he may be alive, pray,
+say it again!"
+
+"His wife! Private Dard, why didn't you tell me? You tell me nothing.
+Yes, my pretty lady, I'll say it again, and I'll prove it. Here is an
+enemy in full retreat, would they encumber themselves with the colonel?
+If he was dead, they'd have whipped off his epaulets, and left him
+there. Alive? why not? Look at me: I am alive, and I was worse wounded
+than he was. They took me for dead, you see. Courage, madame! you will
+see him again, take an old soldier's word for it. Dard, attention! this
+is the colonel's wife."
+
+She gazed on the speaker like one in a trance.
+
+Every eye and every soul had been so bent on Sergeant La Croix that it
+was only now Raynal was observed to be missing. The next minute he came
+riding out of the stable-yard, and went full gallop down the road.
+
+"Ah!" cried Rose, with a burst of hope; "he thinks so too; he has hopes.
+He is gone somewhere for information. Perhaps to Paris."
+
+Josephine's excitement and alternations of hope and fear were now
+alarming. Rose held her hand, and implored her to try and be calm till
+they could see Raynal.
+
+Just before dark he came riding fiercely home. Josephine flew down the
+stairs. Raynal at sight of her forgot all his caution. He waved his
+cocked hat in the air. She fell on her knees and thanked God. He gasped
+out,--
+
+"Prisoner--exchanged for two Prussian lieutenants--sent home--they say
+he is in France!"
+
+The tears of joy gushed in streams from her.
+
+Some days passed in hope and joy inexpressible; but the good doctor
+was uneasy for Josephine. She was always listening with supernatural
+keenness and starting from her chair, and every fibre of her lovely
+person seemed to be on the quiver.
+
+Nor was Rose without a serious misgiving. Would husband and wife ever
+meet? He evidently looked on her as Madame Raynal, and made it a point
+of honor to keep away from Beaurepaire.
+
+They had recourse to that ever-soothing influence--her child. Madame
+Jouvenel was settled in the village, and Josephine visited her every
+day, and came back often with red eyes, but always soothed.
+
+One day Rose and she went to Madame Jouvenel, and, entering the house
+without ceremony, found the nurse out, and no one watching the child.
+
+"How careless!" said Rose.
+
+Josephine stopped eagerly to kiss him. But instead of kissing him, she
+uttered a loud cry. There was a locket hanging round his neck.
+
+It was a locket containing some of Josephine's hair and Camille's. She
+had given it him in the happy days that followed their marriage. She
+stood gasping in the middle of the room. Madame Jouvenel came running
+in soon after. Josephine, by a wonderful effort over herself, asked her
+calmly and cunningly,--
+
+"Where is the gentleman who put this locket round my child's neck? I
+want to speak with him."
+
+Madame Jouvenel stammered and looked confused.
+
+"A soldier--an officer?--come, tell me!"
+
+"Woman," cried Rose, "why do you hesitate?"
+
+"What am I to do?" said Madame Jouvenel. "He made me swear never to
+mention his coming here. He goes away, or hides whenever you come. And
+since Madame does not love the poor wounded gentleman, what can he do
+better?"
+
+"Not love him!" cried Rose: "why, she is his wife, his lawful wedded
+wife; he is a fool or a monster to run away for her. She loves him as no
+woman ever loved before. She pines for him. She dies for him."
+
+The door of a little back room opened at these words of Rose, and there
+stood Camille, with his arm in a sling, pale and astounded, but great
+joy and wonder working in his face.
+
+Josephine gave a cry of love that made the other two women weep, and in
+a moment they were sobbing for joy upon each other's neck.
+
+Away went sorrow, doubt, despair, and all they had suffered. That one
+moment paid for all. And in that moment of joy and surprise, so great as
+to be almost terrible, perhaps it was well for Josephine that Camille,
+weakened by his wound, was quite overcome, and nearly fainted. She was
+herself just going into hysterics; but, seeing him quite overcome,
+she conquered them directly, and nursed, and soothed, and pitied, and
+encouraged him instead.
+
+Then they sat hand in hand. Their happiness stopped their very breath.
+They could not speak. So Rose told him all. He never owned why he had
+slipped away when he saw them coming. He forgot it. He forgot all his
+hard thoughts of her. They took him home in the carriage. His wife would
+not let him out of her sight. For years and years after this she could
+hardly bear to let him be an hour out of her sight.
+
+The world is wide; there may be a man in it who can paint the sudden
+bliss that fell on these two much suffering hearts; but I am not that
+man; this is beyond me; it was not only heaven, but heaven after hell.
+
+Leave we the indescribable and the unspeakable for a moment, and go to a
+lighter theme.
+
+The day Rose's character was so unexpectedly cleared, Edouard had no
+opportunity of speaking to her, or a reconciliation would have taken
+place. As it was, he went home intensely happy. But he did not resume
+his visits to the chateau. When he came to think calmly over it, his
+vanity was cruelly mortified. She was innocent of the greater offence;
+but how insolently she had sacrificed him, his love, and his respect, to
+another's interest.
+
+More generous thoughts prevailed by degrees. And one day that her pale
+face, her tears, and her remorse got the better of his offended pride,
+he determined to give her a good lecture that should drown her in
+penitent tears; and then end by forgiving her. For one thing he could
+not be happy till he had forgiven her.
+
+She walked into the room with a calm, dignified, stately air, and before
+he could utter one word of his grave remonstrance, attacked him thus:
+"You wish to speak to me, sir. If it is to apologize to me, I will save
+your vanity the mortification. I forgive you."
+
+"YOU forgive ME!" cried Edouard furiously.
+
+"No violence, if you please," said the lady with cold hauteur. "Let us
+be friends, as Josephine and Raynal are. We cannot be anything more
+to one another now. You have wounded me too deeply by your jealous,
+suspicious nature."
+
+Edouard gasped for breath, and was so far out-generalled that he
+accepted the place of defendant. "Wasn't I to believe your own lips? Did
+not Colonel Raynal believe you?"
+
+"Oh, that's excusable. He did not know me. But you were my lover; you
+ought to have seen I was forced to deceive poor Raynal. How dare you
+believe your eyes; much more your ears, against my truth, against my
+honor; and then to believe such nonsense?" Then, with a grand assumption
+of superior knowledge, says she, "You little simpleton, how could the
+child be mine when I wasn't married at all?"
+
+At this reproach, Edouard first stared, then grinned. "I forgot that,"
+said he.
+
+"Yes, and you forgot the moon isn't made of green cheese. However, if I
+saw you very humble, and very penitent, I might, perhaps, really forgive
+you--in time."
+
+"No, forgive me at once. I don't understand your angelical, diabolical,
+incomprehensible sex: who on earth can? forgive me."
+
+"Oh! oh! oh! oh!"
+
+Lo! the tears that could not come at a remonstrance were flowing in a
+stream at his generosity.
+
+"What is the matter now?" said he tenderly. She cried away, but at the
+same time explained,--
+
+"What a f--f--foolish you must be not to see that it is I who am without
+excuse. You were my betrothed. It was to you I owed my duty; not my
+sister. I am a wicked, unhappy girl. How you must hate me!"
+
+"I adore you. There, no more forgiving on either side. Let our only
+quarrel be who shall love the other best."
+
+"Oh, I know how that will be," said the observant toad. "You will love
+me best till you have got me; and then I shall love you best; oh, ever
+so much."
+
+However, the prospect of loving best did not seem disagreeable to her;
+for with this announcement she deposited her head on his shoulder, and
+in that attitude took a little walk with him up and down the Pleasaunce:
+sixty times; about eight miles.
+
+These two were a happy pair. This wayward, but generous heart never
+forgot her offence, and his forgiveness. She gave herself to him heart
+and soul, at the altar, and well she redeemed her vow. He rose high in
+political life: and paid the penalty of that sort of ambition; his
+heart was often sore. But by his own hearth sat comfort and ever ready
+sympathy. Ay, and patient industry to read blue-books, and a ready hand
+and brain to write diplomatic notes for him, off which the mind glided
+as from a ball of ice.
+
+In thirty years she never once mentioned the servants to him.
+
+"Oh, let eternal honor crown her name!"
+
+It was only a little bit of heel that Dard had left in Prussia. More
+fortunate than his predecessor (Achilles), he got off with a slight but
+enduring limp. And so the army lost him.
+
+He married Jacintha, and Josephine set them up in Bigot's, (deceased)
+auberge. Jacintha shone as a landlady, and custom flowed in. For all
+that, a hankering after Beaurepaire was observable in her. Her favorite
+stroll was into the Beaurepaire kitchen, and on all fetes and grand
+occasions she was prominent in gay attire as a retainer of the house.
+The last specimen of her homely sagacity I shall have the honor to lay
+before you is a critique upon her husband, which she vented six years
+after marriage.
+
+"My Dard," said she, "is very good as far as he goes. What he has felt
+himself, that he can feel FOR: nobody better. You come to him with an
+empty belly, or a broken head, or all bleeding with a cut, or black
+and blue, and you shall find a friend. But if it is a sore heart, or
+trouble, and sorrow, and no hole in your carcass to show for it, you had
+better come to ME; for you might as well tell your grief to a stone wall
+as to my man."
+
+
+The baroness took her son Raynal to Paris, and there, with keen eye,
+selected him a wife. She proved an excellent one. It would have been
+hard if she had not, for the baroness with the severe sagacity of her
+age and sex, had set aside as naught a score of seeming angels, before
+she could suit herself with a daughter-in-law. At first the Raynals very
+properly saw little of the Dujardins; but when both had been married
+some years, the recollection of that fleeting and nominal connection
+waxed faint, while the memory of great benefits conferred on both sides
+remained lively as ever in hearts so great, and there was a warm, a
+sacred friendship between the two houses--a friendship of the ancient
+Greeks, not of the modern club-house.
+
+Camille and Josephine were blessed almost beyond the lot of humanity:
+none can really appreciate sunshine but those who come out of the cold
+dark. And so with happiness. For years they could hardly be said to live
+like mortals: they basked in bliss. But it was a near thing; for they
+but just scraped clear of life-long misery, and death's cold touch
+grazed them both as they went.
+
+Yet they had heroic virtues to balance White Lies in the great Judge's
+eye.
+
+A wholesome lesson, therefore, and a warning may be gathered from this
+story: and I know many novelists who would have preached that lesson at
+some length in every other chapter, and interrupted the sacred
+narrative to do it. But when I read stories so mutilated, I think of a
+circumstance related by Mr. Joseph Miller.
+
+"An Englishman sojourning in some part of Scotland was afflicted with
+many hairs in the butter, and remonstrated. He was told, in reply, that
+the hairs and the butter came from one source--the cow; and that the
+just and natural proportions hitherto observed, could not be deranged,
+and bald butter invented--for ONE. 'So be it,' said the Englishman; 'but
+let me have the butter in one plate, and the hairs in another.'"
+
+Acting on this hint, I have reserved some admirable remarks,
+reflections, discourses, and tirades, until the story should be ended,
+and the other plate be ready for the subsidiary sermon.
+
+And now that the proper time is come, that love of intruding one's own
+wisdom in one's own person on the reader, which has marred so many works
+of art, is in my case restrained--first, by pure fatigue; secondly,
+because the moral of this particular story stands out so clear in the
+narrative, that he who runs may read it without any sermon at all.
+
+Those who will not take the trouble to gather my moral from the living
+tree, would not lift it out of my dead basket: would not unlock their
+jaw-bones to bite it, were I to thrust it into their very mouths.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of White Lies, by Charles Reade
+
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+This etext was prepared by Donald Lainson, charlie@idirect.com.
+
+
+
+
+
+WHITE LIES
+
+by CHARLES READE
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+
+Towards the close of the last century the Baron de Beaurepaire lived
+in the chateau of that name in Brittany.  His family was of
+prodigious antiquity; seven successive barons had already flourished
+on this spot when a younger son of the house accompanied his
+neighbor the Duke of Normandy in his descent on England, and was
+rewarded by a grant of English land, on which he dug a mote and
+built a chateau, and called it Beaurepaire (the worthy Saxons turned
+this into Borreper without delay).  Since that day more than twenty
+gentlemen of the same lineage had held in turn the original chateau
+and lands, and handed them down to their present lord.
+
+Thus rooted in his native Brittany, Henri Lionel Marie St. Quentin
+de Beaurepaire was as fortunate as any man can be pronounced before
+he dies.  He had health, rank, a good income, a fair domain, a
+goodly house, a loving wife, and two lovely young daughters, all
+veneration and affection.  Two months every year he visited the
+Faubourg St. Germain and the Court.  At both every gentleman and
+every lacquey knew his name, and his face: his return to Brittany
+after this short absence was celebrated by a rustic fete.
+
+Above all, Monsieur de Beaurepaire possessed that treasure of
+treasures, content.  He hunted no heart-burns.  Ambition did not
+tempt him; why should he listen to long speeches, and court the
+unworthy, and descend to intrigue, for so precarious and equivocal a
+prize as a place in the Government, when he could be De Beaurepaire
+without trouble or loss of self-respect?  Social ambition could get
+little hold of him; let parvenus give balls half in doors, half out,
+and light two thousand lamps, and waste their substance battling and
+manoeuvring for fashionable distinction; he had nothing to gain by
+such foolery, nothing to lose by modest living; he was the twenty-
+ninth Baron of Beaurepaire.  So wise, so proud, so little vain, so
+strong in health and wealth and honor, one would have said nothing
+less than an earthquake could shake this gentleman and his house.
+Yet both were shaken, though rooted by centuries to the soil; and by
+no vulgar earthquake.
+
+For years France had bowed in silence beneath two galling burdens--a
+selfish and corrupt monarchy, and a multitudinous, privileged, lazy,
+and oppressive aristocracy, by whom the peasant was handled like a
+Russian serf.  [Said peasant is now the principal proprietor of the
+soil.]
+
+The lower orders rose upon their oppressors, and soon showed
+themselves far blacker specimens of the same breed.  Law, religion,
+humanity, and common sense, hid their faces; innocent blood flowed
+in a stream, and terror reigned.  To Monsieur de Beaurepaire these
+republicans--murderers of women, children, and kings--seemed the
+most horrible monsters nature had ever produced; he put on black,
+and retired from society; he felled timber, and raised large sums of
+money upon his estate.  And one day he mounted his charger, and
+disappeared from the chateau.
+
+Three months after this, a cavalier, dusty and pale, rode into the
+courtyard of Beaurepaire, and asked to see the baroness.  She came
+to him; he hung his head and held her out a letter.
+
+It contained a few sad words from Monsieur de Laroche-jaquelin.  The
+baron had just fallen in La Vendee, fighting for the Crown.
+
+From that hour till her death the baroness wore black.
+
+The mourner would have been arrested, and perhaps beheaded, but for
+a friend, the last in the world on whom the family reckoned for any
+solid aid.  Dr. Aubertin had lived in the chateau twenty years.  He
+was a man of science, and did not care a button for money; so he had
+retired from the practice of medicine, and pursued his researches at
+ease under the baron's roof.  They all loved him, and laughed at his
+occasional reveries, in the days of prosperity; and now, in one
+great crisis, the protege became the protector, to their astonishment
+and his own.  But it was an age of ups and downs.  This amiable
+theorist was one of the oldest verbal republicans in Europe.  And
+why not?  In theory a republic is the perfect form of government:
+it is merely in practice that it is impossible; it is only upon
+going off paper into reality, and trying actually to self-govern
+limited nations, after heating them white hot with the fire of
+politics and the bellows of bombast--that the thing resolves
+itself into bloodshed silvered with moonshine.
+
+Dr. Aubertin had for years talked and written speculative
+republicanism.  So they applied to him whether the baroness shared
+her husband's opinions, and he boldly assured them she did not; he
+added, "She is a pupil of mine."  On this audacious statement they
+contented themselves with laying a heavy fine on the lands of
+Beaurepaire.
+
+Assignats were abundant, but good mercantile paper, a notorious
+coward, had made itself wings and fled, and specie was creeping into
+strong boxes like a startled rabbit into its hole.  The fine was
+paid; but Beaurepaire had to be heavily mortgaged, and the loan bore
+a high rate of interest.  This, with the baron's previous mortgages,
+swamped the estate.
+
+The baroness sold her carriage and horses, and she and her daughters
+prepared to deny themselves all but the bare necessaries of life,
+and pay off their debts if possible.  On this their dependants fell
+away from them; their fair-weather friends came no longer near them;
+and many a flush of indignation crossed their brows, and many an
+aching pang their hearts, as adversity revealed the baseness and
+inconstancy of common people high or low.
+
+When the other servants had retired with their wages, one Jacintha
+remained behind, and begged permission to speak to the baroness.
+
+"What would you with me, my child?" asked that lady, with an accent
+in which a shade of surprise mingled with great politeness.
+
+"Forgive me, madame," began Jacintha, with a formal courtesy; "but
+how can I leave you, and Mademoiselle Josephine, and Mademoiselle
+Rose?  I was born at Beaurepaire; my mother died in the chateau: my
+father died in the village; but he had meat every day from the
+baron's own table, and fuel from the baron's wood, and died blessing
+the house of Beaurepaire.  I CANNOT go.  The others are gone because
+prosperity is here no longer.  Let it be so; I will stay till the
+sun shines again upon the chateau, and then you shall send me away
+if you are bent on it; but not now, my ladies--oh, not now!  Oh! oh!
+oh!"  And the warm-hearted girl burst out sobbing ungracefully.
+
+"My child," said the baroness, "these sentiments touch me, and honor
+you.  But retire, if you please, while I consult my daughters."
+
+Jacintha cut her sobs dead short, and retreated with a formal
+reverence.
+
+The consultation consisted of the baroness opening her arms, and
+both her daughters embracing her at once.  Proud as they were, they
+wept with joy at having made one friend amongst all their servants.
+Jacintha stayed.
+
+As months rolled on, Rose de Beaurepaire recovered her natural
+gayety in spite of bereavement and poverty; so strong are youth, and
+health, and temperament.  But her elder sister had a grief all her
+own: Captain Dujardin, a gallant young officer, well-born, and his
+own master, had courted her with her parents' consent; and, even
+when the baron began to look coldly on the soldier of the Republic,
+young Dujardin, though too proud to encounter the baron's irony and
+looks of scorn, would not yield love to pique.  He came no more to
+the chateau, but he would wait hours and hours on the path to the
+little oratory in the park, on the bare chance of a passing word or
+even a kind look from Josephine.  So much devotion gradually won a
+heart which in happier times she had been half encouraged to give
+him; and, when he left her on a military service of uncommon danger,
+the woman's reserve melted, and, in that moment of mutual grief and
+passion, she vowed she loved him better than all the world.
+
+Letters from the camp breathing a devotion little short of worship
+fed her attachment; and more than one public mention of his name and
+services made her proud as well as fond of the fiery young soldier.
+
+Still she did not open her heart to her parents.  The baron, alive
+at that time, was exasperated against the Republic, and all who
+served it; and, as for the baroness, she was of the old school: a
+passionate love in a lady's heart before marriage was contrary to
+her notions of etiquette.  Josephine loved Rose very tenderly; but
+shrank with modest delicacy from making her a confidante of
+feelings, the bare relation of which leaves the female hearer a
+child no longer.
+
+So she hid her heart, and delicious first love nestled deep in her
+nature, and thrilled in every secret vein and fibre.
+
+They had parted two years, and he had joined the army of the
+Pyrenees about one month, when suddenly all correspondence ceased on
+his part.
+
+Restless anxiety rose into terror as this silence continued; and
+starting and trembling at every sound, and edging to the window at
+every footstep, Josephine expected hourly the tidings of her lover's
+death.
+
+Months rolled on in silence.
+
+Then a new torture came.  He must not be dead but unfaithful.  At
+this all the pride of her race was fired in her.
+
+The struggle between love and ire was almost too much for nature:
+violently gay and moody by turns she alarmed both her mother and the
+good Dr. Aubertin.  The latter was not, I think, quite without
+suspicion of the truth; however, he simply prescribed change of air
+and place; she must go to Frejus, a watering-place distant about
+five leagues.  Mademoiselle de Beaurepaire yielded a languid assent.
+To her all places were alike.
+
+But when they returned from Frejus a change had taken place.  Rose
+had extracted her sister's secret, and was a changed girl.  Pity,
+and the keen sense of Josephine's wrong, had raised her sisterly
+love to a passion.  The great-hearted girl hovered about her lovely,
+suffering sister like an angel, and paid her the tender attentions
+of a devoted lover, and hated Camille Dujardin with all her heart:
+hated him all the more that she saw Josephine shrink even from her
+whenever she inveighed against him.
+
+At last Rose heard some news of the truant lover.  The fact is, this
+young lady was as intelligent as she was inexperienced; and she had
+asked Jacintha to tell Dard to talk to every soldier that passed
+through the village, and ask him if he knew anything about Captain
+Dujardin of the 17th regiment.  Dard cross-examined about a hundred
+invalided warriors, who did not even recognize the captain's name;
+but at last, by extraordinary luck, he actually did fall in with
+two, who told him strange news about Captain Dujardin.  And so then
+Dard told Jacintha; and Jacintha soon had the men into the kitchen
+and told Rose.  Rose ran to tell Josephine; but stopped in the
+passage, and turned suddenly very cold.  Her courage failed her; she
+feared Josephine would not take the news as she ought; and perhaps
+would not love her so well if SHE told her; so she thought to
+herself she would let the soldiers tell their own tale.  She went
+into the room where Josephine was reading to the baroness and Dr.
+Aubertin; she sat quietly down; but at the first opportunity made
+Josephine one of those imperceptible signals which women, and above
+all, sisters, have reduced to so subtle a system.  This done, she
+went carelessly out: and Josephine in due course followed her, and
+found her at the door.
+
+"What is it?" said Josephine, earnestly.
+
+"Have you courage?" was Rose's reply.
+
+"He is dead?" said Josephine, turning pale as ashes.
+
+"No, no;" said Rose hastily; "he is alive.  But you will need all
+your courage."
+
+"Since he lives I fear nothing," said Josephine; and stood there and
+quivered from head to foot.  Rose, with pitying looks, took her by
+the hand and drew her in silence towards the kitchen.
+
+Josephine yielded a mute submission at first; but at the very door
+hung back and faltered, "He loves another; he is married: let me
+go."  Rose made no reply, but left her there and went into the
+kitchen and found two dragoons seated round a bottle of wine.  They
+rose and saluted her.
+
+"Be seated, my brave men," said she; "only please tell me what you
+told Jacintha about Captain Dujardin."
+
+"Don't stain your mouth with the captain, my little lady.  He is a
+traitor."
+
+"How do you know?"
+
+"Marcellus! mademoiselle asks us how we know Captain Dujardin to be
+a traitor.  Speak."
+
+Marcellus, thus appealed to, told Rose after his own fashion that he
+knew the captain well: that one day the captain rode out of the camp
+and never returned: that at first great anxiety was felt on his
+behalf, for the captain was a great favorite, and passed for the
+smartest soldier in the division: that after awhile anxiety gave
+place to some very awkward suspicions, and these suspicions it was
+his lot and his comrade's here to confirm.  About a month later he
+and the said comrade and two more were sent, well mounted, to
+reconnoitre a Spanish village.  At the door of a little inn they
+caught sight of a French uniform.  This so excited their curiosity
+that he went forward nearer than prudent, and distinctly recognized
+Captain Dujardin seated at a table drinking between two guerillas;
+then he rode back and told the others, who then came up and
+satisfied themselves it was so: that if any of the party had
+entertained a doubt, it was removed in an unpleasant way; he,
+Marcellus, disgusted at the sight of a French uniform drinking among
+Spaniards, took down his carabine and fired at the group as
+carefully as a somewhat restive horse permitted: at this, as if by
+magic, a score or so of guerillas poured out from Heaven knows
+where, musket in hand, and delivered a volley; the officer in
+command of the party fell dead, Jean Jacques here got a broken arm,
+and his own horse was wounded in two places, and fell from loss of
+blood a few furlongs from the French camp, to the neighborhood of
+which the vagabonds pursued them, hallooing and shouting and firing
+like barbarous banditti as they were.
+
+"However, here I am," concluded Marcellus, "invalided for awhile, my
+lady, but not expended yet: we will soon dash in among them again
+for death or glory.  Meantime," concluded he, filling both glasses,
+"let us drink to the eyes of beauty (military salute); and to the
+renown of France; and double damnation to all her traitors, like
+that Captain Dujardin; whose neck may the devil twist."
+
+Ere they could drink to this energetic toast, a low wail at the
+door, like a dying hare's, arrested the glasses on their road, and
+the rough soldiers stood transfixed, and looked at one another in
+some dismay.  Rose flew to the door with a face full of concern.
+
+Josephine was gone.
+
+Then Rose had the tact and resolution to say a few kind, encouraging
+words to the soldiers, and bid Jacintha be hospitable to them.  This
+done she darted up-stairs after Josephine; she reached the main
+corridor just in time to see her creep along it with the air and
+carriage of a woman of fifty, and enter her own room.
+
+Rose followed softly with wet eyes, and turned the handle gently.
+But the door was locked.
+
+"Josephine!  Josephine!"
+
+No answer.
+
+"I want to speak to you.  I am frightened.  Oh, do not be alone."
+
+A choking voice answered, "Give me a little while to draw my
+breath."  Rose sank down at the door, and sat close to it, with her
+head against it, sobbing bitterly.  She was hurt at not being let
+in; such a friend as she had proved herself.  But this personal
+feeling was only a fraction of her grief and anxiety.
+
+A good half hour elapsed ere Josephine, pale and stern as no one had
+ever seen her till that hour, suddenly opened the door.  She started
+at sight of Rose couched sorrowful on the threshold; her stern look
+relaxed into tender love and pity; she sank, blushing, on her knees,
+and took her sister's head quickly to her bosom.  "Oh, my little
+love, have you been here all this time?"--"Oh! oh! oh!" was all the
+little love could reply.  Then the deserted one, still kneeling,
+took Rose in her lap, and caressed and comforted her, and poured
+words of gratitude and affection over her like a warm shower.
+
+They rose hand in hand.
+
+Then Rose suddenly seized Josephine, and looked long and anxiously
+down into her eyes.  They flashed fire under the scrutiny.  "Yes, it
+is all over; I could not despise and love.  I am dead to him, as he
+is dead to France."
+
+This was joyful news to Rose.  "I hoped it would be so," said she;
+"but you frightened me.  My noble sister, were I ever to lose your
+esteem, I should die.  Oh, how awful yet how beautiful is your
+scorn.  For worlds I would not be that Cam"--  Josephine laid her
+hand imperiously on Rose's mouth.  "To mention his name to me will
+be to insult me; De Beaurepaire I am, and a Frenchwoman.  Come,
+dear, let us go down and comfort our mother."
+
+They went down; and this patient sufferer, and high minded
+conqueror, of her own accord took up a commonplace book, and read
+aloud for two mortal hours to her mother and Aubertin.  Her voice
+only wavered twice.
+
+To feel that life is ended; to wish existence, too, had ceased; and
+so to sit down, an aching hollow, and take a part and sham an
+interest in twaddle to please others; such are woman's feats.  How
+like nothing at all they look!
+
+A man would rather sit on the buffer of a steam-engine and ride at
+the Great Redan.
+
+Rose sat at her elbow, a little behind her, and turned the leaves,
+and on one pretence or other held Josephine's hand nearly all the
+rest of the day.  Its delicate fibres remained tense, like a
+greyhound's sinews after a race, and the blue veins rose to sight in
+it, though her voice and eyes were mastered.
+
+So keen was the strife, so matched the antagonists, so hard the
+victory.
+
+For ire and scorn are mighty.  And noble blood in a noble heart is
+heroic.  And Love is a giant.
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+
+The French provinces were now organized upon a half military plan,
+by which all the local authorities radiated towards a centre of
+government.  By-the-by, this feature has survived subsequent
+revolutions and political changes.
+
+In days of change, youth is at a premium; because, though experience
+is valuable, the experience of one order of things unfits ordinary
+men for another order of things.  So a good many old fogies in
+office were shown the door, and a good deal of youth and energy
+infused into the veins of provincial government.  For instance,
+Edouard Riviere, who had but just completed his education with
+singular eclat at a military school, was one fine day ordered into
+Brittany to fill a responsible post under Commandant Raynal, a
+blunt, rough soldier, that had risen from the ranks, and bore a much
+higher character for zeal and moral integrity than for affability.
+
+This officer was the son of a widow that kept a grocer's shop in
+Paris.  She intended him for spice, but he thirsted for glory, and
+vexed her.  So she yielded, as mothers will.
+
+In the armies of the republic a good soldier rose with unparalleled
+certainty, and rapidity, too; for when soldiers are being mowed down
+like oats, it is a glorious time for such of them as keep their
+feet.  Raynal mounted fast, and used to write to his mother, and
+joke her about the army being such a bad profession; and, as he was
+all for glory, not money, he lived with Spartan frugality, and saved
+half his pay and all his prize money for the old lady in Paris.
+
+But this prosperous man had to endure a deep disappointment; on the
+very day he was made commandant and one of the general's aides-de-
+camp, came a letter into the camp.  His mother was dead after a
+short illness.  This was a terrible blow to the simple, rugged
+soldier, who had never had much time nor inclination to flirt with a
+lot of girls, and toughen his heart.  He came back to Paris honored
+and rich, but downcast.  The old home, empty of his mother, seemed
+to him not to have the old look.  It made him sadder.  To cheer him
+up they brought him much money.  The widow's trade had taken a
+wonderful start the last few years, and she had been playing the
+same game as he had, living on ten-pence a day, and saving all for
+him.  This made him sadder, if anything.
+
+"What," said he, "have we both been scraping all this dross together
+for?  I would give it all to sit one hour by the fire, with her hand
+in mine, and hear her say, 'Scamp, you made me unhappy when you were
+young, but I have lived to be proud of you.'"
+
+He applied for active service, no matter what: obtained at once this
+post in Brittany, and threw himself into it with that honest zeal
+and activity, which are the best earthly medicine for all our
+griefs.  He was busy writing, when young Riviere first presented
+himself.  He looked up for a moment, and eyed him, to take his
+measure; then put into his hand a report by young Nicole, a
+subordinate filling a post of the same nature as Riviere's; and bade
+him analyze that report on the spot: with this he instantly resumed
+his own work.
+
+Edouard Riviere was an adept at this sort of task, and soon handed
+him a neat analysis.  Raynal ran his eye over it, nodded cold
+approval, and told him to take this for the present as a guide as to
+his own duties.  He then pointed to a map on which Riviere's
+district was marked in blue ink, and bade him find the centre of it.
+Edouard took a pair of compasses off the table, and soon discovered
+that the village of Beaurepaire was his centre.  "Then quarter
+yourself at Beaurepaire; and good-day," said Raynal.
+
+The chateau was in sight from Riviere's quarters, and he soon
+learned that it belonged to a royalist widow and her daughters, who
+all three held themselves quite aloof from the rest of the world.
+"Ah," said the young citizen, "I see.  If these rococo citizens play
+that game with me, I shall have to take them down."  Thus a fresh
+peril menaced this family, on whose hearts and fortunes such heavy
+blows had fallen.
+
+One evening our young official, after a day spent in the service of
+the country, deigned to take a little stroll to relieve the cares of
+administration.  He imprinted on his beardless face the expression
+of a wearied statesman, and strolled through an admiring village.
+The men pretended veneration from policy; the women, whose views of
+this great man were shallower but more sincere, smiled approval of
+his airs; and the young puppy affected to take no notice of either
+sex.
+
+Outside the village, Publicola suddenly encountered two young
+ladies, who resembled nothing he had hitherto met with in his
+district; they were dressed in black, and with extreme simplicity;
+but their easy grace and composure, and the refined sentiment of
+their gentle faces, told at a glance they belonged to the high
+nobility.  Publicola divined them at once, and involuntarily raised
+his hat to so much beauty and dignity, instead of poking it with a
+finger as usual.  On this the ladies instantly courtesied to him
+after the manner of their party, with a sweep and a majesty, and a
+precision of politeness, that the pup would have laughed at if he
+had heard of it; but seeing it done, and well done, and by lovely
+women of rank, he was taken aback by it, and lifted his hat again,
+and bowed again after he had gone by, and was generally flustered.
+In short, instead of a member of the Consular Government saluting
+private individuals of a decayed party that existed only by
+sufferance, a handsome, vain, good-natured boy had met two self-
+possessed young ladies of distinction and breeding, and had cut the
+usual figure.
+
+For the next hundred yards his cheeks burned and his vanity cooled.
+But bumptiousness is elastic in France, as in England, and doubtless
+among the Esquimaux.  "Well, they are pretty girls," says he to
+himself.  "I never saw two such pretty girls together; they will do
+for me to flirt with while I am banished to this Arcadia."  Banished
+from school, I beg to observe.
+
+And "awful beauty" being no longer in sight, Mr. Edouard resolved he
+would flirt with them to their hearts' content.  But there are
+ladies with whom a certain preliminary is required before you can
+flirt with them.  You must be on speaking terms.  How was this to be
+managed?
+
+He used to watch at his window with a telescope, and whenever the
+sisters came out of their own grounds, which unfortunately was not
+above twice a week, he would throw himself in their way by the
+merest accident, and pay them a dignified and courteous salute,
+which he had carefully got up before a mirror in the privacy of his
+own chamber.
+
+One day, as he took off his hat to the young ladies, there broke
+from one of them a smile, so sudden, sweet, and vivid, that he
+seemed to feel it smite him first on the eyes then in the heart.  He
+could not sleep for this smile.
+
+Yet he had seen many smilers; but to be sure most of them smiled
+without effect, because they smiled eternally; they seemed cast with
+their mouths open, and their pretty teeth forever in sight; and this
+has a saddening influence on a man of sense--when it has any.  But
+here a fair, pensive face had brightened at sight of him; a lovely
+countenance, on which circumstances, not nature, had impressed
+gravity, had sprung back to its natural gayety for a moment, and had
+thrilled and bewitched the beholder.
+
+The next Sunday he went to church--and there worshipped--whom?
+Cupid.  He smarted for his heathenism; for the young ladies went
+with higher motives, and took no notice of him.  They lowered their
+long silken lashes over one breviary, and scarcely observed the
+handsome citizen.  Meantime he, contemplating their pious beauty
+with earthly eyes, was drinking long draughts of intoxicating
+passion.  And when after the service they each took an arm of Dr.
+Aubertin, and he with the air of an admiral convoying two ships
+choke-full of specie, conducted his precious charge away home, our
+young citizen felt jealous, and all but hated the worthy doctor.
+
+This went on till he became listless and dejected on the days he did
+not see them.  Then he asked himself whether he was not a cowardly
+fool to keep at such a distance.  After all he was a man in
+authority.  His friendship was not to be despised, least of all by a
+family suspected of disaffection to the state.
+
+He put on his glossy beaver with enormous brim, high curved; his
+blue coat with brass buttons; his white waistcoat, gray breeches,
+and top-boots; and marched up to the chateau of Beaurepaire, and
+sent in his card with his name and office inscribed.
+
+Jacintha took it, bestowed a glance of undisguised admiration on the
+young Adonis, and carried it to the baroness.  That lady sent her
+promptly down again with a black-edged note to this effect.
+
+
+Highly flattered by Monsieur de Riviere's visit, the baroness must
+inform him that she receives none but old acquaintances, in the
+present grief of the family, and of the KINGDOM.
+
+
+Young Riviere was cruelly mortified by this rebuff.  He went off
+hurriedly, grinding his teeth with rage.
+
+"Cursed aristocrats!  We have done well to pull you down, and we
+will have you lower still.  How I despise myself for giving any one
+the chance to affront me thus.  The haughty old fool; if she had
+known her interest, she would have been too glad to make a powerful
+friend.  These royalists are in a ticklish position; I can tell her
+that.  She calls me De Riviere; that implies nobody without a 'De'
+to their name would have the presumption to visit her old tumble-
+down house.  Well, it is a lesson; I am a republican, and the
+Commonwealth trusts and honors me; yet I am so ungrateful as to go
+out of the way to be civil to her enemies, to royalists; as if those
+worn-out creatures had hearts, as if they could comprehend the
+struggle that took place in my mind between duty, and generosity to
+the fallen, before I could make the first overture to their
+acquaintance; as if they could understand the politeness of the
+heart, or anything nobler than curving and ducking and heartless
+etiquette.  This is the last notice I will ever take of that old
+woman, unless it is to denounce her."
+
+He walked home to the town very fast, his heart boiling, and his
+lips compressed, and his brow knitted.
+
+To this mood succeeded a sullen and bitter one.  He was generous,
+but vain, and his love had humiliated him so bitterly, he resolved
+to tear it out of his heart.  He absented himself from church; he
+met the young ladies no more.  He struggled fiercely with his
+passion; he went about dogged, silent, and sighing.  Presently he
+devoted his leisure hours to shooting partridges instead of ladies.
+And he was right; partridges cannot shoot back; whereas beautiful
+women, like Cupid, are all archers more or less, and often with one
+arrow from eye or lip do more execution than they have suffered from
+several discharges of our small shot.
+
+In these excursions, Edouard was generally accompanied by a thick-
+set rustic called Dard, who, I believe, purposes to reveal his own
+character to you, and so save me that trouble.
+
+One fine afternoon, about four o'clock, this pair burst remorselessly
+through a fence, and landed in the road opposite Bigot's Auberge; a
+long low house, with "ICI ON LOGE A PIED ET A CHEVAL," written all
+across it in gigantic letters.  Riviere was for moving homeward,
+but Dard halted and complained dismally of "the soldier's gripes."
+The statesman had never heard of that complaint, so Dard explained
+that the VULGAR name for it was hunger.  "And only smell," said he,
+"the soup is just fit to come off the fire."
+
+Riviere smiled sadly, but consented to deign to eat a morsel in the
+porch.  Thereat Dard dashed wildly into the kitchen.
+
+They dined at one little round table, each after his fashion.  When
+Dard could eat no more, he proceeded to drink; and to talk in
+proportion.  Riviere, lost in his own thoughts, attended to him as
+men of business do to a babbling brook; until suddenly from the mass
+of twaddle broke forth a magic word--Beaurepaire; then the languid
+lover pricked up his ears and found Mr. Dard was abusing that noble
+family right and left.  Young Riviere inquired what ground of
+offence they had given HIM.  "I'll tell you," said Dard; "they
+impose on Jacintha; and so she imposes on me."  Then observing he
+had at last gained his employer's ear, he became prodigiously
+loquacious, as such people generally are when once they get upon
+their own griefs.
+
+"These Beaurepaire aristocrats," said he, with his hard peasant
+good-sense, "are neither the one thing nor the other; they cannot
+keep up nobility, they have not the means; they will not come down
+off their perch, they have not the sense.  No, for as small as they
+are, they must look and talk as big as ever.  They can only afford
+one servant, and I don't believe they pay her; but they must be
+attended on just as obsequious as when they had a dozen.  And this
+is fatal to all us little people that have the misfortune to be
+connected with them."
+
+"Why, how are you connected with them?"
+
+"By the tie of affection."
+
+"I thought you hated them."
+
+"Of course I do; but I have the ill-luck to love Jacintha, and she
+loves these aristocrats, and makes me do little odd jobs for them."
+And at this Dard's eyes suddenly glared with horror.
+
+"Well, what of that?" asked Riviere.
+
+"What of it, citizen, what? you do not know the fatal meaning of
+those accursed words?"
+
+"Why, I never heard of a man's back being broken by little odd
+jobs."
+
+"Perhaps not his back, citizen, but his heart? if little odd jobs
+will not break that, why nothing will.  Torn from place to place,
+and from trouble to trouble; as soon as one tiresome thing begins to
+go a bit smooth, off to a fresh plague, in-doors work when it is
+dry, out-a-doors when it snows; and then all bustle; no taking one's
+work quietly, the only way it agrees with a fellow.  'Milk the cow,
+Dard, but look sharp; the baroness's chair wants mending.  Take
+these slops to the pig, but you must not wait to see him enjoy them:
+you are wanted to chop billets.'  Beat the mats, take down the
+curtains, walk to church (best part of a league), and heat the pew
+cushions; come back and cut the cabbages, paint the door, and wheel
+the old lady about the terrace, rub quicksilver on the little dog's
+back,--mind he don't bite you to make hisself sick,--repair the
+ottoman, roll the gravel, scour the kettles, carry half a ton of
+water up twopurostairs, trim the turf, prune the vine, drag the
+fish-pond; and when you ARE there, go in and gather water lilies for
+Mademoiselle Josephine while you are drowning the puppies; that is
+little odd jobs: may Satan twist her neck who invented them!"
+
+"Very sad all this," said young Riviere.
+
+Dard took the little sneer for sympathy, and proceeded to "the
+cruellest wrong of all."
+
+"When I go into their kitchen to court Jacintha a bit, instead of
+finding a good supper there, which a man has a right to, courting a
+cook, if I don't take one in my pocket, there is no supper, not to
+say supper, for either her or me.  I don't call a salad and a bit of
+cheese-rind--SUPPER.  Beggars in silk and satin!  Every sou they
+have goes on to their backs, instead of into their bellies."
+
+"I have heard their income is much reduced," said Edouard gently.
+
+"Income!  I would not change with them if they'd throw me in half a
+pancake a day.  I tell you they are the poorest family for leagues
+round; not that they need be quite so starved, if they could swallow
+a little of their pride.  But no, they must have china and plate and
+fine linen at dinner; so their fine plates are always bare, and
+their silver trays empty.  Ask the butcher, if you don't believe ME.
+Just you ask him whether he does not go three times to the smallest
+shopkeeper, for once he goes to Beaurepaire.  Their tenants send
+them a little meal and eggs, and now and then a hen; and their great
+garden is chock full of fruit and vegetables, and Jacintha makes me
+dig in it gratis; and so they muddle on.  But, bless your heart,
+coffee! they can't afford it; so they roast a lot of horse-beans
+that cost nothing, and grind them, and serve up the liquor in a
+silver coffee-pot, on a silver salver.  Haw, haw, haw!"
+
+"Is it possible? reduced to this?" said Edouard gravely.
+
+"Don't you be so weak as to pity them," cried the remorseless
+plebeian.  "Why don't they melt their silver into soup, and cut down
+their plate into rashers of bacon? why not sell the superfluous, and
+buy the needful, which it is grub?  And, above all, why don't they
+let their old tumble-down palace to some rich grocer, and that
+accursed garden along with it, where I sweat gratis, and live small
+and comfortable, and pay honest men for their little odd jobs, and"--
+
+Here Riviere interrupted him, and asked if it was really true
+about the beans.
+
+"True?" said Dard, "why, I have seen Rose doing it for the old
+woman's breakfast: it was Rose invented the move.  A girl of
+nineteen beginning already to deceive the world!  But they are all
+tarred with the same stick.  Down with the aristocrats!"
+
+"Dard," said Riviere, "you are a brute."
+
+"Me, citizen?" inquired Dard with every appearance of genuine
+surprise.
+
+Edouard Riviere rose from his seat in great excitement.  Dard's
+abuse of the family he was lately so bitter against had turned him
+right round.  He pitied the very baroness herself, and forgave her
+declining his visit.
+
+"Be silent," said he, "for shame!  There is such a thing as noble
+poverty; and you have described it.  I might have disdained these
+people in their prosperity, but I revere them in their affliction.
+And I'll tell you what, don't you ever dare to speak slightly of
+them again in my presence, or"--
+
+He did not conclude his threat, for just then he observed that a
+strapping girl, with a basket at her feet, was standing against the
+corner of the Auberge, in a mighty careless attitude, but doing
+nothing, so most likely listening with all her ears and soul.  Dard,
+however, did not see her, his back being turned to her as he sat; so
+he replied at his ease,--
+
+"I consent," said he very coolly: "that is your affair; but permit
+me," and here he clenched his teeth at remembrance of his wrongs,
+"to say that I will no more be a scullery man without wages to these
+high-minded starvelings, these illustrious beggars."  Then he heated
+himself red-hot.  "I will not even be their galley slave.  Next, I
+have done my last little odd job in this world," yelled the now
+infuriated factotum, bouncing up to his feet in brief fury.  "Of two
+things one: either Jacintha quits those aristos, or I leave Jacin--
+eh?--ah!--oh!--ahem!  How--'ow d'ye do, Jacintha?"  And his roar
+ended in a whine, as when a dog runs barking out, and receives in
+full career a cut from his master's whip, his generous rage turns to
+whimper with ludicrous abruptness.  "I was just talking of you,
+Jacintha," quavered Dard in conclusion.
+
+"I heard you, Dard," replied Jacintha slowly, softly, grimly.
+
+Dard withered.
+
+It was a lusty young woman, with a comely peasant face somewhat
+freckled, and a pair of large black eyes surmounted by coal-black
+brows.  She stood in a bold attitude, her massive but well-formed
+arms folded so that the pressure of each against the other made them
+seem gigantic, and her cheek red with anger, and her eyes glistening
+like basilisks upon citizen Dard.  She looked so grand, with her
+lowering black brows, that even Riviere felt a little uneasy.  As
+for Jacintha, she was evidently brooding with more ire than she
+chose to utter before a stranger.  She just slowly unclasped her
+arms, and, keeping her eye fixed on Dard, pointed with a domineering
+gesture towards Beaurepaire.  Then the doughty Dard seemed no longer
+master of his limbs: he rose slowly, with his eyes fastened to hers,
+and was moving off like an ill-oiled automaton in the direction
+indicated; but at that a suppressed snigger began to shake Riviere's
+whole body till it bobbed up and down on the seat.  Dard turned to
+him for sympathy.
+
+"There, citizen," he cried, "do you see that imperious gesture?
+That means you promised to dig in the aristocrat's garden this
+afternoon, so march!  Here, then, is one that has gained nothing by
+kings being put down, for I am ruled with a mopstick of iron.  Thank
+your stars, citizen, that you are not in may place."
+
+"Dard," retorted Jacintha, "if you don't like your place, I'd quit
+it.  There are two or three young men down in the village will be
+glad to take it."
+
+"I won't give them the chance, the vile egotists!" cried Dard.  And
+he returned to the chateau and little odd jobs.
+
+Jacintha hung behind, lowered her eyes, put on a very deferential
+manner, and thanked Edouard for the kind sentiments he had uttered;
+but at the same time she took the liberty to warn him against
+believing the extravagant stories Dard had been telling about her
+mistress's poverty.  She said the simple fact was that the baron had
+contracted debts, and the baroness, being the soul of honor, was
+living in great economy to pay them off.  Then, as to Dard getting
+no supper up at Beaurepaire, a complaint that appeared to sting her
+particularly, she assured him she was alone to blame: the baroness
+would be very angry if she knew it.  "But," said she, "Dard is an
+egotist.  Perhaps you may have noticed that trait in him."
+
+"Glimpses of it," replied Riviere, laughing.
+
+"Monsieur, he is so egotistic that he has not a friend in the world
+but me.  I forgive him, because I know the reason; he has never had
+a headache or a heartache in his life."
+
+Edouard, aged twenty, and a male, did not comprehend this piece of
+feminine logic one bit: and, while he puzzled over it in silence,
+Jacintha went on to say that if she were to fill her egotist's
+paunch, she should never know whether he came to Beaurepaire for
+her, or himself.  "Now, Dard," she added, "is no beauty, monsieur;
+why, he is three inches shorter than I am."
+
+"You are joking! he looks a foot," said Edouard.
+
+"He is no scholar neither, and I have had to wipe up many a sneer
+and many a sarcasm on his account; but up to now I have always been
+able to reply that this five feet one of egotism loves me sincerely;
+and the moment I doubt this, I give him the sack,--poor little
+fellow!"
+
+"In a word," said Riviere, a little impatiently, "the family at
+Beaurepaire are not in such straits as he pretends?"
+
+"Monsieur, do I look like one starved?"
+
+"By Jove, no! by Ceres, I mean."
+
+"Are my young mistresses wan, and thin?"
+
+"Treason! blasphemy! ah, no!  By Venus and Hebe, no!"
+
+Jacintha smiled at this enthusiastic denial, and also because her
+sex is apt to smile when words are used they do not understand.
+
+"Dard is a fool," suggested Riviere, by way of general solution.  He
+added, "And yet, do you know I wish every word he said had been
+true."  (Jacintha's eyes expressed some astonishment.)  "Because
+then you and I would have concerted means to do them kindnesses,
+secretly; for I see you are no ordinary servant; you love your young
+mistresses.  Do you not?"
+
+These simple words seemed to touch a grander chord in Jacintha's
+nature.
+
+"Love them?" said she, clasping her hands; "ah, sir, do not be
+offended; but, believe me, it is no small thing to serve an old, old
+family.  My grandfather lived and died with them; my father was
+their gamekeeper, and fed to his last from off the poor baron's
+plate (and now they have killed him, poor man); my mother died in
+the house and was buried in the sacred ground near the family
+chapel.  They put an inscription on her tomb praising her fidelity
+and probity.  Do you think these things do not sink into the heart
+of the poor?--praise on her tomb, and not a word on their own, but
+just the name, and when each was born and died, you know.  Ah! the
+pride of the mean is dirt; but the pride of the noble is gold."
+
+"For, look you, among parvenues I should be a servant, and nothing
+more; in this proud family I am a humble friend; of course they are
+not always gossiping with me like vulgar masters and mistresses; if
+they did, I should neither respect nor love them; but they all smile
+on me whenever I come into the room, even the baroness herself.  I
+belong to them, and they belong to me, by ties without number, by
+the many kind words in many troubles, by the one roof that sheltered
+us a hundred years, and the grave where our bones lie together till
+the day of judgment."*
+
+
+* The French peasant often thinks half a sentence, and utters the
+other half aloud, and so breaks air in the middle of a thought.
+Probably Jacintha's whole thought, if we had the means of knowing
+it, would have run like this--Besides, I have another reason: I
+could not be so comfortable myself elsewhere--for, look you"--
+
+
+Jacintha clasped her hands, and her black eyes shone out warm
+through the dew.  Riviere's glistened too.
+
+"That is well said," he cried; "it is nobly said: yet, after all,
+these are ties that owe their force to the souls they bind.  How
+often have such bonds round human hearts proved ropes of sand!  They
+grapple YOU like hooks of steel; because you are steel yourself to
+the backbone.  I admire you, Jacintha.  Such women as you have a
+great mission in France just now."
+
+Jacintha shook her head incredulously.  "What can we poor women do?"
+
+"Bring forth heroes," cried Publicola with fervor.  "Be the mothers
+of great men, the Catos and the Gracchi of the future!"
+
+Jacintha smiled.  She did not know the Gracchi nor their politics;
+but the name rang well.  "Gracchi!"  Aristocrats, no doubt.  "That
+would be too much honor," replied she modestly.  "At present, I must
+say adieu!" and she moved off an inch at a time, in an uncertain
+hesitating manner, not very difficult to read; but Riviere, you must
+know, had more than once during this interview begged her to sit
+down, and in vain; she had always thanked him, but said she had not
+a moment to stay.  So he made no effort to detain her now.  The
+consequence was--she came slowly back of her own accord, and sat
+down in a corner of the porch, where nobody could see her, and then
+she sighed deeply.
+
+"What is the matter now?" said Edouard, opening his eyes.
+
+She looked at him point-blank for one moment; and her scale turned.
+
+"Monsieur," said she timidly, "you have a good face, and a good
+heart.  All I told you was--give me your honor not to betray us."
+
+"I swear it," said Edouard, a little pompously.
+
+"Then--Dard was not so far from the truth; it was but a guess of
+his, for I never trusted my own sweetheart as I now trust a
+stranger.  But to see what I see every day, and have no one I dare
+breathe a word to, oh, it is very hard!  But on what a thread things
+turn!  If any one had told me an hour ago it was you I should open
+my heart to!  It's not economy: it's not stinginess; they are not
+paying off their debts.  They never can.  The baroness and the
+Demoiselles de Beaurepaire--are paupers."
+
+"Paupers, Jacintha?"
+
+"Ay, paupers! their debts are greater than their means.  They live
+here by sufferance.  They have only their old clothes to wear.  They
+have hardly enough to eat.  Just now our cow is in full milk, you
+know; so that is a great help: but, when she goes dry, Heaven knows
+what we shall do; for I don't.  But that is not the worst; better a
+light meal than a broken heart.  Your precious government offers the
+chateau for sale.  They might as well send for the guillotine at
+once, and cut off all our heads.  You don't know my mistress as I
+do.  Ah, butchers, you will drag nothing out of that but her corpse.
+And is it come to this? the great old family to be turned adrift
+like beggars.  My poor mistress! my pretty demoiselles that I played
+with and nursed ever since I was a child!  (I was just six when
+Josephine was born) and that I shall love with my last breath"--
+
+She could say no more, but choked by the strong feeling so long pent
+up in her own bosom, fell to sobbing hysterically, and trembling
+like one in an ague.
+
+The statesman, who had passed all his short life at school and
+college, was frightened, and took hold of her and pulled her, and
+cried, "Oh! don't, Jacintha; you will kill yourself, you will die;
+this is frightful: help here! help!"  Jacintha put her hand to his
+mouth, and, without leaving off her hysterics, gasped out, "Ah!
+don't expose me."  So then he didn't know what to do; but he seized
+a tumbler and filled it with wine, and forced it between her lips.
+All she did was to bite a piece out of the glass as clean as if a
+diamond had cut it.  This did her a world of good: destruction of
+sacred household property gave her another turn.  "There, I've broke
+your glass now," she cried, with a marvellous change of tone; and
+she came-to and cried quietly like a reasonable person, with her
+apron to her eyes.
+
+When Edouard saw she was better, he took her hand and said proudly,
+"Secret for secret.  I choose this moment to confide to you that I
+love Mademoiselle Rose de Beaurepaire.  Love her?  I did love her;
+but now you tell me she is poor and in distress, I adore her."  The
+effect of this declaration on Jacintha was magical, comical.  Her
+apron came down from one eye, and that eye dried itself and sparkled
+with curiosity: the whole countenance speedily followed suit and
+beamed with sacred joy.  What! an interesting love affair confided
+to her all in a moment!  She lowered her voice to a whisper
+directly.  "Why, how did you manage?  She never goes into company."
+
+"No; but she goes to church.  Besides, I have met her eleven times
+out walking with her sister, and twice out of the eleven she smiled
+on me.  O Jacintha! a smile such as angels smile; a smile to warm
+the heart and purify the soul and last forever in the mind."
+
+"Well, they say 'man is fire and woman tow:' but this beats all.
+Ha! ha!"
+
+"Oh! do not jest.  I did not laugh at you.  Jacintha, it is no
+laughing matter; I revere her as mortals revere the saints; I love
+her so that were I ever to lose all hope of her I would not live a
+day.  And now that you have told me she is poor and in sorrow, and I
+think of her walking so calm and gentle--always in black, Jacintha,--
+and her low courtesy to me whenever we met, and her sweet smile to
+me though her heart must be sad, oh! my heart yearns for her.  What
+can I do for her?  How shall I surround her with myself unseen--make
+her feel that a man's love waits upon her feet every step she takes--
+that a man's love floats in the air round that lovely head?"  Then
+descending to earth for a moment, "but I say, you promise not to
+betray me; come, secret for secret."
+
+"I will not tell a soul; on the honor of a woman," said Jacintha.
+
+The form of protestation was quite new to Edouard, and not exactly
+the one his study of the ancient writers would have led him to
+select.  But the tone was convincing: he trusted her.  They parted
+sworn allies; and, at the very moment of parting, Jacintha, who had
+cast many a furtive glance at the dead game, told Edouard demurely,
+Mademoiselle Rose was very fond of roast partridge.  On this he made
+her take the whole bag; and went home on wings.  Jacintha's
+revelation roused all that was noble and forgiving in him.  His
+understanding and his heart expanded from that hour, and his fancy
+spread its pinions to the sun of love.  Ah! generous Youth, let who
+will betray thee; let who will sneer at thee; let me, though young
+no longer, smile on thee and joy in thee!  She he loved was sad, was
+poor, was menaced by many ills; then she needed a champion.  He
+would be her unseen friend, her guardian angel.  A hundred wild
+schemes whirled in his beating heart and brain.  He could not go in-
+doors, indeed, no room could contain him: he made for a green lane
+he knew at the back of the village, and there he walked up and down
+for hours.  The sun set, and the night came, and the stars
+glittered; but still he walked alone, inspired, exalted, full of
+generous and loving schemes: of sweet and tender fancies: a heart on
+fire; and youth the fuel, and the flame vestal.
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+
+This very day was the anniversary of the baron's death.
+
+The baroness kept her room all the morning, and took no nourishment
+but one cup of spurious coffee Rose brought her.  Towards evening
+she came down-stairs.  In the hall she found two chaplets of
+flowers; they were always placed there for her on this sad day.  She
+took them in her hand, and went into the little oratory that was in
+the park; there she found two wax candles burning, and two fresh
+chaplets hung up.  Her daughters had been there before her.
+
+She knelt and prayed many hours for her husband's soul; then she
+rose and hung up one chaplet and came slowly away with the other in
+her hand.  At the gate of the park, Josephine met her with tender
+anxiety in her sapphire eyes, and wreathed her arms round her, and
+whispered, "But you have your children still."
+
+The baroness kissed her and they came towards the house together,
+the baroness leaning gently on her daughter's elbow.
+
+Between the park and the angle of the chateau was a small plot of
+turf called at Beaurepaire the Pleasance, a name that had descended
+along with other traditions; and in the centre of this Pleasance, or
+Pleasaunce, stood a wonderful oak-tree.  Its circumference was
+thirty-four feet.  The baroness came to this ancient tree, and hung
+her chaplet on a mutilated limb called the "knights' bough."
+
+The sun was setting tranquil and red; a broad ruby streak lingered
+on the deep green leaves of the prodigious oak.  The baroness looked
+at it awhile in silence.
+
+Then she spoke slowly to it and said, "You were here before us: you
+will be here when we are gone."
+
+A spasm crossed Josephine's face, but she said nothing at the time.
+And so they went in together.
+
+Now as this tree was a feat of nature, and, above all, played a
+curious part in our story, I will ask you to stay a few minutes and
+look at it, while I say what was known about it; not the thousandth
+part of what it could have told, if trees could speak as well as
+breathe.
+
+The baroness did not exaggerate; the tree was far older than even
+this ancient family.  They possessed among other archives a
+manuscript written by a monk, a son of the house, about four hundred
+years before our story, and containing many of the oral traditions
+about this tree that had come down to him from remote antiquity.
+According to this authority, the first Baron of Beaurepaire had
+pitched his tent under a fair oak-tree that stood prope rivum, near
+a brook.  His grandson built a square tower hard by, and dug a moat
+that enclosed both tree and tower, and received the waters of the
+brook aforesaid.
+
+At this time the tree seems only to have been remarked for its
+height.  But, a century and a half before the monk wrote, it had
+become famous in all the district for its girth, and in the monk's
+own day had ceased to grow; but not begun to decay.  The mutilated
+arm I have mentioned was once a long sturdy bough, worn smooth as
+velvet in one part from a curious cause: it ran about as high above
+the ground as a full-sized horse, and the knights and squires used
+to be forever vaulting upon it, the former in armor; the monk, when
+a boy, had seen them do it a thousand times.  This bough broke in
+two, A.D. 1617: but the mutilated limb was still called the knights'
+bough, nobody knew why.  So do names survive their ideas.
+
+What had not this tree seen since first it came green and tender as
+a cabbage above the soil, and stood at the mercy of the first hare
+or rabbit that should choose to cut short its frail existence!
+
+Since then eagles had perched on its crown, and wild boars fed
+without fear of man upon its acorns.  Troubadours had sung beneath
+it to lords and ladies seated round, or walking on the grass and
+commenting the minstrel's tales of love by exchange of amorous
+glances.  Mediaeval sculptors had taken its leaves, and wisely
+trusting to nature, had adorned churches with those leaves cut in
+stone.
+
+It had seen a Norman duke conquer England, and English kings invade
+France and be crowned at Paris.  It had seen a girl put knights to
+the rout, and seen the warrior virgin burned by envious priests with
+common consent both of the curs she had defended and the curs she
+had defeated.
+
+Why, in its old age it had seen the rise of printing, and the first
+dawn of national civilization in Europe.  It flourished and decayed
+in France; but it sprung in Gaul.  And more remarkable still, though
+by all accounts it may see the world to an end, it was a tree in
+ancient history: its old age awaits the millennium; its first youth
+belonged to that great tract of time which includes the birth of
+Christ, the building of Rome, and the siege of Troy.
+
+The tree had, ere this, mingled in the fortunes of the family.  It
+had saved their lives and taken their lives.  One lord of
+Beaurepaire, hotly pursued by his feudal enemies, made for the tree,
+and hid himself partly by a great bough, partly by the thick screen
+of leaves.  The foe darted in, made sure he had taken to the house,
+ransacked it, and got into the cellar, where by good-luck was a
+store of Malvoisie: and so the oak and the vine saved the quaking
+baron.  Another lord of Beaurepaire, besieged in his castle, was
+shot dead on the ramparts by a cross-bowman who had secreted himself
+unobserved in this tree a little before the dawn.
+
+A young heir of Beaurepaire, climbing for a raven's nest to the top
+of this tree, lost his footing and fell, and died at its foot: and
+his mother in her anguish bade them cut down the tree that had
+killed her boy.  But the baron her husband refused, and spake in
+this wise: "ytte ys eneugh that I lose mine sonne, I will nat alsoe
+lose mine Tre."  In the male you see the sober sentiment of the
+proprietor outweighed the temporary irritation of the parent.  Then
+the mother bought fifteen ells of black velvet, and stretched a pall
+from the knights' bough across the west side to another branch, and
+cursed the hand that should remove it, and she herself "wolde never
+passe the Tre neither going nor coming, but went still about."  And
+when she died and should have been carried past the tree to the
+park, her dochter did cry from a window to the bearers, "Goe about!
+goe about!" and they went about, and all the company.  And in time
+the velvet pall rotted, and was torn and driven away by the winds:
+and when the hand of Nature, and no human hand, had thus flouted and
+dispersed the trappings of the mother's grief, two pieces were
+picked up and preserved among the family relics: but the black
+velvet had turned a rusty red.
+
+So the baroness did nothing new in this family when she hung her
+chaplet on the knights' bough; and, in fact, on the west side, about
+eighteen feet from the ground, there still mouldered one corner of
+an Atchievement an heir of Beaurepaire had nailed there two
+centuries before, when his predecessor died: "For," said he, "the
+chateau is of yesterday, but the tree has seen us all come and go."
+The inside of the oak was hollow as a drum; and on its east side
+yawned a fissure as high as a man and as broad as a street-door.
+Dard used to wheel his wheelbarrow into the tree at a trot, and
+there leave it.
+
+Yet in spite of excavation and mutilation not life only but vigor
+dwelt in this wooden shell.  The extreme ends of the longer boughs
+were firewood, touchwood, and the crown was gone this many a year:
+but narrow the circle a very little to where the indomitable trunk
+could still shoot sap from its cruse deep in earth, and there on
+every side burst the green foliage in its season countless as the
+sand.  The leaves carved centuries ago from these very models,
+though cut in stone, were most of them mouldered, blunted, notched,
+deformed: but the delicate types came back with every summer,
+perfect and lovely as when the tree was but their elder brother: and
+greener than ever: for, from what cause nature only knows, the
+leaves were many shades richer than any other tree could show for a
+hundred miles round; a deep green, fiery, yet soft; and then their
+multitude--the staircases of foliage as you looked up the tree, and
+could scarce catch a glimpse of the sky.  An inverted abyss of
+color, a mound, a dome, of flake emeralds that quivered in the
+golden air.
+
+And now the sun sets; the green leaves are black; the moon rises:
+her cold light shoots across one half that giant stem.
+
+How solemn and calm stands the great round tower of living wood,
+half ebony, half silver, with its mighty cloud above of flake jet
+leaves tipped with frosty fire!
+
+Now is the still hour to repeat in a whisper the words of the dame
+of Beaurepaire, "You were here before us: you will be here when we
+are gone."
+
+We leave the hoary king of trees standing in the moonlight, calmly
+defying time, and follow the creatures of a day; for, what they
+were, we are.
+
+
+A spacious saloon panelled; dead but showy white picked out
+sparingly with gold.  Festoons of fruits and flowers finely carved
+in wood on some of the panels.  These also not smothered in gilding,
+but as it were gold speckled here and there, like tongues of flame
+winding among insoluble snow.  Ranged against the walls were sofas
+and chairs covered with rich stuffs well worn.  And in one little
+distant corner of the long room a gray-haired gentleman and two
+young ladies sat round a small plain table, on which burned a
+solitary candle; and a little way apart in this candle's twilight an
+old lady sat in an easy-chair, thinking of the past, scarce daring
+to inquire the future.  Josephine and Rose were working: not fancy-
+work but needle-work; Dr. Aubertin writing.  Every now and then he
+put the one candle nearer the girls.  They raised no objection: only
+a few minutes after a white hand would glide from one or other of
+them like a serpent, and smoothly convey the light nearer to the
+doctor's manuscript.
+
+"Is it not supper-time?" he inquired.  "I have an inward monitor;
+and I think our dinner was more ethereal than usual."
+
+"Hush!" said Josephine, and looked uneasily towards her mother.
+"Wax is so dear."
+
+"Wax?--ah!--pardon me:" and the doctor returned hastily to his work.
+But Rose looked up and said, "I wonder Jacintha does not come; it is
+certainly past the hour;" and she pried into the room as if she
+expected to see Jacintha on the road.  But she saw in fact very
+little of anything, for the spacious room was impenetrable to her
+eye; midway from the candle to the distant door its twilight
+deepened, and all became shapeless and sombre.  The prospect ended
+sharp and black, as in those out-o'-door closets imagined and
+painted by a certain great painter, whose Nature comes to a full
+stop as soon as he has no further commercial need of her, instead of
+melting by fine expanse and exquisite gradation into genuine
+distance, as nature does in Claude and in nature.  To reverse the
+picture, if you stood at the door you looked across forty feet of
+black, and the little corner seemed on fire, and the fair heads
+about the candle shone like the St. Cecilias and Madonnas in an
+antique stained-glass window.
+
+At last the door opened, and another candle fired Jacintha's comely
+peasant face in the doorway.  She put down her candle outside the
+door, and started as crow flies for the other light.  After glowing
+a moment in the doorway she dived into the shadow and emerged into
+light again close to the table with napkins on her arm.  She removed
+the work-box reverentially, the doctor's manuscript unceremoniously,
+and proceeded to lay a cloth: in which operation she looked at Rose
+a point-blank glance of admiration: then she placed the napkins; and
+in this process she again cast a strange look of interest upon Rose.
+The young lady noticed it this time, and looked inquiringly at her
+in return, half expecting some communication; but Jacintha lowered
+her eyes and bustled about the table.  Then Rose spoke to her with a
+sort of instinct of curiosity, on the chance of drawing her out.
+
+"Supper is late to-night, is it not, Jacintha?"
+
+"Yes, mademoiselle; I have had more cooking than usual," and with
+this she delivered another point-blank look as before, and dived
+into the palpable obscure, and came to light in the doorway.
+
+Her return was anxiously expected; for, if the truth must be told,
+they were very hungry.  So rigorous was the economy in this decayed
+but honorable house that the wax candles burned to-day in the
+oratory had scrimped their dinner, unsubstantial as it was wont to
+be.  Think of that, you in fustian jackets who grumble after meat.
+The door opened, Jacintha reappeared in the light of her candle a
+moment with a tray in both hands, and, approaching, was lost to
+view; but a strange and fragrant smell heralded her.  All their eyes
+turned with curiosity towards the unwonted odor, and Jacintha dawned
+with three roast partridges on a dish.
+
+They were wonder-struck, and looked from the birds to her in mute
+surprise, that was not diminished by a certain cynical indifference
+she put on.  She avoided their eyes, and forcibly excluded from her
+face everything that could imply she did not serve up partridges to
+this family every night of her life.
+
+"The supper is served, madame," said she, with a respectful courtesy
+and a mechanical tone, and, plunging into the night, swam out at her
+own candle, shut the door, and, unlocking her face that moment,
+burst out radiant, and so to the kitchen, and, with a tear in her
+eye, set-to and polished all the copper stewpans with a vigor and
+expedition unknown to the new-fangled domestic.
+
+"Partridges, mamma!  What next?"
+
+"Pheasants, I hope," cried the doctor, gayly.  "And after them
+hares; to conclude with royal venison.  Permit me, ladies."  And he
+set himself to carve with zeal.
+
+Now nature is nature, and two pair of violet eyes brightened and
+dwelt on the fragrant and delicate food with demure desire; for all
+that, when Aubertin offered Josephine a wing, she declined it.  "No
+partridge?" cried the savant, in utter amazement.
+
+"Not to-day, dear friend; it is not a feast day to-day."
+
+"Ah! no; what was I thinking of?"
+
+"But you are not to be deprived," put in Josephine, anxiously.  "We
+will not deny ourselves the pleasure of seeing you eat some."
+
+"What!" remonstrated Aubertin, "am I not one of you?"
+
+The baroness had attended to every word of this.  She rose from her
+chair, and said quietly, "Both you and he and Rose will be so good
+as to let me see you eat."
+
+"But, mamma," remonstrated Josephine and Rose in one breath.
+
+"Je le veux," was the cold reply.
+
+These were words the baroness uttered so seldom that they were
+little likely to be disputed.
+
+The doctor carved and helped the young ladies and himself.
+
+When they had all eaten a little, a discussion was observed to be
+going on between Rose and her sister.  At last Aubertin caught these
+words, "It will be in vain; even you have not influence enough for
+that, Rose."
+
+"We shall see," was the reply, and Rose put the wing of a partridge
+on a plate and rose calmly from her chair.  She took the plate and
+put it on a little work-table by her mother's side.  The others
+pretended to be all mouths, but they were all ears.  The baroness
+looked in Rose's face with an air of wonder that was not very
+encouraging.  Then, as Rose said nothing, she raised her
+aristocratic hand with a courteous but decided gesture of refusal.
+
+Undaunted Rose laid her palm softly on the baroness's shoulder, and
+said to her as firmly as the baroness herself had just spoken,--
+
+"Il le veut."
+
+The baroness was staggered.  Then she looked with moist eyes at the
+fair young face, then she reflected.  At last she said, with an
+exquisite mixture of politeness and affection, "It is his daughter
+who has told me 'Il le veut.'  I obey."
+
+Rose returning like a victorious knight from the lists, saucily
+exultant, and with only one wet eyelash, was solemnly kissed and
+petted by Josephine and the doctor.
+
+Thus they loved one another in this great, old, falling house.
+Their familiarity had no coarse side; a form, not of custom but
+affection, it went hand-in-hand with courtesy by day and night.
+
+The love of the daughters for their mother had all the tenderness,
+subtlety, and unselfishness of womanly natures, together with a
+certain characteristic of the female character.  And whither that
+one defect led them, and by what gradations, it may be worth the
+reader's while to observe.
+
+The baroness retired to rest early; and she was no sooner gone than
+Josephine leaned over to Rose, and told her what their mother had
+said to the oak-tree.  Rose heard this with anxiety; hitherto they
+had carefully concealed from their mother that the government
+claimed the right of selling the chateau to pay the creditors, etc.;
+and now both sisters feared the old lady had discovered it somehow,
+or why that strange thing she had said to the oak-tree?  But Dr.
+Aubertin caught their remarks, and laid down his immortal MS. on
+French insects, to express his hope that they were putting a forced
+interpretation on the baroness's words.
+
+"I think," said he, "she merely meant how short-lived are we all
+compared with this ancient oak.  I should be very sorry to adopt the
+other interpretation; for if she knows she can at any moment be
+expelled from Beaurepaire, it will be almost as bad for her as the
+calamity itself; THAT, I think, would kill her."
+
+"Why so?" said Rose, eagerly.  "What is this house or that?  Mamma
+will still have her daughters' love, go where she will."
+
+Aubertin replied, "It is idle to deceive ourselves; at her age men
+and women hang to life by their habits; take her away from her
+chateau, from the little oratory where she prays every day for the
+departed, from her place in the sun on the south terrace, and from
+all the memories that surround her here; she would soon pine, and
+die."
+
+Here the savant seeing a hobby-horse near, caught him and jumped on.
+He launched into a treatise upon the vitality of human beings, and
+proved that it is the mind which keeps the body of a man alive for
+so great a length of time as fourscore years; for that he had in the
+earlier part of his studies carefully dissected a multitude of
+animals,--frogs, rabbits, dogs, men, horses, sheep, squirrels,
+foxes, cats, etc.,--and discovered no peculiarity in man's organs to
+account for his singular longevity, except in the brain or organ of
+mind.  Thence he went to the longevity of men with contented minds,
+and the rapid decay of the careworn.  Finally he succeeded in
+convincing them the baroness was so constituted, physically and
+mentally, that she would never move from Beaurepaire except into her
+grave.  However, having thus terrified them, he proceeded to console
+them.  "You have a friend," said he, "a powerful friend; and here in
+my pocket--somewhere--is a letter that proves it."
+
+The letter was from Mr. Perrin the notary.  It appeared by it that
+Dr. Aubertin had reminded the said Perrin of his obligations to the
+late baron, and entreated him to use all his influence to keep the
+estate in this ancient family.
+
+Perrin had replied at first in a few civil lines; but his present
+letter was a long and friendly one.  It made both the daughters of
+Beaurepaire shudder at the peril they had so narrowly escaped.  For
+by it they now learned for the first time that one Jaques Bonard, a
+small farmer, to whom they owed but five thousand francs, had gone
+to the mayor and insisted, as he had a perfect right, on the estate
+being put up to public auction.  This had come to Perrin's ears just
+in time, and he had instantly bought Bonard's debt, and stopped the
+auction; not, however, before the very bills were printed; for which
+he, Perrin, had paid, and now forwarded the receipt.  He concluded
+by saying that the government agent was personally inert, and would
+never move a step in the matter unless driven by a creditor.
+
+"But we have so many," said Rose in dismay.  "We are not safe a day."
+
+Aubertin assured her the danger was only in appearance.  "Your large
+creditors are men of property, and such men let their funds lie
+unless compelled to move them.  The small mortgagee, the petty
+miser, who has, perhaps, no investment to watch but one small loan,
+about which he is as anxious and as noisy as a hen with one chicken,
+he is the clamorous creditor, the harsh little egoist, who for fear
+of risking a crown piece would bring the Garden of Eden to the
+hammer.  Now we are rid of that little wretch, Bonard, and have
+Perrin on our side; so there is literally nothing to fear."
+
+The sisters thanked him warmly, and Rose shared his hopes; and said
+so; but Josephine was silent and thoughtful.  Nothing more worth
+recording passed that night.  But the next day was the first of May,
+Josephine's birthday.
+
+Now they always celebrated this day as well as they could; and used
+to plant a tree, for one thing.  Dard, well spurred by Jacintha, had
+got a little acacia; and they were all out in the Pleasaunce to
+plant it.  Unhappily, they were a preposterous time making up their
+feminine minds where to have it set; so Dard turned rusty and said
+the park was the best place for it.  There it could do no harm,
+stick it where you would.
+
+"And who told you to put in your word?" inquired Jacintha.  "You're
+here to dig the hole where mademoiselle chooses; not to argufy."
+
+Josephine whispered Rose, "I admire the energy of her character.
+Could she be induced to order once for all where the poor thing is
+to be planted?"
+
+"Then where WILL you have it, mademoiselle?" asked Dard, sulkily.
+
+"Here, I think, Dard," said Josephine sweetly.
+
+Dard grinned malignantly, and drove in his spade.  "It will never be
+much bigger than a stinging nettle," thought he, "for the roots of
+the oak have sucked every atom of heart out of this."  His black
+soul exulted secretly.
+
+Jacintha stood by Dard, inspecting his work; the sisters
+intertwined, a few feet from him.  The baroness turned aside, and
+went to look for a moment at the chaplet she had placed yesterday on
+the oak-tree bough.  Presently she uttered a slight ejaculation; and
+her daughters looked up directly.
+
+"Come here, children," said she.  They glided to her in a moment;
+and found her eyes fixed upon an object that lay on the knights'
+bough.
+
+It was a sparkling purse.
+
+I dare say you have noticed that the bark on the boughs of these
+very ancient trees is as deeply furrowed as the very stem of an oak
+tree that boasts but a few centuries; and in one of these deep
+furrows lay a green silk purse with gold coins glittering through
+the glossy meshes.
+
+Josephine and Rose eyed it a moment like startled deer; then Rose
+pounced on it.  "Oh, how heavy!" she cried.  This brought up Dard
+and Jacintha, in time to see Rose pour ten shining gold pieces out
+of the purse into her pink-white palm, while her face flushed and
+her eyes glittered with excitement.  Jacintha gave a scream of joy;
+"Our luck is turned," she cried, superstitiously.  Meanwhile,
+Josephine had found a slip of paper close to the purse.  She opened
+it with nimble fingers; it contained one line in a hand like that of
+a copying clerk: FROM A FRIEND: IN PART PAYMENT OF A GREAT DEBT.
+
+Keen, piquant curiosity now took the place of surprise.  Who could
+it be?  The baroness's suspicion fell at once on Dr. Aubertin.  But
+Rose maintained he had not ten gold pieces in the world.  The
+baroness appealed to Josephine.  She only blushed in an extraordinary
+way, and said nothing.  They puzzled, and puzzled, and were as much
+in the dark as ever, when lo! one of the suspected parties delivered
+himself into the hands of justice with ludicrous simplicity.  It
+happened to be Dr. Aubertin's hour of out-a-door study; and he
+came mooning along, buried in a book, and walked slowly into the
+group--started, made a slight apology, and was mooning off, lost
+in his book again.  Then the baroness, who had eyed him with grim
+suspicion all the time, said with well-affected nonchalance, "Doctor,
+you dropped your purse; we have just picked it up."  And she handed
+it to him.  "Thank you, madame," said he, and took it quietly without
+looking at it, put it in his pocket, and retired, with his soul in
+his book.  They stared comically at one another, and at this cool
+hand.  "It's no more his than it's mine," said Jacintha, bluntly.
+Rose darted after the absorbed student, and took him captive.  "Now,
+doctor," she cried, "be pleased to come out of the clouds."  And
+with the word she whipped the purse out of his coat pocket, and
+holding it right up before his eye, insisted on his telling her
+whether that was his purse or not, money and all.  Thus adjured,
+he disowned the property mighty coolly, for a retired physician,
+who had just pocketed it.
+
+"No, my dear," said he; "and, now I think of it, I have not carried
+a purse this twenty years."
+
+The baroness, as a last resource, appealed to his honor whether he
+had not left a purse and paper on the knights' bough.  The question
+had to be explained by Josephine, and then the doctor surprised them
+all by being rather affronted--for once in his life.
+
+"Baroness," said he, "I have been your friend and pensioner nearly
+twenty years; if by some strange chance money were to come into my
+hands, I should not play you a childish trick like this.  What! have
+I not the right to come to you, and say, 'My old friend, here I
+bring you back a very small part of all I owe you?'"
+
+"What geese we are," remarked Rose.  "Dear doctor, YOU tell us who
+it is."
+
+Dr. Aubertin reflected a single moment; then said he could make a
+shrewd guess.
+
+"Who? who? who?" cried the whole party.
+
+"Perrin the notary."
+
+It was the baroness's turn to be surprised; for there was nothing
+romantic about Perrin the notary.  Aubertin, however, let her know
+that he was in private communication with the said Perrin, and this
+was not the first friendly act the good notary had done her in secret.
+
+While he was converting the baroness to his view, Josephine and Rose
+exchanged a signal, and slipped away round an angle of the chateau.
+
+"Who is it?" said Rose.
+
+"It is some one who has a delicate mind."
+
+"Clearly, and therefore not a notary."
+
+"Rose, dear, might it not be some person who has done us some wrong,
+and is perhaps penitent?"
+
+"Certainly; one of our tenants, or creditors, you mean; but then,
+the paper says 'a friend.'  Stay, it says a debtor.  Why a debtor?
+Down with enigmas!"
+
+"Rose, love," said Josephine, coaxingly, "think of some one that
+might--since it is not the doctor, nor Monsieur Perrin, might it not
+be--for after all, he would naturally be ashamed to appear before me."
+
+"Before you?  Who do you mean?" asked Rose nervously, catching a
+glimpse now.
+
+"He who once pretended to love me."
+
+"Josephine, you love that man still."
+
+"No, no.  Spare me!"
+
+"You love him just the same as ever.  Oh, it is wonderful; it is
+terrible; the power he has over you; over your judgment as well as
+your heart."
+
+"No! for I believe he has forgotten my very name; don't you think so?"
+
+"Dear Josephine, can you doubt it?  Come, you do doubt it."
+
+"Sometimes."
+
+"But why? for what reason?"
+
+"Because of what he said to me as we parted at that gate; the words
+and the voice seem still to ring like truth across the weary years.
+He said, 'I am to join the army of the Pyrenees, so fatal to our
+troops; but say to me what you never yet have said, Camille, I love
+you: and I swear I will come back alive.'  So then I said to him, 'I
+love you,'--and he never came back."
+
+"How could he come here? a deserter, a traitor!"
+
+"It is not true; it is not in his nature; inconstancy may be.  Tell
+me that he never really loved me, and I will believe you; but not
+that he is a traitor.  Let me weep over my past love, not blush for
+it."
+
+"Past?  You love him to-day as you did three years ago."
+
+"No," said Josephine, "no; I love no one.  I never shall love any
+one again."
+
+"But him.  It is that love which turns your heart against others.
+Oh, yes, you love him, dearest, or why should you fancy our secret
+benefactor COULD be that Camille?"
+
+"Why?  Because I was mad: because it is impossible; but I see my
+folly.  I am going in."
+
+"What! don't you care to know who I think it was, perhaps?"
+
+"No," said Josephine sadly and doggedly; she added with cold
+nonchalance, "I dare say time will show."  And she went slowly in,
+her hand to her head.
+
+"Her birthday!" sighed Rose.
+
+The donor, whoever he was, little knew the pain he was inflicting on
+this distressed but proud family, or the hard battle that ensued
+between their necessities and their delicacy.  The ten gold pieces
+were a perpetual temptation: a daily conflict.  The words that
+accompanied the donation offered a bait.  Their pride and dignity
+declined it; but these bright bits of gold cost them many a sharp
+pang.  You must know that Josephine and Rose had worn out their
+mourning by this time; and were obliged to have recourse to gayer
+materials that lay in their great wardrobes, and were older, but
+less worn.  A few of these gold pieces would have enabled the poor
+girls to be neat, and yet to mourn their father openly.  And it went
+through and through those tender, simple hearts, to think that they
+must be disunited, even in so small a thing as dress; that while
+their mother remained in her weeds, they must seem no longer to
+share her woe.
+
+The baroness knew their feeling, and felt its piety, and yet could
+not bow her dignity to say, "Take five of these bits of gold, and
+let us all look what we are--one."  Yet in this, as in everything
+else, they supported each other.  They resisted, they struggled, and
+with a wrench they conquered day by day.  At last, by general
+consent, Josephine locked up the tempter, and they looked at it no
+more.  But the little bit of paper met a kinder fate.  Rose made a
+little frame for it, and it was kept in a drawer, in the salon: and
+often looked at and blessed.  Just when they despaired of human
+friendship, this paper with the sacred word "friend" written on it,
+had fallen all in a moment on their aching hearts.
+
+They could not tell whence it came, this blessed word.
+
+But men dispute whence comes the dew?
+
+Then let us go with the poets, who say it comes from heaven.
+
+And even so that sweet word, friend, dropped like the dew from
+heaven on these afflicted ones.
+
+So they locked the potent gold away from themselves, and took the
+kind slip of paper to their hearts.
+
+The others left off guessing: Aubertin had it all his own way: he
+upheld Perrin as their silent benefactor, and bade them all observe
+that the worthy notary had never visited the chateau openly since
+the day the purse was left there.  "Guilty conscience," said
+Aubertin dryly.
+
+One day in his walks he met a gaunt figure ambling on a fat pony: he
+stopped him, and, holding up his finger, said abruptly, "We have
+found you out, Maitre Perrin."
+
+The notary changed color.
+
+"Oh, never be ashamed," said Aubertin; "a good action done slyly is
+none the less a good action."
+
+The notary wore a puzzled air.
+
+Aubertin admired his histrionic powers in calling up this look.
+
+"Come, come, don't overdo it," said he.  "Well, well; they cannot
+profit by your liberality; but you will be rewarded in a better
+world, take my word for that."
+
+The notary muttered indistinctly.  He was a man of moderate desires;
+would have been quite content if there had been no other world in
+perspective.  He had studied this one, and made it pay: did not
+desire a better; sometimes feared a worse.
+
+"Ah!" said Aubertin, "I see how it is; we do not like to hear
+ourselves praised, do we?  When shall we see you at the chateau?"
+
+"I propose to call on the baroness the moment I have good news to
+bring," replied Perrin; and to avoid any more compliments spurred
+the dun pony suddenly; and he waddled away.
+
+Now this Perrin was at that moment on the way to dine with a
+character who plays a considerable part in the tale--Commandant
+Raynal.  Perrin had made himself useful to the commandant, and had
+become his legal adviser.  And, this very day after dinner, the
+commandant having done a good day's work permitted himself a little
+sentiment over the bottle, and to a man he thought his friend.  He
+let out that he had a heap of money he did not know what to do with,
+and almost hated it now his mother was gone and could not share it.
+
+The man of law consoled him with oleaginous phrases: told him he
+very much underrated the power of money.  His hoard, directed by a
+judicious adviser, would make him a landed proprietor, and the
+husband of some young lady, all beauty, virtue, and accomplishment,
+whose soothing influence would soon heal the sorrow caused by an
+excess of filial sentiment.
+
+"Halt!" shouted Raynal: "say that again in half the words."
+
+Perrin was nettled, for he prided himself on his colloquial style.
+
+"You can buy a fine estate and a chaste wife with the money,"
+snapped this smooth personage, substituting curt brutality for
+honeyed prolixity.
+
+The soldier was struck by the propositions the moment they flew at
+him small and solid, like bullets.
+
+"I've no time," said he, "to be running after women.  But the estate
+I'll certainly have, because you can get that for me without my
+troubling my head."
+
+"Is it a commission, then?" asked the other sharply.
+
+"Of course.  Do you think I speak for the sake of talking?"
+
+And so Perrin received formal instructions to look out for a landed
+estate; and he was to receive a handsome commission as agent.
+
+Now to settle this affair, and pocket a handsome percentage for
+himself, he had only to say "Beaurepaire."
+
+Well, he didn't.  Never mentioned the place; nor the fact that it
+was for sale.
+
+Such are all our agents, when rival speculators.  Mind that.  Still
+it is a terrible thing to be so completely in the power of any man
+of the world, as from this hour Beaurepaire was in the power of
+Perrin the notary.
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+
+Edouard Riviere was unhappy.  She never came out now.  This alone
+made the days dark to him.  And then he began to fear it was him she
+shunned.  She must have seen him lie in wait for her; and so she
+would come out no more.  He prowled about and contrived to fall in
+with Jacintha; he told her his grief.  She assured him the simple
+fact was their mourning was worn out, and they were ashamed to go
+abroad in colors.  This revelation made his heart yearn still more.
+
+"O Jacintha," said he, "if I could only make a beginning; but here
+we might live a century in the same parish, and not one chance for a
+poor wretch to make acquaintance."
+
+Jacintha admitted this, and said gentlefolks were to be pitied.
+"Why, if it was the likes of me, you and I should have made friends
+long before now."
+
+Jacintha herself was puzzled what to do; she would have told Rose if
+she had felt sure it would be well received; but she could not find
+out that the young lady had even noticed the existence of Edouard.
+But her brain worked, and lay in wait for an opportunity.
+
+One came sooner than she expected.  One morning at about six
+o'clock, as she came home from milking the cow, she caught sight of
+young Riviere trying to open the iron gate.  "What is up now?"
+thought she; suddenly the truth flashed upon her, clear as day.  She
+put her pail down and stole upon him.  "You want to leave us another
+purse," said she.  He colored all over and panted.
+
+"How did you know? how could you know? you won't betray me? you
+won't be so cruel? you promised."
+
+"Me betray you," said Jacintha; "why, I'll help you; and then they
+will be able to buy mourning, you know, and then they will come out,
+and give you a chance.  You can't open that gate, for it's locked.
+But you come round to the lane, and I'll get you the key; it is
+hanging up in the kitchen."
+
+The key was in her pocket.  But the sly jade wanted him away from
+that gate; it commanded a view of the Pleasaunce.  He was no sooner
+safe in the lane, than she tore up-stairs to her young ladies, and
+asked them with affected calm whether they would like to know who
+left the purse.
+
+"Oh, yes, yes!" screamed Rose.
+
+"Then come with me.  You ARE dressed; never mind your bonnets, or
+you will be too late."
+
+Questions poured on her; but she waived all explanation, and did not
+give them time to think, or Josephine, for one, she knew would raise
+objections.  She led the way to the Pleasaunce, and, when she got to
+the ancestral oak, she said hurriedly, "Now, mesdemoiselles, hide in
+there, and as still as mice.  You'll soon know who leaves the purses."
+
+With this she scudded to the lane, and gave Edouard the key.  "Look
+sharp," said she, "before they get up; it's almost their dressing
+time."
+
+"YOU'LL SOON KNOW WHO LEAVES THE PURSES!"
+
+Curiosity, delicious curiosity, thrilled our two daughters of Eve.
+
+This soon began to alternate with chill misgivings at the novelty of
+the situation.
+
+"She is not coming back," said Josephine ruefully.
+
+"No," said Rose, "and suppose when we pounce out on him, it should
+be a stranger."
+
+"Pounce on him? surely we are not to do that?"
+
+"Oh, y-yes; that is the p-p-programme," quavered Rose.
+
+A key grated, and the iron gate creaked on its hinges.  They ran
+together and pinched one another for mutual support, but did not
+dare to speak.
+
+Presently a man's shadow came slap into the tree.  They crouched and
+quivered, and expected to be caught instead of catching, and wished
+themselves safe back in bed, and all this a nightmare, and no worse.
+
+At last they recovered themselves enough to observe that this
+shadow, one half of which lay on the ground, while the head and
+shoulders went a little way up the wall of the tree, represented a
+man's profile, not his front face.  The figure, in short, was
+standing between them and the sun, and was contemplating the
+chateau, not the tree.
+
+The shadow took off its hat to Josephine, in the tree.  Then would
+she have screamed if she had not bitten her white hand instead, and
+made a red mark thereon.
+
+It wiped its brow with a handkerchief; it had walked fast, poor
+thing!  The next moment it was away.
+
+They looked at one another and panted.  They scarcely dared do it
+before.  Then Rose, with one hand on her heaving bosom, shook her
+little white fist viciously at where the figure must be, and perhaps
+a comical desire of vengeance stimulated her curiosity.  She now
+glided through the fissure like a cautious panther from her den; and
+noiseless and supple as a serpent began to wind slowly round the
+tree.  She soon came to a great protuberance in the tree, and
+twining and peering round it with diamond eye, she saw a very young,
+very handsome gentleman, stealing on tiptoe to the nearest flower-
+bed.  Then she saw him take a purse out of his bosom, and drop it on
+the bed.  This done, he came slowly past the tree again, and was
+even heard to vent a little innocent chuckle of intense satisfaction:
+but of brief duration; for, when Rose saw the purse leave his hand,
+she made a rapid signal to Josephine to wheel round the other side
+of the tree, and, starting together with admirable concert, both
+the daughters of Beaurepaire glided into sight with a vast appearance
+of composure.
+
+Two women together are really braver than fifteen separate; but
+still, most of this tranquillity was merely put on, but so admirably
+that Edouard Riviere had no chance with them.  He knew nothing about
+their tremors; all he saw or heard was, a rustle, then a flap on
+each side of him as of great wings, and two lovely women were upon
+him with angelic swiftness.  "Ah!" he cried out with a start, and
+glanced from the first-comer, Rose, to the gate.  But Josephine was
+on that side by this time, and put up her hand, as much as to say,
+"You can't pass here."  In such situations, the mind works quicker
+than lightning.  He took off his hat, and stammered an excuse--"Come
+to look at the oak."  At this moment Rose pounced on the purse, and
+held it up to Josephine.  He was caught.  His only chance now was to
+bolt for the mark and run; but it was not the notary, it was a
+novice who lost his presence of mind, or perhaps thought it rude to
+run when a lady told him to stand still.  All he did was to crush
+his face into his two hands, round which his cheeks and neck now
+blushed red as blood.  Blush? they could both see the color rush
+like a wave to the very roots of his hair and the tips of his
+fingers.
+
+The moment our heroines, who, in that desperation which is one of
+the forms of cowardice, had hurled themselves on the foe, saw this,
+flash--the quick-witted poltroons exchanged purple lightning over
+Edouard's drooping head, and enacted lionesses in a moment.
+
+It was with the quiet composure of lofty and powerful natures that
+Josephine opened on him.  "Compose yourself, sir; and be so good as
+to tell us who you are."  Edouard must answer.  Now he could not
+speak through his hands; and he could not face a brace of tranquil
+lionesses: so he took a middle course, removed one hand, and shading
+himself from Josephine with the other, he gasped out, "I am--my name
+is Riviere; and I--I--ladies!"
+
+"I am afraid we frighten you," said Josephine, demurely.
+
+"Don't be frightened," said Rose, majestically; "we are not VERY
+angry, only a LITTLE curious to know why you water our flowers with
+gold."
+
+At this point-blank thrust, and from her, Edouard was so confounded
+and distressed, they both began to pity him.  He stammered out that
+he was so confused he did not know what to say.  He couldn't think
+how ever he could have taken such a liberty; might he be permitted
+to retire? and with this he tried to slip away.
+
+"Let me detain you one instant," said Josephine, and made for the
+house.
+
+Left alone so suddenly with the culprit, the dignity, and majesty,
+and valor of Rose seemed to ooze gently out; and she stood blushing,
+and had not a word to say; no more had Edouard.  But he hung his
+head, and she hung her head.  And, somehow or other, whenever she
+raised her eyes to glance at him, he raised his to steal a look at
+her, and mutual discomfiture resulted.
+
+This awkward, embarrassing delirium was interrupted by Josephine's
+return.  She now held another purse in her hand, and quietly poured
+the rest of the coin into it.  She then, with a blush, requested him
+to take back the money.
+
+At that he found his tongue.  "No, no," he cried, and put up his
+hands in supplication.  "Ladies, do let me speak ONE word to you.
+Do not reject my friendship.  You are alone in the world; your
+father is dead; your mother has but you to lean on.  After all, I am
+your neighbor, and neighbors should be friends.  And I am your
+debtor; I owe you more than you could ever owe me; for ever since I
+came into this neighborhood I have been happy.  No man was ever so
+happy as I, ever since one day I was walking, and met for the first
+time an angel.  I don't say it was you, Mademoiselle Rose.  It might
+be Mademoiselle Josephine."
+
+"How pat he has got our names," said Rose, smiling.
+
+"A look from that angel has made me so good, so happy.  I used to
+vegetate, but now I live.  Live!  I walk on wings, and tread on
+roses.  Yet you insist on declining a few miserable louis d'or from
+him who owes you so much.  Well, don't be angry; I'll take them
+back, and throw them into the nearest pond, for they are really no
+use to me.  But then you will be generous in your turn.  You will
+accept my devotion, my services.  You have no brother, you know;
+well, I have no sisters; let me be your brother, and your servant
+forever."
+
+At all this, delivered in as many little earnest pants as there were
+sentences, the water stood in the fair eyes he was looking into so
+piteously.
+
+Josephine was firm, but angelical.  "We thank you, Monsieur
+Riviere," said she, softly, "for showing us that the world is still
+embellished with hearts like yours.  Here is the money;" and she
+held it out in her creamy hand.
+
+"But we are very grateful," put in Rose, softly and earnestly.
+
+"That we are," said Josephine, "and we beg to keep the purse as a
+souvenir of one who tried to do us a kindness without mortifying us.
+And now, Monsieur Riviere, you will permit us to bid you adieu."
+
+Edouard was obliged to take the hint.  "It is I who am the
+intruder," said he.  "Mesdemoiselles, conceive, if you can, my pride
+and my disappointment."  He then bowed low; they courtesied low to
+him in return; and he retired slowly in a state of mixed feeling
+indescribable.
+
+With all their sweetness and graciousness, he felt overpowered by
+their high breeding, their reserve, and their composure, in a
+situation that had set his heart beating itself nearly out of his
+bosom.  He acted the scene over again, only much more adroitly, and
+concocted speeches for past use, and was very hot and very cold by
+turns.
+
+I wish he could have heard what passed between the sisters as soon
+as ever he was out of earshot.  It would have opened his eyes, and
+given him a little peep into what certain writers call "the sex."
+
+"Poor boy," murmured Josephine, "he has gone away unhappy."
+
+"Oh, I dare say he hasn't gone far," replied Rose, gayly.  "I
+shouldn't if I was a boy."
+
+Josephine held up her finger like an elder sister; then went on to
+say she really hardly knew why she had dismissed him.
+
+"Well, dear," said Rose, dryly, "since you admit so much, I must say
+I couldn't help thinking--while you were doing it--we were letting
+'the poor boy' off ridiculously cheap."
+
+"At least I did my duty?" suggested Josephine, inquiringly.
+
+"Magnificently; you overawed even me.  So now to business, as the
+gentlemen say.  Which of us two takes him?"
+
+"Takes whom?" inquired Josephine, opening her lovely eyes.
+
+"Edouard," murmured Rose, lowering hers.
+
+Josephine glared on the lovely minx with wonder and comical horror.
+
+"Oh! you shall have him," said Rose, "if you like.  You are the
+eldest, you know."
+
+"Fie!"
+
+"Do now; TO OBLIGE ME."
+
+"For shame! Rose.  Is this you? talking like that!"
+
+"Oh! there's no compulsion, dear; I never force young ladies'
+inclinations.  So you decline him?"
+
+"Of course I decline him."
+
+"Then, oh, you dear, darling Josephine, this is the prettiest
+present you ever made me," and she kissed her vehemently.
+
+Josephine was frightened now.  She held Rose out at arm's length
+with both hands, and looked earnestly into her, and implored her not
+to play with fire.  "Take warning by me."
+
+Rose recommended her to keep her pity for Monsieur Riviere, "who had
+fallen into nice hands," she said.  That no doubt might remain on
+that head, she whispered mysteriously, but with much gravity and
+conviction, "I am an Imp;" and aimed at Josephine with her
+forefinger to point the remark.  For one second she stood and
+watched this important statement sink into her sister's mind, then
+set-to and gambolled elfishly round her as she moved stately and
+thoughtful across the grass to the chateau.
+
+Two days after this a large tree was blown down in Beaurepaire park,
+and made quite a gap in the prospect.  You never know what a big
+thing a leafy tree is till it comes down.  And this ill wind blew
+Edouard good; for it laid bare the chateau to his inquiring
+telescope.  He had not gazed above half an hour, when a female
+figure emerged from the chateau.  His heart beat.  It was only
+Jacintha.  He saw her look this way and that, and presently Dard
+appeared, and she sent him with his axe to the fallen tree.  Edouard
+watched him hacking away at it.  Presently his heart gave a violent
+leap; for why? two ladies emerged from the Pleasaunce and walked
+across the park.  They came up to Dard, and stood looking at the
+tree and Dard hacking it, and Edouard watched them greedily.  You
+know we all love to magnify her we love.  And this was a delightful
+way of doing it.  It is "a system of espionage" that prevails under
+every form of government.  How he gazed, and gazed, on his now polar
+star; studied every turn, every gesture, with eager delight, and
+tried to gather what she said, or at least the nature of it.
+
+But by and by they left Dard and strolled towards the other end of
+the park.  Then did our astronomer fling down his tube, and come
+running out in hopes of intercepting them, and seeming to meet them
+by some strange fortuity.  Hope whispered he should be blessed with
+a smile; perhaps a word even.  So another minute and he was running
+up the road to Beaurepaire.  But his good heart was doomed to be
+diverted to a much humbler object than his idol; as he came near the
+fallen tree he heard loud cries for help, followed by groans of
+pain.  He bounded over the hedge, and there was Dard hanging over
+his axe, moaning.  "What is the matter? what is the matter?" cried
+Edouard, running to him.
+
+"Oh! oh! cut my foot.  Oh!"
+
+Edouard looked, and turned sick, for there was a gash right through
+Dard's shoe, and the blood welling up through it.  But, recovering
+himself by an effort of the will, he cried out, "Courage, my lad!
+don't give in.  Thank Heaven there's no artery there.  Oh, dear, it
+is a terrible cut!  Let us get you home, that is the first thing.
+Can you walk?"
+
+"Lord bless you, no! nor stand neither without help."
+
+Edouard flew to the wheelbarrow, and, reversing it, spun a lot of
+billet out.  "Ye must not do that," said Dard with all the energy he
+was capable of in his present condition.  "Why, that is Jacintha's
+wood."--"To the devil with Jacintha and her wood too!" cried
+Edouard, "a man is worth more than a fagot.  Come, I shall wheel you
+home: it is only just across the park."
+
+With some difficulty he lifted him into the barrow.  Luckily he had
+his shooting-jacket on with a brandy-flask in it: he administered it
+with excellent effect.
+
+The ladies, as they walked, saw a man wheeling a barrow across the
+park, and took no particular notice; but, as Riviere was making for
+the same point they were, though at another angle, presently the
+barrow came near enough for them to see Dard's head and arms in it.
+Rose was the first to notice this.  "Look! look! if he is not
+wheeling Dard in the barrow now."
+
+"Who?"
+
+"Can you ask?  Who provides all our excitement?"
+
+Josephine instantly divined there was something amiss.  "Consider,"
+said she, "Monsieur Riviere would not wheel Dard all across the park
+for amusement."
+
+Rose assented; and in another minute, by a strange caprice of fate,
+those Edouard had come to intercept, quickened their pace to
+intercept him.  As soon as he saw their intention he thrilled all
+over, but did not slacken his pace.  He told Dard to take his coat
+and throw it over his foot, for here were the young ladies coming.
+
+"What for?" said Dard sulkily.  "No! let them see what they have
+done with their little odd jobs: this is my last for one while.  I
+sha'n't go on two legs again this year."
+
+The ladies came up with them.
+
+"O monsieur!" said Josephine, "what is the matter?"
+
+"We have met with a little accident, mademoiselle, that is all.
+Dard has hurt his foot; nothing to speak of, but I thought he would
+be best at home."
+
+Rose raised the coat which Riviere, in spite of Dard, had flung over
+his foot.
+
+"He is bleeding!  Dard is bleeding!  Oh, my poor Dard.  Oh! oh!"
+
+"Hush, Rose!"
+
+"No, don't put him out of heart, mademoiselle.  Take another pull at
+the flask, Dard.  If you please, ladies, I must have him home
+without delay."
+
+"Oh yes, but I want him to have a surgeon," cried Josephine.  "And
+we have no horses nor people to send off as we used to have."
+
+"But you have me, mademoiselle," said Edouard tenderly.  "Me, who
+would go to the world's end for you."  He said this to Josephine,
+but his eye sought Rose.  "I'm a famous runner," he added, a little
+bumptiously; "I'll be at the town in half an hour, and send a
+surgeon up full gallop."
+
+"You have a good heart," said Rose simply.
+
+He bowed his blushing, delighted face, and wheeled Dard to his
+cottage hard by with almost more than mortal vigor.  How softly, how
+nobly, that frolicsome girl could speak!  Those sweet words rang in
+his ears and ran warm round and round his heart, as he straightened
+his arms and his back to the work.  When they had gone about a
+hundred yards, a single snivel went off in the wheelbarrow.  Five
+minutes after, Dard was at home in charge of his grandmother, his
+shoe off, his foot in a wet linen cloth; and Edouard, his coat tied
+round the neck, squared his shoulders, and ran the two short leagues
+out.  He ran them in forty minutes, found the surgeon at home, told
+the case, pooh-poohed that worthy's promise to go to the patient
+presently, darted into his stable, saddled the horse, brought him
+round, saw the surgeon into the saddle, started him, dined at the
+restaurateur's, strolled back, and was in time to get a good look at
+the chateau of Beaurepaire just as the sun set on it.
+
+Jacintha came into Dard's cottage that evening.
+
+"So you have been at it, my man," cried she cheerfully and rather
+roughly, then sat down and rocked herself, with her apron over her
+head.  She explained this anomalous proceeding to his grandmother
+privately.  "I thought I would keep his heart up anyway, but you see
+I was not fit."
+
+Next morning, as Riviere sat writing, he received an unexpected
+visit from Jacintha.  She came in with her finger to her lips, and
+said, "You prowl about Dard's cottage.  They are sure to go and see
+him every day, and him wounded in their service."
+
+"Oh, you good girl! you dear girl!" cried Edouard.
+
+She did not reply in words, but, after going to the door, returned
+and gave him a great kiss without ceremony.  "Dare say you know what
+that's for," said she, and went off with a clear conscience and
+reddish cheeks.
+
+Dard's grandmother had a little house, a little land, a little
+money, and a little cow.  She could just maintain Dard and herself,
+and her resources enabled Dard to do so many little odd jobs for
+love, yet keep his main organ tolerably filled.
+
+"Go to bed, my little son, since you have got hashed," said she.--
+"Bed be hanged," cried he.  "What good is bed?  That's a silly old
+custom wants doing away with.  It weakens you: it turns you into
+train oil: it is the doctor's friend, and the sick man's bane.  Many
+a one dies through taking to bed, that could have kept his life if
+he had kept his feet like a man.  If I had cut myself in two I would
+not go to bed,--till I go to the bed with a spade in it.  No! sit up
+like Julius Caesar; and die as you lived, in your clothes: don't
+strip yourself: let the old women strip you; that is their delight
+laying out a chap; that is the time they brighten up, the old
+sorceresses."  He concluded this amiable rhapsody, the latter part
+of which was levelled at a lugubrious weakness of his grandmother's
+for the superfluous embellishment of the dead, by telling her it was
+bad enough to be tied by the foot like an ass, without settling down
+on his back like a cast sheep.  "Give me the armchair.  I'll sit in
+it, and, if I have any friends, they will show it now: they will
+come and tell me what is going on in the village, for I can't get
+out to see it and hear it, they must know that."
+
+Seated in state in his granny's easy-chair, the loss of which after
+thirty years' use made her miserable, she couldn't tell why, le
+Sieur Dard awaited his friends.
+
+They did not come.
+
+The rain did, and poured all the afternoon.  Night succeeded, and
+solitude.  Dard boiled over with bitterness.  "They are a lot of
+pigs then, all those fellows I have drunk with at Bigot's and
+Simmet's.  Down with all fair-weather friends."
+
+The next day the sun shone, the air was clear, and the sky blue.
+"Ah! let us see now," cried Dard.
+
+Alas! no fellow-drinkers, no fellow-smokers, came to console their
+hurt fellow.  And Dard, who had boiled with anger yesterday, was now
+sad and despondent.  "Down with egotists," he groaned.
+
+About three in the afternoon came a tap at the door.
+
+"Ah! at last," cried Dard: "come in!"
+
+The door was slowly opened, and two lovely faces appeared at the
+threshold.  The demoiselles De Beaurepaire wore a tender look of
+interest and pity when they caught sight of Dard, and on the old
+woman courtesying to them they courtesied to her and Dard.  The next
+moment they were close to him, one a little to his right, the other
+to his left, and two pair of sapphire eyes with the mild lustre of
+sympathy playing down incessantly upon him.  How was he?  How had he
+slept?  Was he in pain?  Was he in much pain? tell the truth now.
+Was there anything to eat or drink he could fancy?  Jacintha should
+make it and bring it, if it was within their means.  A prince could
+not have had more solicitous attendants, nor a fairy king lovelier
+and less earthly ones.
+
+He looked in heavy amazement from one to the other.  Rose bent, and
+was by some supple process on one knee, taking the measure of the
+wounded foot.  When she first approached it he winced: but the next
+moment he smiled.  He had never been touched like this--it was
+contact and no contact--she treated his foot as the zephyr the
+violets--she handled it as if it had been some sacred thing.  By the
+help of his eye he could just know she was touching him.  Presently
+she informed him he was measured for a list shoe: and she would run
+home for the materials.  During her absence came a timid tap to the
+door; and Edouard Riviere entered.  He was delighted to see
+Josephine, and made sure Rose was not far off.  It was Dard who let
+out that she was gone to Beaurepaire for some cloth to make him a
+shoe.  This information set Edouard fidgeting on his chair.  He saw
+such a chance as was not likely to occur again.  He rose with
+feigned nonchalance, and saying, "I leave you in good hands; angel
+visitors are best enjoyed alone," slowly retired, with a deep
+obeisance.  Once outside the door, dignity vanished in alacrity; he
+flew off into the park, and ran as hard as he could towards the
+chateau.  He was within fifty yards of the little gate, when sure
+enough Rose emerged.  They met; his heart beat violently.
+"Mademoiselle," he faltered.
+
+"Ah! it is Monsieur Riviere, I declare," said Rose, coolly; all over
+blushes though.
+
+"Yes, mademoiselle, and I am so out of breath.  Mademoiselle
+Josephine awaits you at Dard's house."
+
+"She sent you for me?" inquired Rose, demurely.
+
+"Not positively.  But I could see I should please her by coming for
+you; there is, I believe, a bull or so about."
+
+"A bull or two! don't talk in that reckless way about such things.
+She has done well to send you; let us make haste."
+
+"But I am a little out of breath."
+
+"Oh, never mind that!  I abhor bulls."
+
+"But, mademoiselle, we are not come to them yet, and the faster we
+go now the sooner we shall."
+
+"Yes; but I always like to get a disagreeable thing over as soon as
+possible," said Rose, slyly.
+
+"Ah," replied Edouard, mournfully, "in that case let us make haste."
+
+After a little spurt, mademoiselle relaxed the pace of her own
+accord, and even went slower than before.  There was an awkward
+silence.  Edouard eyed the park boundary, and thought, "Now what I
+have to say I must say before we get to you;" and being thus
+impressed with the necessity of immediate action, he turned to lead.
+
+Rose eyed him and the ground, alternately, from under her long
+lashes.
+
+At last he began to color and flutter.  She saw something was
+coming, and all the woman donned defensive armor.
+
+"Mademoiselle."
+
+"Monsieur."
+
+"Is it quite decided that your family refuse my acquaintance, my
+services, which I still--forgive me--press on you?  Ah! Mademoiselle
+Rose, am I never to have the happiness of--of--even speaking to
+you?"
+
+"It seems so," said Rose, ironically.
+
+"Have you then decided against me too?"
+
+"I?" asked Rose.  "What have I to do with questions of etiquette?  I
+am only a child: so considered at least."
+
+"You a child--an angel like you?"
+
+"Ask any of them, they will tell you I am a child; and it is to that
+I owe this conversation, no doubt; if you did not look on me as a
+child, you would not take this liberty with me," said the young cat,
+scratching without a moment's notice.
+
+"Mademoiselle, do not be angry.  I was wrong."
+
+"Oh! never mind.  Children are little creatures without reserve, and
+treated accordingly, and to notice them is to honor them."
+
+"Adieu then, mademoiselle.  Try to believe no one respects you more
+than I do."
+
+"Yes, let us part, for there is Dard's house; and I begin to suspect
+that Josephine never sent you."
+
+"I confess it."
+
+"There, he confesses it.  I thought so all along; WHAT A DUPE I HAVE
+BEEN!"
+
+"I will offend no more," said poor silly Edouard.  "Adieu,
+mademoiselle.  May you find friends as sincere as I am, and more to
+your taste!"
+
+"Heaven hear your prayers!" replied the malicious thing, casting up
+her eyes with a mock tragic air.
+
+Edouard sighed; a chill conviction that she was both heartless and
+empty fell on him.  He turned away without another word.  She called
+to him with a sudden airy cheerfulness that made him start.  "Stay,
+monsieur, I forgot--I have a favor to ask you."
+
+"I wish I could believe that:" and his eyes brightened.
+
+Rose stopped, and began to play with her parasol.  "You seem," said
+she softly, "to be pretty generous in bestowing your acquaintance on
+strangers.  I should be glad if I might secure you for a dear friend
+of mine, Dr. Aubertin.  He will not discredit my recommendation; and
+he will not make so many difficulties as we do; shall I tell you
+why?  Because he is really worth knowing.  In short, believe me, it
+will be a valuable acquaintance for you--and for him," added she
+with all the grace of the De Beaurepaires.
+
+Many a man, inferior in a general way to Edouard Riviere, would have
+made a sensible reply to this.  Such as, "Oh, any friend of yours,
+mademoiselle, must be welcome to me," or the like.  But the proposal
+caught Edouard on his foible, his vanity, to wit; and our foibles
+are our manias.  He was mortified to the heart's core.  "She refuses
+to know me herself," thought he, "but she will use my love to make
+me amuse that old man."  His heart swelled against her injustice and
+ingratitude, and his crushed vanity turned to strychnine.
+"Mademoiselle," said he, bitterly and doggedly, but sadly, "were I
+so happy as to have your esteem, my heart would overflow, not only
+on the doctor but on every honest person around.  But if I must not
+have the acquaintance I value more than life, suffer me to be alone
+in the world, and never to say a word either to Dr. Aubertin, or to
+any human creature if I can help it."
+
+The imperious young beauty drew herself up directly.  "So be it,
+monsieur; you teach me how a child should be answered that forgets
+herself, and asks a favor of a stranger--a perfect stranger," added
+she, maliciously.
+
+Could one of the dog-days change to mid-winter in a second, it would
+hardly seem so cold and cross as Rose de Beaurepaire turned from the
+smiling, saucy fairy of the moment before.  Edouard felt as it were
+a portcullis of ice come down between her and him.  She courtesied
+and glided away.  He bowed and stood frozen to the spot.
+
+He felt so lonely and so bitter, he must go to Jacintha for comfort.
+
+He took advantage of the ladies being with Dard, and marched boldly
+into the kitchen of Beaurepaire.
+
+"Well, I never," cried Jacintha.  "But, after all, why not?"
+
+He hurled himself on the kitchen table (clean as china), and told
+her it was all over.  "She hates me now; but it is not my fault,"
+and so poured forth his tale, and feeling sure of sympathy, asked
+Jacintha whether it was not bitterly unjust of Rose to refuse him
+her own acquaintance, yet ask him to amuse that old fogy.
+
+Jacintha stood with her great arms akimbo, taking it all in, and
+looking at him with a droll expression of satirical wonder.
+
+"Now you listen to a parable," said she.  "Once there was a little
+boy madly in love with raspberry jam."
+
+"A thing I hate."
+
+"Don't tell me!  Who hates raspberry jam?  He came to the store
+closet, where he knew there were jars of it, and--oh! misery--the
+door was locked.  He kicked the door, and wept bitterly.  His mamma
+came and said, 'Here is the key,' and gave him the key.  And what
+did he do?  Why, he fell to crying and roaring, and kicking the
+door.  'I don't wa-wa-wa-wa-nt the key-ey-ey.  I wa-a-ant the jam--
+oh! oh! oh! oh!'" and Jacintha mimicked, after her fashion, the
+mingled grief and ire of infancy debarred its jam.  Edouard wore a
+puzzled air, but it was only for a moment; the next he hid his face
+in his hands, and cried, "Fool!"
+
+"I shall not contradict you," said his Mentor.
+
+"She was my best friend.  Once acquainted with the doctor, I could
+visit at Beaurepaire."
+
+"Parbleu!"
+
+"She had thought of a way to reconcile my wishes with this terrible
+etiquette that reigns here."
+
+"She thinks to more purpose than you do; that is clear."
+
+"Nothing is left now but to ask her pardon, and to consent; I am
+off."
+
+"No, you are not," and Jacintha laid a grasp of iron on him.  "Will
+you be quiet?--is not one blunder a day enough?  If you go near her
+now, she will affront you, and order the doctor not to speak to you."
+
+"O Jacintha! your sex then are fiends of malice?"
+
+"While it lasts.  Luckily with us nothing lasts very long.  Now you
+don't go near her till you have taken advantage of her hint, and
+made the doctor's acquaintance; that is easy done.  He walks two
+hours on the east road every day, with his feet in the puddles and
+his head in the clouds.  Them's HIS two tastes."
+
+"But how am I to get him out of the clouds and the puddles?"
+inquired Riviere half peevishly.
+
+"How?" asked Jacintha, with a dash of that contempt uneducated
+persons generally have for any one who does not know some little
+thing they happen to know themselves.  "How?  Why, with the nearest
+blackbeetle, to be sure."
+
+"A blackbeetle?"
+
+"Black or brown; it matters little.  Have her ready for use in your
+handkerchief: pull a long face: and says you--'Excuse me, sir, I
+have THE MISFORTUNE not to know the Greek name of this merchandise
+here.'  Say that, and behold him launched.  He will christen you the
+beast in Hebrew and Latin as well as Greek, and tell you her history
+down from the flood: next he will beg her of you, and out will come
+a cork and a pin, and behold the creature impaled.  For that is how
+men love beetles.  He has a thousand pinned down at home--beetles,
+butterflies, and so forth.  When I go near the rubbish with my
+duster he trembles like an aspen.  I pretend to be going to clean
+them, but it is only to see the face he makes, for even a domestic
+must laugh now and then--or die.  But I never do clean them, for
+after all he is more stupid than wicked, poor man: I have not
+therefore the sad courage to make him wretched."
+
+"Let us return to our beetle--what will his tirades about its
+antiquity advance me?"
+
+"Oh! one begins about a beetle, but one ends Heaven knows where."
+
+Riviere profited by this advice.  He even improved on it.  In due
+course he threw himself into Aubertin's way.  He stopped the doctor
+reverentially, and said he had heard he was an entomologist.  WOULD
+he be kind enough to tell him what was this enormous chrysalis he
+had just found?
+
+"The death's head moth!" cried Aubertin with enthusiasm--"the
+death's head moth! a great rarity in this district.  Where found you
+this?"  Riviere undertook to show him the place.
+
+It was half a league distant.  Coming and going he had time to make
+friends with Aubertin, and this was the easier that the old
+gentleman, who was a physiognomist as well as ologist, had seen
+goodness and sensibility in Edouard's face.  At the end of the walk
+he begged the doctor to accept the chrysalis.  The doctor coquetted.
+"That would be a robbery.  You take an interest in these things
+yourself--at least I hope so."
+
+The young rogue confessed modestly to the sentiment of entomology,
+but "the government worked him so hard as to leave him no hopes of
+shining in so high a science," said he sorrowfully.
+
+The doctor pitied him.  "A young man of your attainments and tastes
+to be debarred from the everlasting secrets of nature, by the
+fleeting politics of the day."
+
+Riviere shrugged his shoulders.  "Somebody must do the dirty work,"
+said he, chuckling inwardly.
+
+The chrysalis went to Beaurepaire in the pocket of a grateful man,
+who that same evening told the whole party his conversation with
+young Riviere, on whom he pronounced high encomiums.  Rose's saucy
+eyes sparkled with fun: you might have lighted a candle at one and
+exploded a mine at the other; but not a syllable did she utter.
+
+The doctor proved a key, and opened the enchanted castle.  One fine
+day he presented his friend in the Pleasaunce to the baroness and
+her daughters.
+
+They received him with perfect politeness.  Thus introduced, and as
+he was not one to let the grass grow under his feet, he soon
+obtained a footing as friend of the family, which, being now advised
+by Josephine, he took care not to compromise by making love to Rose
+before the baroness.  However, he insisted on placing his financial
+talent at their service.  He surveyed and valued their lands, and
+soon discovered that all their farms were grossly underlet.  Luckily
+most of the leases were run out.  He prepared a new rent roll, and
+showed it Aubertin, now his fast friend.  Aubertin at his request
+obtained a list of the mortgages, and Edouard drew a balance-sheet
+founded on sure data, and proved to the baroness that in able hands
+the said estate was now solvent.
+
+This was a great comfort to the old lady: and she said to Aubertin,
+"Heaven has sent us a champion, a little republican--with the face
+of an angel."
+
+Descending to practice, Edouard actually put three of the farms into
+the market, and let them at an advance of twenty per cent on the
+expired leases.  He brought these leases signed; and the baroness
+had scarcely done thanking him, when her other secret friend,
+Monsieur Perrin, was announced.  Edouard exchanged civilities with
+him, and then retired to the Pleasaunce.  There he found both
+sisters, who were all tenderness and gratitude to him.  By this time
+he had learned to value Josephine: she was so lovely and so good,
+and such a true womanly friend to him.  Even Rose could not resist
+her influence, and was obliged to be kind to him, when Josephine was
+by.  But let Josephine go, and instead of her being more tender, as
+any other girl would, left alone with her lover, sauciness resumed
+its empire till sweet Josephine returned.  Whereof cometh an
+example; for the said Josephine was summoned to a final conference
+with the baroness and Monsieur Perrin.
+
+"Don't be long," said Rose, as Josephine glided away, and (taking
+the precaution to wait till she was quite out of hearing), "I shall
+be so dull, dear, till you come back."
+
+"I shall not though," said Edouard.
+
+"I am not so sure of that.  Now then."
+
+"Now then, what?"
+
+"Begin."
+
+"Begin what?"
+
+"Amusing me."  And she made herself look sullen and unamusable all
+over.
+
+"I will try," said Riviere.  "I'll tell you what they say of you:
+that you are too young to love."
+
+"So I am, much."
+
+"No, no, no! I made a mistake.  I mean too young to be loved."
+
+"Oh, I am not too young for that, not a bit."
+
+This point settled, she suggested that, if he could not amuse her,
+he had better do THE NEXT BEST THING, and that was, talk sense.
+
+"I think I had better not talk at all," said he, "for I am no match
+for such a nimble tongue.  And then you are so remorseless.  I'll
+hold my tongue, and make a sketch of this magnificent oak."
+
+"Ay, do: draw it as it appeared on a late occasion: with two ladies
+flying out of it, and you rooted with dismay."
+
+"There is no need; that scene is engraved."
+
+"Where? in all the shops?"
+
+"No; on all our memories."
+
+"Not on mine; not on mine.  How terrified you were--ha, ha! and how
+terrified we should have been if you had not.  Listen: once upon a
+time--don't be alarmed: it was long after Noah--a frightened hare
+ran by a pond; the frogs splashed in the water, smit with awe.  Then
+she said, 'Ah ha! there are people in the world I frighten in my
+turn; I am the thunderbolt of war.'  Excuse my quoting La Fontaine:
+I am not in 'Charles the Twelfth of Sweden' yet.  I am but a child."
+
+"And it's a great mercy, for when you grow up, you will be too much
+for me, that is evident.  Come, then, Mademoiselle the Quizzer, come
+and adorn my sketch."
+
+"Monsieur, shall I make you a confession?  You will not be angry: I
+could not support your displeasure.  I have a strange inclination to
+walk up and down this terrace while you go and draw that tree in the
+Pleasaunce."
+
+"Resist that inclination; perhaps it will fly from you."
+
+"No; you fly from me, and draw.  I will rejoin you in a few minutes."
+
+"Thank you, I'm not so stupid.  You will step indoors directly."
+
+"Do you doubt my word, sir?" asked she haughtily.
+
+He had learned to obey all her caprices; so he went and placed
+himself on the west side of the oak and took out his sketch-book,
+and worked zealously and rapidly.  He had done the outlines of the
+tree and was finishing in detail a part of the huge trunk, when his
+eyes were suddenly dazzled: in the middle of the rugged bark,
+deformed here and there with great wart-like bosses, and wrinkled,
+seamed, and ploughed all over with age, burst a bit of variegated
+color; bright as a poppy on a dungeon wall, it glowed and glittered
+out through a large hole in the brown bark; it was Rose's face
+peeping.  To our young lover's eye how divine it shone!  None of the
+half tints of common flesh were there, but a thing all rose, lily,
+sapphire, and soul.  His pencil dropped, his mouth opened, he was
+downright dazzled by the glowing, bewitching face, sparkling with
+fun, in the gaunt tree.  Tell me, ladies, did she know, even at that
+age, the value of that sombre frame to her brightness?  The moment
+she found herself detected, the gaunt old tree rang musical with a
+crystal laugh, and out came the arch-dryad.  "I have been there all
+the time.  How solemn you looked!  Now for the result of such
+profound study."  He showed her his work; she altered her tone.
+"Oh, how clever!" she cried, "and how rapid!  What a facility you
+have!  Monsieur is an artist," said she gravely; "I will be more
+respectful," and she dropped him a low courtesy.  "Mind you promised
+it me," she added sharply.
+
+"You will accept it, then?"
+
+"That I will, now it is worth having: dear me, I never reckoned on
+that.  Finish it directly," cried this peremptory young person.
+
+"First I must trouble you to stand out there near the tree."
+
+"Me? what for?"
+
+"Because art loves contrasts.  The tree is a picture of age and
+gradual decay; by its side then I must place a personification of
+youth and growing loveliness."
+
+She did not answer, but made a sort of defiant pirouette, and went
+where she was bid, and stood there with her back to the artist.
+"That will never do," said he; "you really must be so good as to
+turn round."
+
+"Oh, very well."  And when she came round, behold her color had
+risen mightily.  Flattery is sweet.
+
+This child of nature was delighted, and ashamed it should be seen
+that she was.
+
+And so he drew her, and kept looking off the paper at her, and had a
+right in his character of artist to look her full in the face; and
+he did so with long lingering glances.  To be sure, they all began
+severe and businesslike with half-closed eyes, and the peculiar
+hostile expression art puts on; but then they always ended open-
+eyed, and so full and tender, that she, poor girl, who was all real
+gold, though sham brass, blushed and blushed, and did not know which
+way to look not to be scorched up by his eye like a tender flower,
+or blandly absorbed like the pearly dew.  Ah, happy hour! ah, happy
+days of youth and innocence and first love!
+
+Trouble loves to intrude on these halcyon days.
+
+The usually quiet Josephine came flying from the house, pale and
+agitated, and clung despairingly to Rose, and then fell to sobbing
+and lamenting piteously.
+
+I shall take leave to relate in my own words what had just occurred
+to agitate her so.  When she entered her mother's room, she found
+the baroness and Perrin the notary seated watching for her.  She sat
+down after the usual civilities, and Perrin entered upon the subject
+that had brought him.
+
+He began by confessing to them that he had not overcome the
+refractory creditor without much trouble; and that he had since
+learned there was another, a larger creditor, likely to press for
+payment or for sale of the estate.  The baroness was greatly
+troubled by this communication: the notary remained cool as a
+cucumber, and keenly observant.  After a pause he went on to say all
+this had caused him grave reflections.  "It seems," said he with
+cool candor, "a sad pity the estate should pass from a family that
+has held it since the days of Charlemagne."
+
+"Now God forbid!" cried the baroness, lifting her eyes and her
+quivering hands to heaven.
+
+The notary held the republican creed in all its branches.
+"Providence, madame, does not interfere--in matters of business,"
+said he.  "Nothing but money can save the estate.  Let us then be
+practical.  Has any means occurred to you of raising money to pay
+off these incumbrances?"
+
+"No.  What means can there be?  The estate is mortgaged to its full
+value: so they say, at least."
+
+"And they say true," put in the notary quickly.  "But do not
+distress yourself, madame: confide in me."
+
+"Ah, my good friend, may Heaven reward you."
+
+"Madame, up to the present time I have no complaint to make of
+Heaven.  I am on the rise: here, mademoiselle, is a gimcrack they
+have given me;" and he unbuttoned his overcoat, and showed them a
+piece of tricolored ribbon and a clasp.  "As for me, I look to 'the
+solid;' I care little for these things," said he, swelling visibly,
+"but the world is dazzled by them.  However, I can show you
+something better."  He took out a letter.  "This is from the
+Minister of the Interior to a client of mine: a promise I shall be
+the next prefect; and the present prefect--I am happy to say--is on
+his death-bed.  Thus, madame, your humble servant in a few short
+months will be notary no longer, but prefect; I shall then sell my
+office of notary: and I flatter myself when I am a prefect you will
+not blush to own me."
+
+"Then, as now, monsieur," said the baroness politely, "we shall
+recognize your merit.  But"--
+
+"I understand, madame: like me you look to 'the solid.'  Thus then
+it is; I have money."
+
+"Ah! all the better for you."
+
+"I have a good deal of money.  But it is dispersed in a great many
+small but profitable investments: to call it in suddenly would
+entail some loss.  Nevertheless, if you and my young lady there have
+ever so little of that friendly feeling towards me of which I have
+so much towards you, all my investments shall be called in, and two-
+thirds of your creditors shall be paid off at once.  A single client
+of mine, no less a man than the Commandant Raynal, will, I am sure,
+advance me the remaining third at an hour's notice; and so
+Beaurepaire chateau, park, estate, and grounds, down to the old oak-
+tree, shall be saved; and no power shall alienate them from you,
+mademoiselle, and from the heirs of your body."
+
+The baroness clasped her hands in ecstasy.
+
+"But what are we to do for this?" inquired Josephine calmly, "for it
+seems to me that it can only be effected by a sacrifice on your
+part."
+
+"I thank you, mademoiselle, for your penetration in seeing that I
+must make sacrifices.  I would never have told you, but you have
+seen it; and I do not regret that you have seen it.  Madame--
+mademoiselle--those sacrifices appear little to me; will seem
+nothing; will never be mentioned, or even alluded to after this day,
+if you, on your part, will lay me under a far heavier obligation, if
+in short"--here the contemner of things unsubstantial reopened his
+coat, and brought his ribbon to light again--"if you, madame, will
+accept me for your son-in-law--if you, mademoiselle, will take me
+for your husband."
+
+The baroness and her daughter looked at one another in silence.
+
+"Is it a jest?" inquired the former of the latter.
+
+"Can you think so?  Answer Monsieur Perrin.  He has just done us a
+kind office, mother."
+
+"I shall remember it.  Monsieur, permit me to regret that having
+lately won our gratitude and esteem, you have taken this way of
+modifying those feelings.  But after all," she added with gentle
+courtesy, "we may well put your good deeds against this--this error
+in judgment.  The balance is in your favor still, provided you never
+return to this topic.  Come, is it agreed?"  The baroness's manner
+was full of tact, and the latter sentences were said with an open
+kindliness of manner.  There was nothing to prevent Perrin from
+dropping the subject, and remaining good friends.  A gentleman or a
+lover would have so done.  Monsieur Perrin was neither.  He said
+bitterly, "You refuse me, then."
+
+The tone and the words were each singly too much for the baroness's
+pride.  She answered coldly but civilly,--
+
+"I do not refuse you.  I do not take an affront into consideration."
+
+"Be calm, mamma; no affront whatever was intended."
+
+"Ah! here is one that is more reasonable," cried Perrin.
+
+"There are men," continued Josephine without noticing him, "who look
+to but one thing--interest.  It was an offer made politely in the
+way of business: decline it in the same spirit; that is what you
+have to do."
+
+"Monsieur, you hear what mademoiselle says?  She carries politeness
+a long way.  After all it is a good fault.  Well, monsieur, I need
+not answer you, since Mademoiselle de Beaurepaire has answered you;
+but I detain you no longer."
+
+Strictly a weasel has no business with the temper of a tiger, but
+this one had, and the long vindictiveness of a Corsican.  "Ah! my
+little lady, you turn me out of the house, do you?" cried he,
+grinding his teeth.
+
+"Turn him out of the house? what a phrase! where has this man
+lived?"
+
+"A man!" snarled Perrin, "whom none ever yet insulted without
+repenting it, and repenting in vain.  You are under obligations to
+me, and you think to turn me out!  You are at my mercy, and you
+think I will let you turn me to your door!  In less than a mouth I
+will stand here, and say to you, Beaurepaire is mine.  Begone from
+it!"
+
+When he uttered these terrible words, each of which was like a
+sword-stroke to the baroness, the old lady, whose courage was not
+equal to her strength, shrank over the side of her arm-chair, and
+cried piteously--"He threatens me! he threatens me! I am
+frightened;" and put up her trembling hands, for the notary's
+eloquence, being accompanied with abundance of gesture, bordered
+upon physical violence.  His brutality received an unexpected check.
+Imagine that a sparrow-hawk had seized a trembling pigeon, and that
+a royal falcon swooped, and with one lightning-like stroke of body
+and wing, buffeted him away, and sent him gaping and glaring and
+grasping at pigeonless air with his claws.  So swift and majestic,
+Josephine de Beaurepaire came from her chair with one gesture of her
+body between her mother and the notary, who was advancing with arms
+folded in a brutal, menacing way--not the Josephine we have seen
+her, the calm languid beauty, but the demoiselle de Beaurepaire--her
+great heart on fire--her blood up--not her own only, but all the
+blood of all the De Beaurepaires--pale as ashes with great wrath,
+her purple eyes on fire, and her whole panther-like body full of
+spring.  "Wretch! you dare to insult her, and before me!  Arriere
+miserable! or I soil my hand with your face."  And her hand was up
+with the word, up, up, higher it seemed than ever a hand was raised
+before.  And if he had hesitated one moment, I really believe it
+would have come down; not heavily, perhaps--the lightning is not
+heavy.  But there was no need.  The towering threat and the flaming
+eye and the swift rush buffeted the caitiff away: he recoiled.  She
+followed him as he went, strong, FOR A MOMENT OR TWO, as Hercules,
+beautiful and terrible as Michael driving Satan.  He dared not, or
+could not stand before her: he writhed and cowered and recoiled all
+down the room, while she marched upon him.  But the driven serpent
+hissed horribly as it wriggled away.
+
+"You shall both be turned out of Beaurepaire by me, and forever; I
+swear it, parole de Perrin."
+
+He had not been gone a minute when Josephine's courage oozed away,
+and she ran, or rather tottered, into the Pleasaunce, and clung like
+a drowning thing to Rose, and, when Edouard took her hand, she clung
+to him.  They had to gather what had happened how they could: the
+account was constantly interrupted with her sobs and self-
+reproaches.  She said she had ruined all she loved: ruined her
+sister, ruined her mother, ruined the house of Beaurepaire.  Why was
+she ever born?  Why had she not died three years ago?  (Query, what
+was the date at which Camille's letters suddenly stopped?)  "That
+coward," said she, "has the heart of a fiend.  He told us he never
+forgave an affront; and he holds our fate in his hands.  He will
+drive our mother from her home, and she will die: murdered by her
+own daughter.  After all, why did I refuse him?  What should I have
+sacrificed by marrying him?  Rose, write to him, and say--say--I was
+taken by surprise, I--I"--a violent flood of tears interrupted the
+sentence.
+
+Rose flung her arms round her neck.  "My beautiful Josephine marry
+that creature?  Let house and lands go a thousand times sooner.  I
+love my sister a thousand times better than the walls of this or any
+other house."
+
+"Come, come," cried Edouard, "you are forgetting ME all this time.
+Do you really think I am the sort of man to stand by with my hands
+in my pockets, and let her marry that cur, or you be driven out of
+Beaurepaire?  Neither, while I live."
+
+"Alas! dear boy," sighed Josephine, "what can you do?"
+
+"I'll soon show you.  From this hour forth it is a duel between that
+Perrin and me.  Now, Josephine--Rose--don't you cry and fret like
+that: but just look quietly on, and enjoy the fight, both of you."
+
+Josephine shook her head with a sad smile: but Rose delivered
+herself thus, after a sob, "La, yes; I forgot: we have got a
+gentleman now; that's one comfort."
+
+Edouard rose to the situation: he saw that Perrin would lose no
+time; and that every day, or even hour, might be precious.  He told
+them that the first thing he must do for them was to leave the
+company he loved best on earth, and run down to the town to consult
+Picard the rival notary: he would be back by supper-time, when he
+hoped they would do him the honor, in a matter of such importance,
+to admit him to a family council.
+
+Josephine assented with perfect simplicity; Rose with a deep blush,
+for she was too quick not to see all the consequences of admitting
+so brisk a wooer into a family council.
+
+
+It was a wet evening, and a sad and silent party sat round a wood
+fire in the great dining-hall.  The baroness was almost prostrated
+by the scene with Perrin; and a sombre melancholy and foreboding
+weighed on all their spirits, when presently Edouard Riviere entered
+briskly, and saluted them all profoundly, and opened the proceedings
+with a little favorite pomposity.  "Madame the baroness, and you
+Monsieur Aubertin, who honor me with your esteem, and you
+Mademoiselle de Beaurepaire, whom I adore, and you Mademoiselle
+Rose, whom I hoped to be permitted--you have this day done me the
+honor to admit me as your adviser.  I am here to lay my plans before
+you.  I believe, madame, I have already convinced you that your
+farms are under-let, and your property lowered in value by general
+mismanagement; this was doubtless known to Perrin, and set him
+scheming.  Well, I rely on the same circumstance to defeat him.  I
+have consulted Picard and shown him the rent-roll and balance-sheet
+I had already shown you.  He has confessed that the estate is worth
+more than its debts, so capitalists can safely advance the money.
+To-morrow morning, then, I ride to Commandant Raynal for a week's
+leave of absence; then, armed with Picard's certificate, shall
+proceed to my uncle and ask him to lend the money.  His estate is
+very small compared with Beaurepaire, but he has always farmed it
+himself.  'I'll have no go-between,' says he, 'to impoverish both
+self and soil.'  He is also a bit of a misanthrope, and has made me
+one.  I have a very poor opinion of my fellow-creatures, very."
+
+"Well, but," said Rose, "if he is all that, he will not sympathize
+with us, who have so mismanaged Beaurepaire.  Will he not despise
+us?"
+
+Edouard was a little staggered, but Aubertin came to his aid.
+
+"Permit me, Josephine," said he.  "Natural history steps in here,
+and teaches by me, its mouth-piece.  A misanthrope hates all
+mankind, but is kind to every individual, generally too kind.  A
+philanthrope loves the whole human race, but dislikes his wife, his
+mother, his brother, and his friends and acquaintances.  Misanthrope
+is the potato: rough and repulsive outside, but good to the core.
+Philanthrope is a peach: his manner all velvet and bloom, his words
+sweet juice, his heart of hearts a stone.  Let me read Philanthrope's
+book, and fall into the hands of Misanthrope."
+
+Edouard admitted the shrewdness of this remark.
+
+"And so," said he, "my misanthrope will say plenty of biting words,--
+which, by-the-by, will not hurt you, who will not hear them, only
+me,--and then he'll lend us the money, and Beaurepaire will be free,
+and I shall have had a hand in it.  Hurrah!"
+
+Then came a delicious hour to Edouard Riviere.  Young and old poured
+out their glowing thanks and praises upon him till his checks burned
+like fire.
+
+The baroness was especially grateful, and expressed a gentle regret
+that she could see no way of showing her gratitude except in words.
+"What can we do for this little angel?" said she, turning to
+Josephine.
+
+"Leave that to me, mamma," replied Josephine, turning her lovely
+eyes full on Edouard, with a look the baroness misunderstood
+directly.
+
+She sat and watched Josephine and Edouard with comical severity all
+the rest of the time she was there; and, when she retired, she
+kissed Rose affectionately, but whispered her eldest daughter, "I
+hope you are not serious.  A mere boy compared with you."
+
+"But such a sweet one," suggested Josephine, apologetically.
+
+"What will the world come to?" said the baroness out loud, and
+retreated with a sour glance at all of them--except Rose.
+
+She had not been gone five minutes when a letter came by messenger
+to Edouard.  It was from Picard.  He read it out.
+
+
+"Perrin has been with me, to raise money.  He wants it in forty-
+eight hours.  Promises good legal security.  I have agreed to try
+and arrange the matter for him."
+
+
+They were all astonished at this.
+
+"The double-faced traitor!" cried Edouard.  "Stay; wait a minute.
+Let us read it to an end."
+
+
+"This promise is, of course, merely to prevent his going elsewhere.
+At the end of the forty-eight hours I shall begin to make
+difficulties.  Meantime, as Perrin is no fool, you had better profit
+to the full by this temporary delay."
+
+
+"Well done, Picard!" shouted Edouard.  "Notary cut notary.  I won't
+lose an hour.  I'll start at five; Commandant Raynal is an early
+riser himself."
+
+Accordingly, at five he was on the road; Raynal's quarters lay in
+the direct line to his uncle's place.  He found the commandant at
+home, and was well received.  Raynal had observed his zeal, and
+liked his manners.  He gave him the week's leave, and kept him to
+breakfast, and had his horse well fed.  At eight o'clock Edouard
+rode out of the premises in high spirits.  At the very gate he met a
+gaunt figure riding in on a squab pony.  It was Perrin the notary
+coming in hot haste to his friend and employer, Commandant Raynal.
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+
+After Edouard's departure, Josephine de Beaurepaire was sad, and
+weighed down with presentiments.  She felt as soldiers sometimes
+feel who know the enemy is undermining them; no danger on the
+surface; nothing that can be seen, met, baffled, attacked, or
+evaded; in daily peril, all the more horrible that it imitates
+perfect serenity, they await the fatal match.  She imparted her
+misgivings to Aubertin; but he assured her she exaggerated the
+danger.
+
+"We have a friend still more zealous and active than our enemy;
+believe me, your depression is really caused by his absence; we all
+miss the contact of that young heroic spirit; we are a body, and he
+its soul."
+
+Josephine was silent, for she said to herself, "Why should I dash
+their spirits? they are so happy and confident."
+
+Edouard had animated Rose and Aubertin with his own courage, and had
+even revived the baroness.
+
+It had been agreed between him and Picard that the latter should
+communicate with Dr. Aubertin direct, should anything fresh occur.
+And on the third day after Edouard's departure, Picard sent up a
+private message: "Perrin has just sent me a line to say he will not
+trouble us, as he is offered the money in another quarter."
+
+This was a heavy blow, and sent them all to bed more or less
+despondent.
+
+The next day brought a long letter from Edouard to Rose, telling her
+he had found his uncle crusty at first; but at last with a little
+patience, and the co-operation of Martha, his uncle's old servant,
+and his nurse, the old boy had come round.  They might look on the
+affair as all but settled.
+
+The contents of this letter were conveyed to the baroness.  The
+house brightened under it: the more so that there was some hope of
+their successful champion returning in person next day.  Meantime
+Perrin had applied to Raynal for the immediate loan of a large sum
+of money on excellent security.  Raynal refused plump.  Perrin rode
+away disconsolate.
+
+But the next day he returned to the charge with another proposal:
+and the nature of this second proposal we shall learn from events.
+
+The day Edouard was expected opened deliciously.  It was a balmy
+morning, and tempted the sisters out before breakfast.  They
+strolled on the south terrace with their arms round each other's
+waists, talking about Edouard, and wondering whether they should
+really see him before night.  Rose owned she had missed him, and
+confessed for the first time she was a proud and happy girl.
+
+"May I tell him so?" asked Josephine.
+
+"Not for all the world.  Would you dare?"
+
+Further discussion of that nice point was stopped by the baroness
+coming out, leaning on Dr. Aubertin.
+
+Then--how we young people of an unceremonious age should have
+stared--the demoiselles de Beaurepaire, inasmuch as this was their
+mother's first appearance, lowered their fair heads at the same time
+like young poplars bowing to the wind, and so waited reverently till
+she had slightly lifted her hands, and said, "God bless you, my
+children!"
+
+It was done in a moment on both sides, but full of grace and piety,
+and the charm of ancient manners.
+
+"How did our dear mother sleep?" inquired Josephine.  Aubertin
+interposed with a theory that she slept very well indeed if she took
+what he gave her.
+
+"Ay, IF," suggested Rose, saucily.
+
+"I slept," said the baroness, "and I wish I had not for I dreamed an
+ugly dream."  They all gathered round her, and she told her dream.
+
+"I thought I was with you all in this garden.  I was admiring the
+flowers and the trees, and the birds were singing with all their
+might.  Suddenly a dark cloud came; it cleared almost directly; but
+flowers, trees, sky, and birds were gone now, and I could see the
+chateau itself no more.  It means that I was dead.  An ugly dream,
+my children, an ugly dream."
+
+"But only a dream, dear mother," said Rose: then with a sweet,
+consoling smile, "See, here is your terrace and your chateau."
+
+"And here are your daughters," said Josephine; and they both came
+and kissed her to put their existence out of doubt.  "And here is
+your Aesculapius," said Aubertin.  "And here is your Jacintha."
+
+"Breakfast, madame," said Jacintha.  "Breakfast, mesdemoiselles.
+Breakfast, monsieur:" dropping each a distinct courtesy in turn.
+
+"She has turned the conversation very agreeably," said the baroness,
+and went in leaning on her old friend.
+
+But the sisters lagged behind and took several turns in silence.
+Rose was the first to speak.  "How superstitious of you!"
+
+"I said nothing."
+
+"No; but you looked volumes at me while mamma was telling her dream.
+For my part I feel sure love is stronger than hate; and we shall
+stay all our days in this sweet place: and O Josey! am I not a happy
+girl that it's all owing to HIM!"
+
+At this moment Jacintha came running towards them.  They took it for
+a summons to breakfast, and moved to meet her.  But they soon saw
+she was almost as white as her apron, and she came open-mouthed and
+wringing her hands.  "What shall I do? what shall I do?  Oh, don't
+let my poor mistress know!"
+
+They soon got from her that Dard had just come from the town, and
+learned the chateau was sold, and the proprietor coming to take
+possession this very day.  The poor girls were stupefied by the
+blow.
+
+If anything, Josephine felt it worst.  "It is my doing," she gasped,
+and tottered fainting.  Rose supported her: she shook it off by a
+violent effort.  "This is no time for weakness," she cried, wildly;
+"come to the Pleasaunce; there is water there.  I love my mother.
+What will I not do for her?  I love my mother."
+
+Muttering thus wildly she made for the pond in the Pleasaunce.  She
+had no sooner turned the angle of the chateau than she started back
+with a convulsive cry, and her momentary feebleness left her
+directly; she crouched against the wall and griped the ancient
+corner-stone with her tender hand till it powdered, and she spied
+with dilating eye into the Pleasaunce, Rose and Jacintha panting
+behind her.  Two men stood with their backs turned to her looking at
+the oak-tree; one an officer in full uniform, the other the human
+snake Perrin.  Though the soldier's back was turned, his off-handed,
+peremptory manner told her he was inspecting the place as its master.
+
+"The baroness! the baroness!" cried Jacintha, with horror.  They
+looked round, and the baroness was at their very backs.
+
+"What is it?" cried she, gayly.
+
+"Nothing, mamma."
+
+"Let me see this nothing."
+
+They glanced at one another, and, idle as the attempt was, the habit
+of sparing her prevailed, and they flung themselves between her and
+the blow.
+
+"Josephine is not well," said Rose.  "She wants to go in."  Both
+girls faced the baroness.
+
+"Jacintha," said the baroness, "fetch Dr. Aubertin.  There, I have
+sent her away.  So now tell me, why do you drive me back so?
+Something has happened," and she looked keenly from one to the
+other.
+
+"O mamma! do not go that way: there are strangers in the Pleasaunce."
+
+"Let me see.  So there are.  Call Jacintha back that I may order
+these people out of my premises."  Josephine implored her to be
+calm.
+
+"Be calm when impertinent intruders come into my garden?"
+
+"Mother, they are not intruders."
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+"They have a right to be in our Pleasaunce.  They have bought the
+chateau."
+
+"It is impossible.  HE was to buy it for us--there is some mistake--
+what man would kill a poor old woman like me?  I will speak to this
+gentleman: he wears a sword.  Soldiers do not trample on women.  Ah!
+that man."
+
+The notary, attracted by her voice, was coming towards her, a paper
+in his hand.
+
+Raynal coolly inspected the tree, and tapped it with his scabbard,
+and left Perrin to do the dirty work.  The notary took off his hat,
+and, with a malignant affectation of respect, presented the baroness
+with a paper.
+
+The poor old thing took it with a courtesy, the effect of habit, and
+read it to her daughters as well as her emotion permitted, and the
+language, which was as new to her as the dialect of Cat Island to
+Columbus.
+
+
+"Jean Raynal, domiciled by right, and lodging in fact at the Chateau
+of Beaurepaire, acting by the pursuit and diligence of Master
+Perrin, notary; I, Guillaume Le Gras, bailiff, give notice to
+Josephine Aglae St. Croix de Beaurepaire, commonly called the
+Baroness de Beaurepaire, having no known place of abode"--
+
+
+"Oh!"
+
+
+"but lodging wrongfully at the said Chateau of Beaurepaire, that she
+is warned to decamp within twenty-four hours"--
+
+
+"To decamp!"
+
+
+"failing which that she will be thereto enforced in the manner for
+that case made and provided with the aid of all the officers and
+agents of the public force."
+
+
+"Ah! no, messieurs, pray do not use force.  I am frightened enough
+already.  I did not know I was doing anything wrong.  I have been
+here thirty years.  But, since Beaurepaire is sold, I comprehend
+perfectly that I must go.  It is just.  As you say, I am not in my
+own house.  I will go, gentlemen, I will go.  Whither shall I go, my
+children?  The house where you were born to me is ours no longer.
+Excuse me, gentlemen--this is nothing to you.  Ah! sir, you have
+revenged yourself on two weak women--may Heaven forgive you!"
+
+The notary turned on his heel.  The poor baroness, all whose pride
+the iron law, with its iron gripe, had crushed into dismay and
+terror, appealed to him.  "O sir! send me from the house, but not
+from the soil where my Henri is laid! is there not in all this
+domain a corner where she who was its mistress may lie down and die?
+Where is the NEW BARON, that I may ask this favor of him on my
+knees?"
+
+She turned towards Raynal and seemed to be going towards him with
+outstretched arms.  But Rose checked her with fervor.  "Mamma! do
+not lower yourself.  Ask nothing of these wretches.  Let us lose
+all, but not forget ourselves."
+
+The baroness had not her daughter's spirit.  Her very person
+tottered under this blow.  Josephine supported her, and the next
+moment Aubertin came out and hastened to her side.  Her head fell
+back; what little strength she had failed her; she was half lifted,
+half led, into the house.
+
+Commandant Raynal was amazed at all this, and asked what the deuce
+was the matter.
+
+"Oh!" said the notary, "we are used to these little scenes in our
+business."
+
+"But I am not," replied the soldier.  "You never told me there was
+to be all this fuss."
+
+He then dismissed his friend rather abruptly and strode up and down
+the Pleasaunce.  He twisted his mustaches, muttered, and "pested,"
+and was ill at ease.  Accustomed to march gayly into a town, and see
+the regiment, that was there before, marching gayly out, or vice
+versa, and to strike tents twice a quarter at least, he was little
+prepared for such a scene as this.  True, he did not hear all the
+baroness's words, but more than one tone of sharp distress reached
+him where he stood, and the action of the whole scene was so
+expressive, there was little need of words.  He saw the notice
+given; the dismay it caused, and the old lady turn imploringly
+towards him with a speaking gesture, and above all he saw her
+carried away, half fainting, her hands clasped, her reverend face
+pale.  He was not a man of quick sensibilities.  He did not
+thoroughly take the scene in at first: it grew upon him afterwards.
+
+"Confound it," thought he, "I am the proprietor.  They all say so.
+Instead of which I feel like a thief.  Fancy her getting so fond of
+a PLACE as all this."
+
+Presently it occurred to him that the shortness of the notice might
+have much to do with her distress.  "These notaries," said he to
+himself, "understand nothing save law: women have piles of baggage,
+and can't strike tents directly the order comes, as we can.  Perhaps
+if I were to give them twenty-four days instead of hours?--hum!"
+
+With this the commandant fell into a brown study.  Now each of us
+has his attitude of brown study.  One runs about the room like hyena
+in his den; another stands stately with folded arms (this one seldom
+thinks to the purpose); another sits cross-legged, brows lowered:
+another must put his head into his hand, and so keep it up to
+thinking mark: another must twiddle a bit of string, or a key; grant
+him this, he can hatch an epic.  This commandant must draw himself
+up very straight, and walk six paces and back very slowly, till the
+problem was solved: I suspect he had done a good bit of sentinel
+work in his time.
+
+Now whilst he was guarding the old oak-tree, for all the world as if
+it had been the gate of the Tuileries or the barracks, Josephine de
+Beaurepaire came suddenly out from the house and crossed the
+Pleasaunce: her hair was in disorder, her manner wild: she passed
+swiftly into the park.
+
+Raynal recognized her as one of the family; and after a moment's
+reflection followed her into the park with the good-natured
+intention of offering her a month to clear out instead of a day.
+
+But it was not so easy to catch her: she flew.  He had to take his
+scabbard in his left hand and fairly run after her.  Before he could
+catch her, she entered the little chapel.  He came up and had his
+foot on the very step to go in, when he was arrested by that he
+heard within.
+
+Josephine had thrown herself on her knees and was praying aloud:
+praying to the Virgin with sighs and sobs and all her soul:
+wrestling so in prayer with a dead saint as by a strange perversity
+men cannot or will not wrestle with Him, who alone can hear a
+million prayers at once from a million different places,--can
+realize and be touched with a sense of all man's infirmities in a
+way no single saint with his partial experience of them can realize
+and be touched by them; who unasked suspended the laws of nature
+that had taken a stranger's only son, and she a widow; and wept at
+another great human sorrow, while the eyes of all the great saints
+that stood around it and Him were dry.
+
+Well, the soldier stood, his right foot on the step and his sword in
+his left hand, transfixed: listening gravely to the agony of prayer
+the innocent young creature poured forth within:--
+
+"O Madonna! hear me: it is for my mother's life.  She will die--she
+will die.  You know she cannot live if she is taken away from her
+house and from this holy place where she prays to you this many
+years.  O Queen of Heaven! put out your hand to us unfortunates!
+Virgin, hear a virgin: mother, listen to a child who prays for her
+mother's life!  The doctor says she will not live away from here.
+She is too old to wander over the world.  Let them drive us forth:
+we are young, but not her, mother, oh, not her!  Forgive the cruel
+men that do this thing!--they are like those who crucified your Son--
+they know not what they are doing.  But you, Queen of Heaven, you
+know all; and, sweet mother, if you have kind sentiments towards me,
+poor Josephine, ah! show them now: for you know that it was I who
+insulted that wicked notary, and it is out of hatred to me he has
+sold our beloved house to a hard stranger.  Look down on me, a child
+who loves her mother, yet will destroy her unless you pity me and
+help me.  Oh! what shall I say?--what shall I do? mercy! mercy! for
+my poor mother, for me!"
+
+Here her utterance was broken by sobs.
+
+The soldier withdrew his foot quietly.  Her words had knocked
+against his very breast-bone.  He marched slowly to and fro before
+the chapel, upright as a dart, and stiff as a ramrod, and actually
+pale: for even our nerves have their habits; a woman's passionate
+grief shook him as a cannon fired over his head could not.
+
+Josephine little thought who was her sentinel.  She came to the door
+at last, and there he was marching backwards and forwards, upright
+and stiff.  She gave a faint scream and drew back with a shudder at
+the sight of their persecutor.  She even felt faintish at him, as
+women will in such cases.
+
+Not being very quick at interpreting emotion, Raynal noticed her
+alarm, but not her repugnance; he saluted her with military
+precision by touching his cap as only a soldier can, and said rather
+gently for him, "A word with you, mademoiselle."
+
+She replied only by trembling.
+
+"Don't be frightened," said Raynal, in a tone not very reassuring.
+"I propose an armistice."
+
+"I am at your disposal, sir," said Josephine, now assuming a
+calmness that was belied by the long swell of her heaving bosom.
+
+"Of course you look on me as an enemy."
+
+"How can I do otherwise, sir? yet perhaps I ought not.  You did not
+know us.  You just wanted an estate, I suppose--and--oh!"
+
+"Well, don't cry; and let us come to the point, since I am a man of
+few words."
+
+"If you please, sir.  My mother may miss me."
+
+"Well, I was in position on your flank when the notary delivered his
+fire.  And I saw the old woman's distress."
+
+"Ah, sir!"
+
+"When you came flying out I followed to say a good word to you.  I
+could not catch you.  I listened while you prayed to the Virgin.
+That was not a soldier-like trick, you will say.  I confess it."
+
+"It matters little, sir, and you heard nothing I blush for."
+
+"No! by St. Denis; quite the contrary.  Well, to the point.  Young
+lady, you love your mother."
+
+"What has she on earth now but her children's love?"
+
+"Now look here, young lady, I had a mother; I loved her in my
+humdrum way very dearly.  She promised me faithfully not to die till
+I should be a colonel; and she went and died before I was a
+commandant, even; just before, too."
+
+"Then I pity you," murmured Josephine; and her soft purple eye began
+to dwell on him with less repugnance.
+
+"Thank you for that word, my good young lady," said Raynal.  "Now, I
+declare, you are the first that has said that word to me about my
+losing the true friend, that nursed me on her knee, and pinched and
+pinched to make a man of me.  I should like to tell you about her
+and me."
+
+"I shall feel honored," said Josephine, politely, but with
+considerable restraint.
+
+Then he told her all about how he had vexed her when he was a boy,
+and gone for a soldier, though she was all for trade, and how he had
+been the more anxious to see her enjoy his honors and success.
+"And, mademoiselle," said he, appealingly, "the day this epaulet was
+put on my shoulder in Italy, she died in Paris.  Ah! how could you
+have the heart to do that, my old woman?"
+
+The soldier's mustache quivered, and he turned away brusquely, and
+took several steps.  Then he came back to Josephine, and to his
+infinite surprise saw that her purple eyes were thick with tears.
+"What? you are within an inch of crying for my mother, you who have
+your own trouble at this hour."
+
+"Monsieur, our situations are so alike, I may well spare some little
+sympathy for your misfortune."
+
+"Thank you, my good young lady.  Well, then, to business; while you
+were praying to the Virgin, I was saying a word or two for my part
+to her who is no more."
+
+"Sir!"
+
+"Oh! it was nothing beautiful like the things you said to the other.
+Can I turn phrases?  I saw her behind her little counter in the Rue
+Quincampoix; for she is a woman of the people, is my mother.  I saw
+myself come to the other side of the counter, and I said, 'Look
+here, mother, here is the devil to pay about this new house.  The
+old woman talks of dying if we take her from her home, and the young
+one weeps and prays to all the saints in paradise; what shall we do,
+eh?'  Then I thought my old woman said to me, 'Jean, you are a
+soldier, a sort of vagabond; what do you want with a house in
+France? you who are always in a tent in Italy or Austria, or who
+knows where.  Have you the courage to give honest folk so much pain
+for a caprice?  Come now,' says she, 'the lady is of my age, say
+you, and I can't keep your fine house, because God has willed it
+otherwise; so give her my place; so then you can fancy it is me you
+have set down at your hearth: that will warm your heart up a bit,
+you little scamp,' said my old woman in her rough way.  She was not
+well-bred like you, mademoiselle.  A woman of the people, nothing
+more."
+
+"She was a woman of God's own making, if she was like that," cried
+Josephine, the tears now running down her cheeks.
+
+"Ah, that she was, she was.  So between her and me it is settled--
+what are you crying for NOW? why, you have won the day; the field is
+yours; your mother and you remain; I decamp."  He whipped his
+scabbard up with his left hand, and was going off without another
+word, if Josephine had not stopped him.
+
+"But, sir, what am I to think? what am I to hope? it is impossible
+that in this short interview--and we must not forget what is due to
+you.  You have bought the estate."
+
+"True; well, we will talk over that, to-morrow; but being turned out
+of the house, that was the bayonet thrust to the old lady.  So you
+run in and put her heart at rest about it.  Tell her that she may
+live and die in this house for Jean Raynal; and tell her about the
+old woman in the Rue Quincampoix."
+
+"God bless you, Jean Raynal!" cried Josephine, clasping her hands.
+
+"Are you going?" said he, peremptorily.
+
+"Oh, yes!" and she darted towards the chateau.
+
+But when she had taken three steps she paused, and seemed irresolute.
+She turned, and in a moment she had glided to Raynal again and had
+taken his hand before he could hinder her, and pressed two velvet
+lips on it, and was away again, her cheeks scarlet at what she had
+done, and her wet eyes beaming with joy.  She skimmed the grass like
+a lapwing; you would have taken her at this minute for Rose, or for
+Virgil's Camilla; at the gate she turned an instant and clasped her
+hands together, with such a look, to show Raynal she blessed him
+again, then darted into the house.
+
+"Aha, my lady," said he, as he watched her fly, "behold you changed
+a little since you came out."  He was soon on the high road marching
+down to the town at a great rate, his sword clanking, and thus ran
+his thoughts: "This does one good; you are right, my old woman.
+Your son's bosom feels as warm as toast.  Long live the five-franc
+pieces!  And they pretend money cannot make a fellow happy.  They
+lie; it is because they do not know how to spend it."
+
+Meantime at the chateau, as still befalls in emergencies and trials,
+the master spirit came out and took its real place.  Rose was now
+the mistress of Beaurepaire; she set Jacintha, and Dard, and the
+doctor, to pack up everything of value in the house.  "Do it this
+moment!" she cried; "once that notary gets possession of the house,
+it may be too late.  Enough of folly and helplessness.  We have
+fooled away house and lands; our movables shall not follow them."
+
+The moment she had set the others to work, she wrote a single line
+to Riviere to tell him the chateau and lands were sold, and would he
+come to Beaurepaire at once?  She ran with it herself to Bigot's
+auberge, the nearest post-office, and then back to comfort her
+mother.
+
+The baroness was seated in her arm-chair, moaning and wringing her
+hands, and Rose was nursing and soothing her, and bathing her
+temples with her last drop of eau de Cologne, and trying in vain to
+put some of her own courage into her, when in came Josephine radiant
+with happiness, crying "Joy! joy! joy!" and told her strange tale,
+with this difference, that she related her own share in it briefly
+and coldly, and was more eloquent than I about the strange soldier's
+goodness, and the interest her mother had awakened in his heart.
+And she told about the old woman in the Rue Quincampoix, her rugged
+phrases, and her noble, tender heart.  The baroness, deaf to Rose's
+consolations, brightened up directly at Josephine's news, and at her
+glowing face, as she knelt pouring the good news, and hope, and
+comfort, point blank into her.  But Rose chilled them both.
+
+"It is a generous offer," said, she, "but one we cannot accept.  We
+cannot live under so great an obligation.  Is all the generosity to
+be on the side of this Bonapartist?  Are we noble in name only?
+What would our father have said to such a proposal?"
+
+Josephine hung her head.  The baroness groaned.
+
+"No, mother," continued Rose; "let house and land go, but honor and
+true nobility remain."
+
+"What shall I do? you are cruel to me, Rose."
+
+"Mamma," cried the enthusiastic girl, "we need depend on no one.
+Josephine and I have youth and spirit."
+
+"But no money."
+
+"We have plenty of jewels, and pictures, and movables.  We can take
+a farm."
+
+"A farm!" shrieked the baroness.
+
+"Why, his uncle has a farm, and we have had recourse to him for
+help: better a farmhouse than an almshouse, though that almshouse
+were a palace instead of a chateau."
+
+Josephine winced and held up her hand deprecatingly.  The baroness
+paled: it was a terrible stroke of language to come from her
+daughter.  She said sternly, "There is no answer to that.  We were
+born nobles, let us die farmers: only permit me to die first."
+
+"Forgive me, mother," said Rose, kneeling.  "I was wrong; it is for
+me to obey you, not to dictate.  I speak no more."  And, after
+kissing her mother and Josephine, she crept away, but she left her
+words sticking in both their consciences.
+
+"HIS uncle," said the shrewd old lady.  "She is no longer a child;
+and she says his uncle.  This makes me half suspect it is her that
+dear boy--Josephine, tell me the truth, which of you is it?"
+
+"Dear mother, who should it be? they are nearly of an age: and what
+man would not love our sweet Rose, that had eyes or a heart?"
+
+The baroness sighed deeply; and was silent.  After awhile she said,
+"The moment they have a lover, he detaches their hearts from their
+poor old mother.  She is no longer what my Josephine is to me."
+
+"Mamma, she is my superior.  I see it more and more every day.  She
+is proud: she is just; she looks at both sides.  As for me, I am too
+apt to see only what will please those I love."
+
+"And that is the daughter for me," cried the poor baroness, opening
+her arms wide to her.
+
+The next morning when they were at breakfast, in came Jacintha to
+say the officer was in the dining-room and wanted to speak with the
+young lady he talked to yesterday.  Josephine rose and went to him.
+"Well, mademoiselle," said he gayly, "the old woman was right.  Here
+I have just got my orders to march: to leave France in a month.  A
+pretty business it would have been if I had turned your mother out.
+So you see there is nothing to hinder you from living here."
+
+"In your house, sir?"
+
+"Why not, pray?"
+
+"Forgive us.  But we feel that would be unjust to you, humiliating
+to us: the poor are sometimes proud."
+
+"Of course they are," said Raynal: "and I don't want to offend your
+pride.  Confound the house: why did I go and buy it?  It is no use
+to me except to give pain to worthy people."  He then, after a
+moment's reflection, asked her if the matter could not be arranged
+by some third party, a mutual friend.  "Then again," said he, "I
+don't know any friend of yours."
+
+"Yes, sir," said Josephine; "we have one friend, who knows you, and
+esteems you highly."
+
+She wanted to name Edouard; but she hesitated, and asked her
+conscience if it was fair to name him: and while she blushed and
+hesitated, lo and behold a rival referee hove in sight.  Raynal saw
+him, suddenly opened a window, and shouted, "Hallo come in here: you
+are wanted."
+
+Perrin had ridden up to complete the exodus of the De Beaurepaires,
+and was strolling about inspecting the premises he had expelled them
+from.
+
+Here was a pretty referee!
+
+Josephine almost screamed--"What are you doing? that is our enemy,
+our bitterest enemy.  He has only sold you the estate to spite us,
+not for the love of you.  I had--we had--we mortified his vanity.
+It was not our fault: he is a viper.  Sir, pray, pray, pray be on
+your guard against his counsels."
+
+These words spoken with rare fire and earnestness carried
+conviction: but it was too late to recall the invitation.  The
+notary entered the room, and was going to bow obsequiously to
+Raynal, when he caught sight of Josephine, and almost started.
+Raynal, after Josephine's warning, was a little at a loss how to
+make him available; and even that short delay gave the notary's one
+foible time to lead him into temptation.  "Our foibles are our
+manias."
+
+"So," said he, "you have taken possession, commandant.  These
+military men are prompt, are they not, mademoiselle?"
+
+"Do not address yourself to me, sir, I beg," said Josephine quietly.
+
+Perrin kept his self-command.  "It is only as Commandant Raynal's
+agent I presume to address so distinguished a lady: in that
+character I must inform you that whatever movables you have removed
+are yours: those we find in the house on entering we keep."
+
+"Come, come, not so fast," cried Raynal; "bother the chairs and
+tables! that is not the point."
+
+"Commandant," said the notary with dignity, "have I done anything to
+merit this? have I served your interests so ill that you withdraw
+your confidence from me?"
+
+"No, no, my good fellow; but you exceed your powers.  Just now I
+want you to take orders, not give them."
+
+"That is only just," said Perrin, "and I recall my hasty remark:
+excuse the susceptibility of a professional man, who is honored with
+the esteem of his clients; and favor me with your wishes."
+
+"All right," said Raynal heartily.  "Well, then--I want mademoiselle
+and her family to stay here while I go to Egypt with the First
+Consul.  Mademoiselle makes difficulties; it offends her delicacy."
+
+"Comedy!" said the notary contemptuously.
+
+"Though her mother's life depends on her staying here."
+
+"Comedy!" said Perrin.  Raynal frowned.
+
+"Her pride (begging her pardon) is greater than her affection."
+
+"Farce!"
+
+"I have pitched upon you to reconcile the two."
+
+"Then you have pitched upon the wrong man," said Perrin bluntly.  He
+added obsequiously, "I am too much your friend.  She has been
+talking you over, no doubt; but you have a friend, an Ulysses, who
+is deaf to the siren's voice.  I will be no party to such a
+transaction.  I will not co-operate to humbug my friend and rob him
+of his rights."
+
+If Josephine was inferior to the notary in petty sharpness, she was
+his superior in the higher kinds of sagacity; and particularly in
+instinctive perception of character.  Her eye flashed with delight
+at the line Perrin was now taking with Raynal.  The latter speedily
+justified her expectations: he just told Perrin to be off, and send
+him a more accommodating notary.
+
+"A more accommodating notary!" screamed Perrin, stung to madness by
+this reproach.  "There is not a more accommodating notary in Europe.
+Ungrateful man! is this the return for all my zeal, my integrity, my
+unselfishness?  Is there another agent in the world who would have
+let such a bargain as Beaurepaire fall into your hands?  It serves
+me right for deviating from the rules of business.  Send me another
+agent--oh!"
+
+The honest soldier was confused.  The lawyer's eloquence overpowered
+him.  He felt guilty.  Josephine saw his simplicity, and made a cut
+with a woman's two-edged sword.  "Sir," said she coolly, "do you not
+see it is an affair of money?  This is his way of saying, Pay me
+handsomely for so unusual a commission."
+
+"And I'll pay him double," cried Raynal, catching the idea; "don't
+be alarmed, I'll pay you for it."
+
+"And my zeal, my devotion?"
+
+"Put 'em in figures."
+
+"And my prob--?"
+
+"Add it up."
+
+"And my integ--?"
+
+"Add them together: and don't bother me."
+
+"I see! I see! my poor soldier.  You are no match for a woman's
+tongue."
+
+"Nor, for a notary's.  Go to h---, and send in your bill!" roared
+the soldier in a fury.  "Well, will you go?" and he marched at him.
+
+The notary scuttled out, with something between a snarl and a squeak.
+
+Josephine hid her face in her hands.
+
+"What is the matter with you?" inquired Raynal.  "Not crying again,
+surely!"
+
+"Me!  I never cry--hardly. I hid my face because I could not help
+laughing.  You frightened me, sir," said she: then very demurely, "I
+was afraid you were going to beat him."
+
+"No, no; a good soldier never leathers a civilian if he can possibly
+help it; it looks so bad; and before a lady!"
+
+"Oh, I would have forgiven you, monsieur," said Josephine benignly,
+and something like a little sun danced in her eye.
+
+"Now, mademoiselle, since my referee has proved a pig, it is your
+turn.  Choose you a mutual friend."
+
+Josephine hesitated.  "Ours is so young.  You know him very well.
+You are doubtless the commandant of whom I once heard him speak with
+such admiration: his name is Riviere, Edouard Riviere."
+
+"Know him? he is my best officer, out and out."  And without a
+moment's hesitation he took Edouard's present address, and accepted
+that youthful Daniel as their referee; then looked at his watch and
+marched off to his public duties with sabre clanking at his heels.
+
+The notary went home gnashing his teeth.  His sweet revenge was
+turned to wormwood this day.  Raynal's parting commissions rang in
+his ear; in his bitter mood the want of logical sequence in the two
+orders disgusted him.
+
+So he inverted them.
+
+He sent in a thundering bill the very next morning, but postponed
+the other commission till his dying day.
+
+As for Josephine, she came into the drawing-room beaming with love
+and happiness, and after kissing both her mother and Rose with
+gentle violence, she let them know the strange turn things had
+taken.
+
+And she whispered to Rose, "Only think, YOUR Edouard to be OUR
+referee!"
+
+Rose blushed and bent over her work; and wondered how Edouard would
+discharge so grave an office.
+
+The matter approached a climax; for, as the reader is aware, Edouard
+was hourly expected at Beaurepaire.
+
+He did not come; but it was not his fault.  On receiving Rose's
+letter he declined to stay another hour at his uncle's.
+
+He flung himself on his horse; and, before he was well settled on
+the stirrups, the animal shied violently at a wheelbarrow some fool
+had left there; and threw Edouard on the stones of the courtyard.
+He jumped up in a moment and laughed at Marthe's terror; meantime a
+farm-servant caught the nag and brought him back to his work.
+
+But when Edouard went to put his hand on the saddle, he found it
+would not obey him.  "Wait a minute," said he; "my arm is benumbed."
+
+"Let me see!" said the farmer, and examined the limb himself;
+"benumbed? yes; and no wonder.  Jacques, get on the brute and ride
+for the surgeon."
+
+"Are you mad, uncle?" cried Edouard.  "I can't spare my horse, and I
+want no surgeon; it will be well directly."
+
+"It will be worse before it is better."
+
+"I don't know what you mean, uncle; it is only numbed, ah! it hurts
+when I rub it."
+
+"It is worse than numbed, boy; it is broken."
+
+"Broken? nonsense:" and he looked at it in piteous bewilderment:
+"how can it be broken? it does not hurt except when I touch it."
+
+"It WILL hurt: I know all about it.  I broke mine fifteen years ago:
+fell off a haystack."
+
+"Oh, how unfortunate I am!" cried Edouard, piteously.  "But I will
+go to Beaurepaire all the same.  I can have the thing mended there,
+as well as here."
+
+"You will go to bed," said the old man, quietly; "that is where
+YOU'LL go."
+
+"I'll go to blazes sooner," yelled the young one.
+
+The old man made a signal to his myrmidons, whom Marthe's cries had
+brought around, and four stout fellows took hold of Edouard by the
+legs and the left shoulder and carried him up-stairs raging and
+kicking; and deposited him on a bed.
+
+Presently he began to feel faint, and so more reasonable.  They cut
+his coat off, and put him in a loose wrapper, and after considerable
+delay the surgeon came, and set his arm skilfully, and behold this
+ardent spirit caged.  He chafed and fretted sadly.  Fortitude was
+not his forte.
+
+It was two days after his accident.  He was lying on his back,
+environed by slops and cursing his evil fate, and fretting his soul
+out of its fleshly prison, when suddenly he heard a cheerful
+trombone saying three words to Marthe, then came a clink-clank, and
+Marthe ushered into the sickroom the Commandant Raynal.  The sick
+man raised himself in bed, with great surprise and joy.
+
+"O commandant! this is kind to come and see your poor officer in
+purgatory."
+
+"Ah," cried Raynal, "you see I know what it is.  I have been chained
+down by the arm, and the leg, and all: it is deadly tiresome."
+
+"Tiresome! it is--it is--oh, dear commandant, Heaven bless you for
+coming!"
+
+"Ta! ta! ta!  I am come on my own business."
+
+"All the better.  I have nothing to do; that is what kills me.  I'm
+eating my own heart."
+
+"Cannibal!  Well, my lad, since you are in that humor, cheer up, for
+I bring you a job, and a tough one; it has puzzled me."
+
+"What is it, commandant?  What is it?"
+
+"Well, do you know a house and a family called Beaurepaire?"
+
+"Do I know Beaurepaire?"
+
+And the pale youth turned very red; and stared with awe at this
+wizard of a commandant.  He thought he was going to be called over
+the coals for frequenting a disaffected family.  "Well," said
+Raynal, "I have been and bought this Beaurepaire."
+
+Edouard uttered a loud exclamation.  "It was YOU bought it! she
+never told me that."
+
+"Yes," said Raynal, "I am the culprit; and we have fixed on you to
+undo my work without hurting their pride too much, poor souls; but
+let us begin with the facts."
+
+Then Raynal told him my story after his fashion.  Of course I shall
+not go and print his version; you might like his concise way better
+than my verbose; and I'm not here to hold up any man's coat-tails.
+Short as he made it, Edouard's eyes were moist more than once; and
+at the end he caught Raynal's hand and kissed it.  Then he asked
+time to reflect; "for," said he, "I must try and be just."
+
+"I'll give you an hour," said Raynal, with an air of grand
+munificence.  The only treasure he valued was time.
+
+In less than an hour Edouard had solved the knot, to his entire
+satisfaction; he even gave the commandant particular instructions
+for carrying out his sovereign decree.  Raynal received these orders
+from his subordinate with that simplicity which formed part of his
+amazing character, and rode home relieved of all responsibility in
+the matter.
+
+
+COMMANDANT RAYNAL TO MADEMOISELLE DE BEAUREPAIRE.
+
+Mademoiselle,--Before I could find time to write to our referee,
+news came in that he had just broken his arm;--
+
+
+"Oh! oh, dear! our poor Edouard!"
+
+And if poor Edouard had seen the pale faces, and heard the faltering
+accents, it would have reconciled him to his broken arm almost.
+This hand-grenade the commandant had dropped so coolly among them,
+it was a long while ere they could recover from it enough to read
+the rest of the letter,--
+
+
+so I rode over to him, and found him on his back, fretting for want
+of something to do.  I told him the whole story.  He undertook the
+business.  I have received his instructions, and next week shall be
+at his quarters to clear off his arrears of business, and make
+acquaintance with all your family, if they permit.
+
+RAYNAL.
+
+
+As the latter part of this letter seemed to require a reply, the
+baroness wrote a polite note, and Jacintha sent Dard to leave it for
+the commandant at Riviere's lodgings.  But first they all sat down
+and wrote kind and pitying and soothing letters to Edouard.  Need I
+say these letters fell upon him like balm?
+
+They all inquired carelessly in their postscripts what he had
+decided as their referee.  He replied mysteriously that they would
+know that in a week or two.  Meantime, all he thought it prudent to
+tell them was that he had endeavored to be just to both parties.
+
+"Little solemn puppy," said Rose, and was racked with curiosity.
+
+Next week Raynal called on the baroness.  She received him alone.
+They talked about Madame Raynal.  The next day he dined with the
+whole party, and the commandant's manners were the opposite of what
+the baroness had inculcated.  But she had a strong prejudice in his
+favor.  Had her feelings been the other way his brusquerie would
+have shocked her.  It amused her.  If people's hearts are with you,
+THAT for their heads!
+
+He came every day for a week, chatted with the baroness, walked with
+the young ladies; and when after work he came over in the evening,
+Rose used to cross-examine him, and out came such descriptions of
+battles and sieges, such heroism and such simplicity mixed, as made
+the evening pass delightfully.  On these occasions the young ladies
+fixed their glowing eyes on him, and drank in his character as well
+as his narrative, in which were fewer "I's" than in anything of the
+sort you ever read or heard.
+
+At length Rose contrived to draw him aside, and, hiding her
+curiosity under feigned nonchalance, asked him what the referee had
+decided.  He told her that was a secret for the present.
+
+"Well, but," said Rose, "not from me.  Edouard and I have no
+secrets."
+
+"Come, that's good," said Raynal.  "Why, you are the very one he
+warned me against the most; said you were as curious as Mother Eve,
+and as sharp as her needle."
+
+"Then he is a little scurrilous traitor," cried Rose, turning very
+red.  "So that is how he talks of me behind my back, and calls me an
+angel to my face; I'll pay him for this.  Do tell me, commandant;
+never mind what HE says."
+
+"What! disobey orders?"
+
+"Orders? to you from that boy!"
+
+"Oh!" said Raynal, "for that matter, we soldiers are used to command
+one moment, and obey the next."
+
+In a word, this military pedant was impracticable, and Rose gave him
+up in disgust, and began to call up a sulky look when the other two
+sang his praises.  For the old lady pronounced him charming, and
+Josephine said he was a man of crystal; never said a word he did not
+mean, and she wished she was like him.  But the baroness thought
+this was going a little too far.
+
+"No, thank you," said she hastily; "he is a man, a thorough man.  He
+would make an intolerable woman.  A fine life if one had a parcel of
+women about, all blurting out their real minds every moment, and
+never smoothing matters."
+
+"Mamma, what a horrid picture!" chuckled Rose.
+
+She then proposed that at his next visit they should all three make
+an earnest appeal to him to let them know what Edouard had decided.
+
+But Josephine begged to be excused, feared it would be hardly
+delicate; and said languidly that for her part she felt they were in
+good hands, and prescribed patience.  The baroness acquiesced, and
+poor Rose and her curiosity were baffled on every side.
+
+At last, one fine day, her torments were relieved without any
+further exertion on her part.  Jacintha bounced into the drawing-
+room with a notice that the commandant wanted to speak to Josephine
+a minute out in the Pleasaunce.
+
+"How droll he is," said Rose; "fancy sending in for a young lady
+like that.  Don't go, Josephine; how, he would stare."
+
+"My dear, I no more dare disobey him than if I was one of his
+soldiers."  And she laid down her work, and rose quietly to do what
+she was bid.
+
+"Well," said Rose, superciliously, "go to your commanding officer.
+And, O Josephine, if you are worth anything at all, do get out of
+him what that Edouard has settled."
+
+Josephine kissed her, and promised to try.  After the first
+salutation, there was a certain hesitation about Raynal which
+Josephine had never seen a trace of in him before; so, to put him at
+his ease, and at the same time keep her promise to Rose, she asked
+timidly if their mutual friend had been able to suggest anything.
+
+"What! don't you know that I have been acting all along upon his
+instructions?" answered Raynal.
+
+"No, indeed! and you have not told us what he advised."
+
+"Told you? why, of course not; they were secret instructions.  I
+have obeyed one set, and now I come to the other; and there is the
+difficulty, being a kind of warfare I know nothing about."
+
+"It must be savage warfare, then," suggested the lady politely.
+
+"Not a bit of it.  Now, who would have thought I was such a coward?"
+
+Josephine was mystified; however, she made a shrewd guess.  "Do you
+fear a repulse from any one of us?  Then, I suppose, you meditate
+some extravagant act of generosity."
+
+"Not I."
+
+"Of delicacy, then."
+
+"Just the reverse.  Confound the young dog! why is he not here to
+help me?"
+
+"But, after all," suggested Josephine, "you have only to carry out
+his instructions."
+
+"That is true! that is true! but when a fellow is a coward, a
+poltroon, and all that sort of thing."
+
+This repeated assertion of cowardice on the part of the living
+Damascus blade that stood bolt-upright before her, struck Josephine
+as so funny that she laughed merrily, and bade him fancy it was only
+a fort he was attacking instead of the terrible Josephine; whom none
+but heroes feared, she assured him.
+
+This encouragement, uttered in jest, was taken in earnest.  The
+soldier thanked her, and rallied visibly at the comparison.  "All
+right," said he, "as you say, it is only a fort--so--mademoiselle!"
+
+"Monsieur!"
+
+"Hum! will you lend me your hand for a moment?"
+
+"My hand! what for? there," and she put it out an inch a minute.  He
+took it, and inspected it closely.
+
+"A charming hand; the hand of a virtuous woman?"
+
+"Yes," said Josephine as cool as a cucumber, too sublimely and
+absurdly innocent even to blush.
+
+"Is it your own?"
+
+"Sir!"  She blushed at that, I can tell you.
+
+"Because if it was, I would ask you to give it me.  (I've fired the
+first shot anyway.)"
+
+Josephine whipped her hand off his palm, where it lay like cream
+spilt on a trencher.
+
+"Ah! I see; you are not free: you have a lover."
+
+"No, no!" cried Josephine in distress; "I love nobody but my mother
+and sister: I never shall."
+
+"Your mother," cried Raynal; "that reminds me; he told me to ask
+her; by Jove, I think he told me to ask her first;" and Raynal up
+with his scabbard and was making off.
+
+Josephine begged him to do nothing of the kind.
+
+"I can save you the trouble," said she.
+
+"Ah, but my instructions! my instructions!" cried the military
+pedant, and ran off into the house, and left Josephine "planted
+there," as they say in France.
+
+Raynal demanded a private interview of the baroness so significantly
+and unceremoniously that Rose had no alternative but to retire, but
+not without a glance of defiance at the bear.  She ran straight,
+without her bonnet, into the Pleasaunce to slake her curiosity at
+Josephine.  That young lady was walking pensively, but turned at
+sight of Rose, and the sisters came together with a clash of tongues.
+
+"O Rose! he has"--
+
+"Oh!"
+
+So nimbly does the female mind run on its little beaten tracks, that
+it took no more than those syllables for even these innocent young
+women to communicate that Raynal had popped.
+
+Josephine apologized for this weakness in a hero.  "It wasn't his
+fault," said she.  "It is your Edouard who set him to do it."
+
+"My Edouard?  Don't talk in that horrid way: I have no Edouard.  You
+said 'no' of course."
+
+"Something of the kind."
+
+"What, did you not say 'no' plump?"
+
+"I did not say it brutally, dear."
+
+"Josephine, you frighten me.  I know you can't say 'no' to any one;
+and if you don't say 'no' plump to such a man as this, you might as
+well say 'yes.'"
+
+"Well, love," said Josephine, "you know our mother will relieve me
+of this; what a comfort to have a mother!"
+
+They waited for Raynal's departure, to go to the baroness.  They had
+to wait a long time.  Moreover, when he did leave the chateau he
+came straight into the Pleasaunce.  At sight of him Rose seized
+Josephine tight and bade her hold her tongue, as she could not say
+"no" plump to any one.  Josephine was far from raising any objection
+to the arrangement.
+
+"Monsieur," said Rose, before he could get a word out, "even if she
+had not declined, I could not consent."
+
+Raynal tapped his forehead reflectively, and drew forth from memory
+that he had no instructions whatever to ask HER consent.
+
+She colored high, but returned to the charge.
+
+"Is her own consent to be dispensed with too?  She declined the
+honor, did she not?"
+
+"Of course she did; but this was anticipated in my instructions.  I
+am to be sure and not take the first two or three refusals."
+
+"O Josephine, look at that insolent boy: he has found you out."
+
+"Insolent boy!" cried Raynal; "why, it is the referee of your own
+choosing, and as well behaved a lad as ever I saw, and a zealous
+officer."
+
+"My kind friends," put in Josephine with a sweet languor, "I cannot
+let you quarrel about a straw."
+
+"It is not about a straw," said Raynal, "it is about you."
+
+"The distinction involves a compliment, sir," said Josephine; then
+she turned to Rose, "Is it possible you do not see Monsieur Raynal's
+strange proposal in its true light? and you so shrewd in general.
+He has no personal feeling whatever in this eccentric proceeding: he
+wants to make us all happy, especially my mother, without seeming to
+lay us under too great an obligation.  Surely good-nature was never
+carried so far before; ha, ha! Monsieur, I will encumber you with my
+friendship forever, if you permit me, but farther than that I will
+not abuse your generosity."
+
+"Now look here, mademoiselle," began Raynal bluntly, "I did start
+with a good motive at first, that there's no denying.  But, since I
+have been every day in your company, and seen how good and kind you
+are to all about you, I have turned selfish; and I say to myself,
+what a comfort such a wife as you would be to a soldier!  Why, only
+to have you to write letters home to, would be worth half a fellow's
+pay.  Do you know sometimes when I see the fellows writing their
+letters it gives me a knock here to think I have no one at all to
+write to."
+
+Josephine sighed.
+
+"So you see I am not so mighty disinterested.  Now, mademoiselle,
+you speak so charmingly, I can't tell what you mean: can't tell
+whether you say 'no' because you could never like me, or whether it
+is out of delicacy, and you only want pressing.  So I say no more at
+present: it is a standing offer.  Take a day to consider.  Take two
+if you like.  I must go to the barracks; good-day."
+
+"Oh! this must be put an end to at once," said Rose.
+
+"With all my heart," replied Josephine; "but how?"
+
+"Come to our mother, and settle that," said the impetuous sister,
+and nearly dragged the languid one into the drawing-room.
+
+To their surprise they found the baroness walking up and down the
+room with unusual alacrity for a person of her years.  She no sooner
+caught sight of Josephine than she threw her arms open to her with
+joyful vivacity, and kissed her warmly.  "My love, you have saved
+us.  I am a happy old woman.  If I had all France to pick from I
+could not have found a man so worthy of my Josephine.  He is brave,
+he is handsome, he is young, he is a rising man, he is a good son,
+and good sons make good husbands--and--I shall die at Beaurepaire,
+shall I not, Madame the Commandante?"
+
+Josephine held her mother round the neck, but never spoke.  After a
+silence she held her tighter, and cried a little.
+
+"What is it?" asked the baroness confidentially of Rose, but without
+showing any very profound concern.
+
+"Mamma! mamma! she does not love him."
+
+"Love him?  She would be no daughter of mine if she loved a man at
+sight.  A modest woman loves her husband only."
+
+"But she scarcely knows Monsieur Raynal."
+
+"She knows more of him than I knew of your father when I married
+him.  She knows his virtues and appreciates them.  I have heard her,
+have I not, love?  Esteem soon ripens into love when they are once
+fairly married."
+
+"Mother, does her silence then tell you nothing?  Her tears--are
+they nothing to you?"
+
+"Silly child!  These are tears that do not scald.  The sweet soul
+weeps because she now for the first time sees she will have to leave
+her mother.  Alas! my eldest, it is inevitable.  Mothers are not
+immortal.  While they are here it is their duty to choose good
+husbands for their daughters.  My youngest, I believe, has chosen
+for herself--like the nation.  But for my eldest I choose.  We shall
+see which chooses the best.  Meantime we stay at Beaurepaire, thanks
+to my treasure here."
+
+"Josephine!  Josephine! you don't say one word," cried Rose in
+dismay.
+
+"What CAN I say?  I love my mother and I love you.  You draw me
+different ways.  I want you to be both happy."
+
+"Then if you will not speak out I must.  Mother, do not deceive
+yourself: it is duty alone that keeps her silent: this match is
+odious to her."
+
+"Then we are ruined.  Josephine, is this match odious to you?"
+
+"Not exactly odious: but I am very, very indifferent."
+
+"There!" cried Rose triumphantly.
+
+"There!" cried the baroness in the same breath, triumphantly.  "She
+esteems his character; but his person is indifferent to her: in
+other words, she is a modest girl, and my daughter; and let me tell
+you, Rose, that but for the misfortunes of our house, both my
+daughters would be married as I was, without knowing half as much of
+their husbands as Josephine knows of this brave, honest, generous,
+filial gentleman."
+
+"Well, then, since she will not speak out, I will.  Pity me: I love
+her so.  If this stranger, whom she does not love, takes her away
+from us, he will kill me.  I shall die; oh!"
+
+Josephine left her mother and went to console Rose.
+
+The baroness lost her temper at this last stroke of opposition.
+"Now the truth comes out, Rose; this is selfishness.  Do not deceive
+YOURself--selfishness!"
+
+"Mamma!"
+
+"You are only waiting to leave me yourself.  Yet your eldest sister,
+forsooth, must be kept here for you,--till then."  She added more
+gently, "Let me advise you to retire to your own room, and examine
+your heart fairly.  You will find there is a strong dash of egoism
+in all this."
+
+"If I do"--
+
+"You will retract your opposition."
+
+"My heart won't let me; but I will despise myself, and be silent."
+
+And the young lady, who had dried her eyes the moment she was
+accused of selfishness, walked, head erect, from the room.
+Josephine cast a deprecating glance at her mother.  "Yes, my angel!"
+said the latter, "I was harsh.  But we are no longer of one mind,
+and I suppose never shall be again."
+
+"Oh, yes, we shall.  Be patient!  Mother--you shall not leave
+Beaurepaire."
+
+The baroness colored faintly at these four last words of her
+daughter, and hung her head.
+
+Josephine saw that, and darted to her and covered her with kisses.
+
+That day the doctor scolded them both.  "You have put your mother
+into a high fever," said he; "here's a pulse; I do wish you would be
+more considerate."
+
+The commandant did not come to dinner as usual.  The evening passed
+heavily; their hearts were full of uncertainty.
+
+"We miss our merry, spirited companion," said the baroness with a
+grim look at Rose.  Both young ladies assented with ludicrous
+eagerness.
+
+That night Rose came and slept with Josephine, and more than once
+she awoke with a start and seized Josephine convulsively and held
+her tight.
+
+Accused of egoism! at first her whole nature rose in arms against
+the charge: but, after a while, coming as it did from so revered a
+person, it forced her to serious self-examination.  The poor girl
+said to herself, "Mamma is a shrewd woman.  Am I after all deceiving
+myself?  Would she be happy, and am I standing in the way?"  In the
+morning she begged her sister to walk with her in the park, so that
+they might be safe from interruption.
+
+There, she said sadly, she could not understand her own sister.
+"Why are you so calm and cold, while am I in tortures of anxiety?
+Have you made some resolve and not confided it to your Rose?"
+
+"No, love," was the reply; "I am scarce capable of a resolution; I
+am a mere thing that drifts."
+
+"Let me put it in other words, then.  How will this end?"
+
+"I hardly know."
+
+"Do you mean to marry Monsieur Raynal, then? answer me that."
+
+"No; but I should not wonder if he were to marry ME."
+
+"But you said 'no.'"
+
+"Yes, I said 'no' once."
+
+"And don't you mean to say it again, and again, and again, till
+kingdom come?"
+
+"What is the use? you heard him say he would not desist any the
+more, and I care too little about the matter to go on persisting,
+and persisting, and persisting."
+
+"Why not, if he goes on pestering, and pestering, and pestering?"
+
+"Ah, he is like you, all energy, at all hours; but I have so little
+where my heart is unconcerned: he seems, too, to have a wish!  I
+have none either way, and my conscience says 'marry him!'"
+
+"Your conscience say marry one man when you love another?"
+
+"Heaven forbid!  Rose, I love no one: I HAVE loved; but now my heart
+is dead and silent; only my conscience says, 'You are the cause of
+all your mother's trouble; you are the cause that Beaurepaire was
+sold.  Now you can repair that mischief, and at the same time make a
+brave man happy, our benefactor happy.'  It is a great temptation: I
+hardly know why I said 'no' at all; surprise, perhaps--or to please
+you, pretty one."
+
+Rose groaned: "Are you then worth so little that you would throw
+yourself away on a man who does not love you, nor want you, and is
+quite as happy single?"
+
+"No; not happy; he is only stout-hearted and good, and therefore
+content; and he is a character that it would be easy--in short, I
+feel my power here: I could make that man happy; he has nobody to
+write to even, when he is away--poor fellow!"
+
+"I shall lose all patience," cried Rose; "you are at your old trick,
+thinking of everybody but yourself: I let you do it in trifles, but
+I love you too well to permit it when the happiness of your whole
+life is at stake.  I must be satisfied on one point, or else this
+marriage shall never take place: just answer me this; if Camille
+Dujardin stood on one side, and Monsieur Raynal on the other, and
+both asked your hand, which would you take?"
+
+"That will never be.  Whose?  Not his whom I despise.  Esteem might
+ripen into love, but what must contempt end in?"
+
+This reply gave Rose great satisfaction.  To exhaust all awkward
+contingencies, she said, "One question more, and I have done.
+Suppose Camille should turn out--be not quite--what shall I say--
+inexcusable?"
+
+At this unlucky gush, Josephine turned pale, then red, then pale
+again, and cried eagerly, "Then all the world should not part us.
+Why torture me with such a question?  Ah! you have heard something."
+And in a moment the lava of passion burst wildly through its thin
+sheet of ice.  "I was blind.  This is why you would save me from
+this unnatural marriage.  You are breaking the good news to me by
+degrees.  There is no need.  Quick--quick--let me have it.  I have
+waited three years; I am sick of waiting.  Why don't you speak?  Why
+don't you tell me?  Then I will tell YOU.  He is alive--he is well--
+he is coming.  It was not he those soldiers saw; they were so far
+off.  How could they tell?  They saw a uniform but not a face.
+Perhaps he has been a prisoner, and so could not write; could not
+come: but he is coming now.  Why do you groan? why do you turn pale?
+ah! I see; I have once more deceived myself.  I was mad.  He I love
+is still a traitor to France and me, and I am wretched forever.  Oh!
+that I were dead! oh! that I were dead!  No; don't speak to me:
+never mind me; this madness will pass as it has before, and leave me
+a dead thing among the living.  Ah! sister, why did you wake me from
+my dream?  I was drifting so calmly, so peacefully, so dead, and
+painless, drifting over the dead sea of the heart towards the living
+waters of gratitude and duty.  I was going to make more than one
+worthy soul happy; and seeing them happy, I should have been content
+and useful--what am I now?--and comforted other hearts, and died
+joyful--and young.  For God is good; he releases the meek and
+patient from their burdens."
+
+With this came a flood of tears; and she leaned against a bough with
+her forehead on her arm, bowed like a wounded lily.
+
+"Accursed be that man's name, and MY tongue if ever I utter it again
+in your hearing!" cried Rose, weeping bitterly.  "You are wiser than
+I, and every way better.  O my darling, dry your tears!  Here he
+comes: look! riding across the park."
+
+"Rose," cried Josephine, hastily, "I leave all to you.  Receive
+Monsieur Raynal, and decline his offer if you think proper.  It is
+you who love me best.  My mother would give me up for a house; for
+an estate, poor dear."
+
+"I would not give you for all the world."
+
+"I know it.  I trust all to you."
+
+"Well, but don't go; stay and hear what I shall say."
+
+"Oh, no; that poor man is intolerable to me NOW.  Let me avoid his
+sight, and think of his virtues."
+
+Rose was left alone, mistress of her sister's fate.  She put her
+head into her hands and filled with anxiety and sudden doubt.
+
+Like a good many more of us, she had been positive so long as the
+decision did not rest with her.  But with power comes responsibility,
+with responsibility comes doubt.  Easy to be an advocate in
+re incerta; hard to be the judge.  And she had but a few seconds
+to think in; for Raynal was at hand.  The last thing in her
+mind before he joined her was the terrible power of that base
+Camille over her sister.  She despaired of curing Josephine, but a
+husband might.  There's such divinity doth hedge a husband in
+innocent girls' minds.
+
+"Well, little lady," began Raynal, "and how are you, and how is my
+mother-in-law that is to be--or is not to be, as your sister
+pleases; and how is SHE? have I frightened her away?  There were two
+petticoats, and now there is but one."
+
+"She left me to answer you."
+
+"All the worse for me: I am not to your taste."
+
+"Do not say that," said Rose, almost hysterically.
+
+"Oh! it is no sacrilege.  Not one in fifty likes me."
+
+"But I do like you, sir."
+
+"Then why won't you let me have your sister?"
+
+"I have not quite decided that you shall not have her," faltered
+poor Rose.  She murmured on, "I dare say you think me very unkind,
+very selfish; but put yourself in my place.  I love my sister as no
+man can ever love her, I know: my heart has been one flesh and one
+soul with hers all my life.  A stranger comes and takes her away
+from me as if she was I don't know what; his portmanteau; takes her
+to Egypt, oh! oh! oh!"
+
+Raynal comforted her.
+
+"What, do you think I am such a brute as to take that delicate
+creature about fighting with me? why, the hot sand would choke her,
+to begin.  No.  You don't take my manoeuvre.  I have no family; I
+try for a wife that will throw me in a mother and sister.  You will
+live all together the same as before, of course; only you must let
+me make one of you when I am at home.  And how often will that be?
+Besides, I am as likely to be knocked on the head in Egypt as not;
+you are worrying yourself for nothing, little lady."
+
+He uttered the last topic of consolation in a broad, hearty,
+hilarious tone, like a trombone impregnated with cheerful views of
+fate.
+
+"Heaven forbid!" cried Rose: "and I will, for even I shall pray for
+you now.  What you will leave her at home? forgive me for not seeing
+all your worth: of course I knew you were an angel, but I had no
+idea you were a duck.  You are just the man for my sister.  She
+likes to obey: you are all for commanding.  So you see.  Then she
+never thinks of herself; any other man but you would impose on her
+good-nature; but you are too generous to do that.  So you see.  Then
+she esteems you so highly.  And one whom I esteem (between you and
+me) has chosen you for her."
+
+"Then say yes, and have done with it," suggested the straightforward
+soldier.
+
+"Why should I say 'no?' you will make one another happy some day:
+you are both so good.  Any other man but you would tear her from me;
+but you are too just, too kind.  Heaven will reward you.  No! I
+will.  I will give you Josephine: ah, my dear brother-in-law, it is
+the most precious thing I have to give in the world."
+
+"Thank you, then.  So that is settled.  Hum! no, it is not quite; I
+forgot; I have something for you to read; an anonymous letter.  I
+got it this morning; it says your sister has a lover."
+
+The letter ran to this tune: a friend who had observed the
+commandant's frequent visits at Beaurepaire wrote to warn him
+against traps.  Both the young ladies of Beaurepaire were doubtless
+at the new proprietor's service to pick and choose from.  But for
+all that each of them had a lover, and though these lovers had their
+orders to keep out of the way till monsieur should be hooked, he
+might be sure that if he married either, the man of her heart would
+come on the scene soon after, perhaps be present at the wedding.
+
+In short, it was one of those poisoned arrows a coarse vindictive
+coward can shoot.
+
+It was the first anonymous letter Rose had ever seen.  It almost
+drove her mad on the spot.  Raynal was sorry he had let her see it.
+
+She turned red and white by turns, and gasped for breath.
+
+"Why am I not a man?--why don't I wear a sword?  I would pass it
+through this caitiff's heart.  The cowardly slave!--the fiend! for
+who but a fiend could slander an angel like my Josephine?  Hooked?
+Oh! she will never marry you if she sees this."
+
+"Then don't let her see it: and why take it to heart like that?  I
+don't trust to the word of a man who owns that his story is a thing
+he dares not sign his name to; at all events, I shall not put his
+word against yours.  But it is best to understand one another in
+time.  I am a plain man, but not a soft one.  I should not be an
+easygoing husband like some I see about: I'd have no wasps round my
+honey; if my wife took a lover I would not lecture THE WOMAN--what
+is the use?--I'd kill THE MAN then and there, in-doors or out, as I
+would kill a snake.  If she took another, I'd send him after the
+first, and so on till one killed me."
+
+"And serve the wretches right."
+
+"Yes; but for my own sake I don't choose to marry a woman that loves
+any other man.  So tell me the plain truth; come."
+
+Rose turned chill in her inside.  "I have no lover," she stammered.
+"I have a young fool that comes and teases me: but it is no secret.
+He is away, but why? he is on a sickbed, poor little fellow!"
+
+"But your sister?  She could not have a lover unknown to you."
+
+"I defy her.  No, sir; I have not seen her speak three words to any
+young man except Monsieur Riviere this three years past."
+
+"That is enough;" and he tore the letter quietly to atoms.
+
+Then Rose saw she could afford a little more candor.  "Understand
+me; I can't speak of what happened when I was a child.  But if ever
+she had a girlish attachment, he has not followed it up, or surely I
+should have seen something of him all these years."
+
+"Of course.  Oh! as for flirtations, let them pass: a lovely girl
+does not grow up without one or two whispering some nonsense into
+her ear.  Why, I myself should have flirted no doubt; but I never
+had the time.  Bonaparte gives you time to eat and drink, but not to
+sleep or flirt, and that reminds me I have fifty miles to ride, so
+good-by, sister-in-law, eh?"
+
+"Adieu, brother-in-law."
+
+Left alone, Rose had some misgivings.  She had equivocated with one
+whose upright, candid nature ought to have protected him: but an
+enemy had accused Josephine; and it came so natural to shield her.
+"Did he really think I would expose my own sister?" said she to
+herself, angrily.  Was not this anger secret self-discontent?
+
+
+"Well, love," said Josephine, demurely, "have you dismissed him?"
+
+"No."
+
+Josephine smiled feebly.  "It is easy to say 'say no;' but it is not
+so easy to say 'no,' especially when you feel you ought to say
+'yes,' and have no wish either way except to give pleasure to
+others."
+
+"But I am not such skim milk as all that," replied Rose: "I have
+always a strong wish where you are concerned, and your happiness.  I
+hesitated whilst I was in doubt, but I doubt no longer: I have had a
+long talk with him.  He has shown me his whole heart: he is the
+best, the noblest of creatures: he has no littleness or meanness.
+And then he is a thorough man; I know that by his being the very
+opposite of a woman in his ways.  Now you are a thorough woman, and
+so you will suit one another to a T.  I have decided: so no more
+doubts, love; no more tears; no more disputes.  We are all of one
+mind, and I do think I have secured your happiness.  It will not
+come in a day, perhaps, but it will come.  So then in one little
+fortnight you marry Monsieur Raynal."
+
+"What!" said Josephine, "you have actually settled that?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"But are you sure I can make him as happy as he deserves?"
+
+"Positive."
+
+"I think so too; still"--
+
+"It is settled, dear," said Rose soothingly.
+
+"Oh, the comfort of that! you relieve me of a weight; you give me
+peace.  I shall have duties; I shall do some good in the world.
+They were all for it but you before, were they not?"
+
+"Yes, and now I am strongest for it of them all.  Josephine, it is
+settled."
+
+Josephine looked at her for a moment in silence, then said eagerly,
+"Bless you, dear Rose; you have saved your sister;" then, after a
+moment, in a very different voice, "O Camille! Camille! why have you
+deserted me?"
+
+And with this she fell to sobbing terribly.  Rose wept on her neck,
+but said nothing.  She too was a woman, and felt that this was the
+last despairing cry of love giving up a hopeless struggle.
+
+They sat twined together in silence till Jacintha came to tell them
+it was close upon dinner-time; so then they hastened to dry their
+tears and wash their red eyes, for fear their mother should see what
+they had been at, and worry herself.
+
+
+"Well, mademoiselle, these two consent; but what do you say? for
+after all, it is you I am courting, and not them.  Have you the
+courage to venture on a rough soldier like me?"
+
+This delicate question was put point-blank before the three ladies.
+
+"Sir," replied Josephine timidly, "I will be as frank, as
+straightforward as you are.  I thank you for the honor you do me."
+
+Raynal looked perplexed.
+
+"And does that mean 'yes' or 'no'?"
+
+"Which you please," said Josephine, hanging her sweet head.
+
+The wedding was fixed for that day fortnight.  The next morning
+wardrobes were ransacked.  The silk, muslin, and lace of their
+prosperous days were looked out: grave discussions were held over
+each work of art.  Rose was active, busy, fussy.  The baroness threw
+in the weight of her judgment and experience.
+
+Josephine managed to smile whenever either Rose or the baroness
+looked at all fixedly at her.
+
+So glided the peaceful days.  So Josephine drifted towards the haven
+of wedlock.
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+
+At Bayonne, a garrison town on the south frontier of France, two
+sentinels walked lethargically, crossing and recrossing before the
+governor's house.  Suddenly their official drowsiness burst into
+energy; for a pale, grisly man, in rusty, defaced, dirty, and torn
+regimentals, was walking into the courtyard as if it belonged to
+him.  The sentinels lowered their muskets, and crossed them with a
+clash before the gateway.
+
+The scarecrow did not start back.  He stopped and looked down with a
+smile at the steel barrier the soldiers had improvised for him, then
+drew himself a little up, carried his hand carelessly to his cap,
+which was nearly in two, and gave the name of an officer in the
+French army.
+
+If you or I, dressed like a beggar who years ago had stolen
+regimentals and worn them down to civil garments, had addressed
+these soldiers with these very same words, the bayonets would have
+kissed closer, or perhaps the points been turned against our sacred
+and rusty person: but there is a freemasonry of the sword.  The
+light, imperious hand that touched that battered cap, and the quiet
+clear tone of command told.  The sentinels slowly recovered their
+pieces, but still looked uneasy and doubtful in their minds.  The
+battered one saw this, and gave a sort of lofty smile; he turned up
+his cuffs and showed his wrists, and drew himself still higher.
+
+The sentinels shouldered their pieces sharp, then dropped them
+simultaneously with a clatter and ring upon the pavement.
+
+"Pass, captain."
+
+The rusty figure rang the governor's bell.  A servant came and eyed
+him with horror and contempt.  He gave his name, and begged to see
+the governor.  The servant left him in the hall, and went up-stairs
+to tell his master.  At the name the governor reflected, then
+frowned, then bade his servant reach him down a certain book.  He
+inspected it.  "I thought so: any one with him?"
+
+"No, your excellency."
+
+"Load my pistols, put them on the table, show him in, and then order
+a guard to the door."
+
+The governor was a stern veteran with a powerful brow, a shaggy
+eyebrow, and a piercing eye.  He never rose, but leaned his chin on
+his hand, and his elbow on a table that stood between them, and eyed
+his visitor very fixedly and strangely.  "We did not expect to see
+you on this side the Pyrenees," said he gravely.
+
+"Nor I myself, governor."
+
+"What do you come for?"
+
+"A suit of regimentals, and money to take me to Paris."
+
+"And suppose, instead of that, I turn out a corporal's guard, and
+bid them shoot you in the courtyard?"
+
+"It would be the drollest thing you ever did, all things considered,"
+said the other coolly, but bitterly.
+
+The governor looked for the book he had lately consulted, found the
+page, handed it to the rusty officer, and watched him keenly: the
+blood rushed all over his face, and his lip trembled; but his eye
+dwelt stern yet sorrowful on the governor.
+
+"I have read your book, now read mine."  He drew off his coat and
+showed his wrists and arms, blue and waled.  "Can you read that,
+sir?"
+
+"No."
+
+"All the better for you: Spanish fetters, general."  He showed a
+white scar on his shoulder.  "Can you read that?  This is what I cut
+out of it," and he handed the governor a little round stone as big
+and almost as regular as a musket-ball.
+
+"Humph! that could hardly have been fired from a French musket."
+
+"Can you read this?" and he showed him a long cicatrix on his other
+arm.
+
+"Knife I think," said the governor.
+
+"You are right, sir: Spanish knife.  Can you read this?" and opening
+his bosom he showed a raw wound on his breast.
+
+"Oh, the devil!" cried the governor.
+
+The wounded man put his rusty coat on again, and stood erect, and
+haughty, and silent.
+
+The general eyed him, and saw his great spirit shining through this
+man.  The more he looked the less could the scarecrow veil the hero
+from his practised eye.  He said there must be some mistake, or else
+he was in his dotage; after a moment's hesitation, he added, "Be
+seated, if you please, and tell me what you have been doing all
+these years."
+
+"Suffering."
+
+"Not all the time, I suppose."
+
+"Without intermission."
+
+"But what? suffering what?"
+
+"Cold, hunger, darkness, wounds, solitude, sickness, despair,
+prison, all that man can suffer."
+
+"Impossible! a man would be dead at that rate before this."
+
+"I should have died a dozen deaths but for one thing; I had promised
+her to live."
+
+There was a pause.  Then the old soldier said gravely, but more
+kindly, to the young one, "Tell me the facts, captain" (the first
+time he had acknowledged his visitor's military rank).
+
+An hour had scarce elapsed since the rusty figure was stopped by the
+sentinels at the gate, when two glittering officers passed out under
+the same archway, followed by a servant carrying a furred cloak.
+The sentinels presented arms.  The elder of these officers was the
+governor: the younger was the late scarecrow, in a brand-new uniform
+belonging to the governor's son.  He shone out now in his true
+light; the beau ideal of a patrician soldier; one would have said he
+had been born with a sword by his side and drilled by nature, so
+straight and smart, yet easy he was in every movement.  He was like
+a falcon, eye and all, only, as it were, down at the bottom of the
+hawk's eye lay a dove's eye.  That compound and varying eye seemed
+to say, I can love, I can fight: I can fight, I can love, as few of
+you can do either.
+
+The old man was trying to persuade him to stay at Bayonne, until his
+wound should be cured.
+
+"No, general, I have other wounds to cure of longer standing than
+this one."
+
+"Well, promise me to lay up at Paris."
+
+"General, I shall stay an hour at Paris."
+
+"An hour in Paris!  Well, at least call at the War Office and
+present this letter."
+
+That same afternoon, wrapped in the governor's furred cloak, the
+young officer lay at his full length in the coupe of the diligence,
+the whole of which the governor had peremptorily demanded for him,
+and rolled day and night towards Paris.
+
+He reached it worn with fatigue and fevered by his wound, but his
+spirit as indomitable as ever.  He went to the War Office with the
+governor's letter.  It seemed to create some little sensation; one
+functionary came and said a polite word to him, then another.  At
+last to his infinite surprise the minister himself sent down word he
+wished to see him; the minister put several questions to him, and
+seemed interested in him and touched by his relation.
+
+"I think, captain, I shall have to send to you: where do you stay in
+Paris?"
+
+"Nowhere, monsieur; I leave Paris as soon as I can find an easy-
+going horse."
+
+"But General Bretaux tells me you are wounded."
+
+"Not dangerously."
+
+"Pardon me, captain, but is this prudent? is it just to yourself and
+your friends?"
+
+"Yes, I owe it to those who perhaps think me dead."
+
+"You can write to them."
+
+"I grudge so great, so sacred a joy to a letter.  No! after all I
+have suffered I claim to be the one to tell her I have kept my word:
+I promised to live, and I live."
+
+"HER? then I say no more, only tell me what road you take."
+
+"The road to Brittany."
+
+As the young officer was walking his horse by the roadside about a
+league and a half from Paris, he heard a clatter behind him, and up
+galloped an aide-de-camp and drew up alongside, bringing his horse
+nearly on his haunches.
+
+He handed him a large packet sealed with the arms of France.  The
+other tore it open; and there was his brevet as colonel.  His cheek
+flushed and his eye glittered with joy.  The aide-de-camp next gave
+him a parcel: "Your epaulets, colonel!  We hear you are going into
+the wilds where epaulets don't grow.  You are to join the army of
+the Rhine as soon as your wound is well."
+
+"Wherever my country calls me."
+
+"Your address, then, colonel, that we may know where to put our
+finger on a tried soldier when we want one."
+
+"I am going to Beaurepaire."
+
+"Beaurepaire?  I never heard of it."
+
+"You never heard of Beaurepaire? it is in Brittany, forty-five
+leagues from Paris, forty-three leagues and a half from here."
+
+"Good!  Health and honor to you, colonel."
+
+"The same to you, lieutenant; or a soldier's death."
+
+The new colonel read the precious document across his horse's mane,
+and then he was going to put one of the epaulets on his right
+shoulder, bare at present: but he reflected.
+
+"No; she should make him a colonel with her own dear hand.  He put
+them in his pocket.  He would not even look at them till she had
+seen them.  Oh, how happy he was not only to come back to her alive,
+but to come back to her honored."
+
+His wound smarted, his limbs ached, but no pain past or present
+could lay hold of his mind.  In his great joy he remembered past
+suffering and felt present pain--yet smiled.  Only every now and
+then he pined for wings to shorten the weary road.
+
+He was walking his horse quietly, drooping a little over his saddle,
+when another officer well mounted came after him and passed him at a
+hand gallop with one hasty glance at his uniform, and went tearing
+on like one riding for his life.
+
+"Don't I know that face?" said Dujardin.
+
+He cudgelled his memory, and at last he remembered it was the face
+of an old comrade.  At least it strongly reminded him of one Jean
+Raynal who had saved his life in the Arno, when they were lieutenants
+together.
+
+Yes, it was certainly Raynal, only bronzed by service in some hot
+country.
+
+"Ah!" thought Camille; "I suppose I am more changed than he is; for
+he certainly did not recognize me at all.  Now I wonder what that
+fellow has been doing all this time.  What a hurry he was in! a
+moment more and I should have hailed him.  Perhaps I may fall in
+with him at the next town."
+
+He touched his horse with the spur, and cantered gently on, for
+trotting shook him more than he could bear.  Even when he cantered
+he had to press his hand against his bosom, and often with the
+motion a bitterer pang than usual came and forced the water from his
+eyes; and then he smiled.  His great love and his high courage made
+this reply to the body's anguish.  And still his eyes looked
+straight forward as at some object in the distant horizon, while he
+came gently on, his hand pressed to his bosom, his head drooping now
+and then, smiling patiently, upon the road to Beaurepaire.
+
+Oh! if anybody had told him that in five days his Josephine was to
+be married; and that the bronzed comrade, who had just galloped past
+him, was to marry her!
+
+
+At Beaurepaire they were making and altering wedding-dresses.  Rose
+was excited, and even Josephine took a calm interest.  Dress never
+goes for nothing with her sex.  The chairs and tables were covered,
+and the floor was littered.  The baroness was presiding over the
+rites of vanity, and telling them what she wore at her wedding,
+under Louis XV., with strict accuracy, and what we men should
+consider a wonderful effort of memory, when the Commandant Raynal
+came in like a cannon-ball, without any warning, and stood among
+them in a stiff, military attitude.  Exclamations from all the
+party, and then a kind greeting, especially from the baroness.
+
+"We have been so dull without you, Jean."
+
+"And I have missed you once or twice, mother-in-law, I can tell you.
+Well, I have got bad news; but you must consider we live in a busy
+time.  To-morrow I start for Egypt."
+
+Loud ejaculations from the baroness and Rose.  Josephine put down
+her work quietly.
+
+The baroness sighed deeply, and the tears came into her eyes.  "Oh,
+you must not be down-hearted, old lady," shouted Raynal.  "Why, I am
+as likely to come back from Egypt as not.  It is an even chance, to
+say the least."
+
+This piece of consolation completed the baroness's unhappiness.  She
+really had conceived a great affection for Raynal, and her heart had
+been set on the wedding.
+
+"Take away all that finery, girls," said she bitterly; "we shall not
+want it for years.  I shall not be alive when he comes home from
+Egypt.  I never had a son--only daughters--the best any woman ever
+had; but a mother is not complete without a son, and I shall never
+live to have one now."
+
+"I hate General Bonaparte," said Rose viciously.
+
+"Hate my general?" groaned Raynal, looking down with a sort of
+superstitious awe and wonder at the lovely vixen.  "Hate the best
+soldier the world ever saw?"
+
+"What do I care for his soldiership?  He has put off our wedding.
+For how many years did you say?"
+
+"No; he has put it on."
+
+In answer to the astonished looks this excited, he explained that
+the wedding was to have been in a week, but now it must be to-morrow
+at ten o'clock.
+
+The three ladies set up their throats together.  "Tomorrow?"
+
+"To-morrow.  Why, what do you suppose I left Paris for yesterday?
+left my duties even."
+
+"What, monsieur?" asked Josephine, timidly, "did you ride all that
+way, and leave your duties MERELY TO MARRY ME?" and she looked a
+little pleased.
+
+"You are worth a great deal more trouble than that," said Raynal
+simply.  "Besides, I had passed my word, and I always keep my word."
+
+"So do I," said Josephine, a little proudly.  "I will not go from it
+now, if you insist; but I confess to you, that such a proposal
+staggers me; so sudden--no preliminaries--no time to reflect; in
+short, there are so many difficulties that I must request you to
+reconsider the matter."
+
+"Difficulties," shouted Raynal with merry disdain; "there are none,
+unless you sit down and make them; we do more difficult things than
+this every day of our lives: we passed the bridge of Arcola in
+thirteen minutes; and we had not the consent of the enemy, as we
+have yours--have we not?"
+
+Her only reply was a look at her mother, to which the baroness
+replied by a nod; then turning to Raynal, "This empressement is very
+flattering; but I see no possibility: there is an etiquette we
+cannot altogether defy: there are preliminaries before a daughter of
+Beaurepaire can become a wife."
+
+"There used to be all that, madam," laughed Raynal, putting her down
+good-humoredly; "but it was in the days when armies came out and
+touched their caps to one another, and went back into winter
+quarters.  Then the struggle was who could go slowest; now the fight
+is who can go fastest.  Time and Bonaparte wait for nobody; and
+ladies and other strong places are taken by storm, not undermined a
+foot a month as under Noah Quartorze: let me cut this short, as time
+is short."
+
+He then drew a little plan of a wedding campaign.  "The carriages
+will be here at 9 A.M.," said he; "they will whisk us down to the
+mayor's house by a quarter to ten: Picard, the notary, meets us
+there with the marriage contract, to save time; the contract signed,
+the mayor will do the marriage at quick step out of respect for me--
+half an hour--quarter past ten; breakfast in the same house an hour
+and a quarter:--we mustn't hurry a wedding breakfast--then ten
+minutes or so for the old fogies to waste in making speeches about
+our virtues--my watch will come out--my charger will come round--I
+rise from the table--embrace my dear old mother--kiss my wife's
+hand--into the saddle--canter to Paris--roll to Toulon--sail to
+Egypt.  But I shall leave a wife and a mother behind me: they will
+both send me a kind word now and then; and I will write letters to
+you all from Egypt, and when I come home, my wife and I will make
+acquaintance, and we will all be happy together: and if I am killed
+out there, don't you go and fret your poor little hearts about it;
+it is a soldier's lot sooner or later.  Besides, you will find I
+have taken care of you; nobody shall come and turn you out of your
+quarters, even though Jean Raynal should be dead; I have got to meet
+Picard at Riviere's on that very business--I am off."
+
+He was gone as brusquely as he came.
+
+"Mother! sister!" cried Josephine, "help me to love this man."
+
+"You need no help," cried the baroness, with enthusiasm, "not love
+him, we should all be monsters."
+
+Raynal came to supper looking bright and cheerful.  "No more work
+to-day.  I have nothing to do but talk; fancy that."
+
+This evening Josephine de Beaurepaire, who had been silent and
+thoughtful, took a quiet opportunity, and purred in his ear,
+"Monsieur!"
+
+"Mademoiselle!" rang the trombone.
+
+"Am I not to go to Egypt?"
+
+"No."
+
+Josephine drew back at this brusque reply like a sensitive plant.
+But she returned to the attack.
+
+"But is it not a wife's duty to be by her husband's side to look
+after his comfort--to console him when others vex him--to soothe him
+when he is harassed?"
+
+"Her first duty is to obey him."
+
+"Certainly."
+
+"Well, when I am your husband, I shall bid you stay with your mother
+and sister while I go to Egypt."
+
+"I shall obey you."
+
+He told her bluntly he thought none the worse of her for making the
+offer; but should not accept it.
+
+
+Camille Dujardin slept that night at a roadside inn about twelve
+miles from Beaurepaire, and not more than six from the town where
+the wedding was to take place next day.
+
+It was a close race.
+
+And the racers all unconscious of each other, yet spurred impartially
+by events that were now hurrying to a climax.
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+
+The next day at sharp nine two carriages were at the door.
+
+But the ladies were not ready.  Thus early in the campaign did they
+throw all into disorder.  For so nicely had Raynal timed the several
+events that this threw him all into confusion.  He stamped backwards
+and forwards, and twisted his mustaches, and swore.  This enforced
+unpunctuality was a new torture to him.  Jacintha told them he was
+angry, and that made them nervous and flurried, and their fingers
+strayed wildly among hooks and eyes, and all sorts of fastenings;
+they were not ready till half-past nine.  Conscious they deserved a
+scolding, they sent Josephine down first to mollify.  She dawned
+upon the honest soldier so radiant, so dazzling in her snowy dress,
+with her coronet of pearls (an heirloom), and her bridal veil
+parted, and the flush of conscious beauty on her cheek, that instead
+of scolding her, he actually blurted out, "Well! by St. Denis it was
+worth waiting half an hour for."
+
+He recovered a quarter of an hour by making the driver gallop.  Then
+occasional shrieks issued from the carriage that held the baroness.
+That ancient lady feared annihilation: she had not come down from a
+galloping age.
+
+They drove into the town, drew up at the mayor's house, were
+received with great ceremony by that functionary and Picard, and
+entered the house.
+
+When their carriages rattled into the street from the north side,
+Colonel Dujardin had already entered it from the south, and was
+riding at a foot's pace along the principal street.  The motion of
+his horse now shook him past endurance.  He dismounted at an inn a
+few doors from the mayor's house, and determined to do the rest of
+the short journey on foot.  The landlord bustled about him
+obsequiously.  "You are faint, colonel; you have travelled too far.
+Let me order you an excellent breakfast."
+
+"No.  I want a carriage; have you one?"
+
+"I have two; but, unluckily, they are both engaged for the day, and
+by people of distinction.  Commandant Raynal is married to-day."
+
+"Ah! I wish him joy," said Camille, heartily.  He then asked the
+landlord to open the window, as he felt rather faint.  The landlord
+insisted on breakfast, and Camille sat down to an omelet and a
+bottle of red wine.  Then he lay awhile near the window, revived by
+the air, and watched the dear little street he had not seen for
+years.  He felt languid, but happy, celestially happy.
+
+She was a few doors from him, and neither knew it.
+
+A pen was put into her white hand, and in another moment she had
+signed a marriage contract.
+
+"Now to the church," cried the baroness, gayly.  To get to the
+church, they must pass by the window Camille reclined at.
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+
+"Oh! there's no time for that," said Raynal.  And as the baroness
+looked horrified and amazed, Picard explained: "The state marries
+its citizens now, with reason: since marriage is a civil contract."
+
+"Marriage a civil contract!" repeated the baroness.  "What, is it
+then no longer one of the holy sacraments?  What horrible impiety
+shall we come to next?  Unhappy France!  Such a contract would never
+be a marriage in my eyes: and what would become of an union the
+Church had not blessed?"
+
+"Madame," said Picard, "the Church can bless it still; but it is
+only the mayor here that can DO it."
+
+All this time Josephine was blushing scarlet, and looking this way
+and that, with a sort of instinctive desire to fly and hide, no
+matter where, for a week or so.
+
+"Haw! haw! haw!" roared Raynal; "here is a pretty mother.  Wants her
+daughter to be unlawfully married in a church, instead of lawfully
+in a house.  Give me the will!"
+
+"Look here, mother-in-law: I have left Beaurepaire to my lawful
+wife."
+
+"Otherwise," put in Picard, "in case of death, it would pass to his
+heir-at-law."
+
+"And HE would turn you all out, and that does not suit me.  Now
+there stands the only man who can make mademoiselle my LAWFUL wife.
+So quick march, monsieur the mayor, for time and Bonaparte wait for
+no man."
+
+"Stay a minute, young people," said the mayor.  "We should soothe
+respectable prejudices, not crush them.  Madam, I am at least as old
+as you, and have seen many changes.  I perfectly understand your
+feelings."
+
+"Ah, monsieur! oh!"
+
+"Calm yourself, dear madam; the case is not so bad as you think.  It
+is perfectly true that in republican France the civil magistrate
+alone can bind French citizens in lawful wedlock.  But this does not
+annihilate the religious ceremony.  You can ask the Church's
+blessing on my work; and be assured you are not the only one who
+retains that natural prejudice.  Out of every ten couples that I
+marry, four or five go to church afterwards and perform the ancient
+ceremonies.  And they do well.  For there before the altar the
+priest tells them what it is not my business to dilate upon--the
+grave moral and religious duties they have undertaken along with
+this civil contract.  The state binds, but the Church still blesses,
+and piously assents to that"--
+
+"From which she has no power to dissent."
+
+"Monsieur Picard, do you consider it polite to interrupt the chief
+magistrate of the place while he is explaining the law to a
+citizen?"
+
+(This closed Picard.)
+
+"I married a daughter last year," continued the worthy mayor.
+
+"What, after this fashion?"
+
+"I married her myself, as I will marry yours, if you will trust me
+with her.  And after I have made them one, there is nothing to
+prevent them adjourning to the church."
+
+"I beg your pardon," cried Raynal, "there are two things to prevent
+it: a couple that wait for no man: Time and Bonaparte.  Come, sir;
+marry us, and have done with it."
+
+The mayor assented.  He invited Josephine to stand before him.  She
+trembled and wept a little: Rose clung to her and wept, and the good
+mayor married the parties off hand.
+
+"Is that all?" asked the baroness; "it is terribly soon done."
+
+"It is done effectively, madam," said the mayor, with a smile.
+"Permit me to tell you that his Holiness the Pope cannot undo my
+work."
+
+Picard grinned slyly, and whispered something into Raynal's ear.
+
+"Oh! indeed," said Raynal aloud and carelessly.  "Come, Madame
+Raynal, to breakfast: follow us, the rest of you."
+
+They paired, and followed the bride and bridegroom into the
+breakfast-room.
+
+
+The light words Picard whispered were five in number.
+
+Now if the mayor had not snubbed Picard just before, he would have
+uttered those jocose but true words aloud.  There was no particular
+reason why he should not.  And if he had,--The threads of the web of
+life, how subtle they are!  The finest cotton of Manchester, the
+finer meshes of the spider, seem three-inch cables by comparison
+with those moral gossamers which vulgar eyes cannot see at all, the
+"somethings, nothings," on which great fates have hung.
+
+It was a cheerful breakfast, thanks to Raynal, who would be in high
+spirits, and would not allow a word of regret from any one.  Madame
+Raynal sat by his side, looking up at him every now and then with
+innocent admiration.  A merry wedding breakfast.
+
+But if men and women could see through the walls of houses!
+
+Two doors off sat the wounded colonel alone, recruiting the small
+remnant of his sore tried strength, that he might struggle on to
+Beaurepaire, and lose in one moment years of separation, pain,
+prison, anguish, martyrdom, in one great gush of joy without
+compare.
+
+
+The wedding breakfast was ended.  The time was drawing near to part.
+There was a silence.  It was broken by Madame Raynal.  She asked
+Raynal very timidly if he had reflected.  "On what?" said he.
+
+"About taking me to Egypt."
+
+"No: I have not given it a thought since I said 'no.'"
+
+"Yet permit me to say that it is my duty to be by your side, my
+husband."  And she colored at this word, being the first time she
+had ever used it.  Raynal was silent.  She murmured on, "I would not
+be an encumbrance to you, sir: I should not be useless.  Gentlemen,
+I could add more to his comfort than he gives me credit for."
+
+Warm assent of the mayor and notary to this hint.
+
+"I give you credit for being an angel," said Raynal warmly.
+
+He hesitated.  Rose was trembling, her fork shaking in her poor
+little hand.
+
+She cast a piteous glance at him.  He saw it.
+
+"You shall go with me next time," said he.  "Let us speak of it no
+more."
+
+Josephine bowed her head.  "At least give me something to do for you
+while you are away.  Tell me what I can do for my absent friend to
+show my gratitude, my regard, my esteem."
+
+"Well, let me think.  I saw a plain gray dress at Beaurepaire."
+
+"Yes, monsieur.  My gray silk, Rose."
+
+"I like that dress."
+
+"Do you?  Then the moment I reach home after losing you I shall put
+it on, and it shall be my constant wear.  I see; you are right; gray
+becomes a wife whose husband is not dead, but is absent, and alas!
+in hourly danger."
+
+"Now look at that!" cried Raynal to the company.  "That is her all
+over: she can see six meanings where another would see but one.  I
+never thought of that, I swear.  I like modest colors, that is all.
+My mother used to be all for modest wives wearing modest colors."
+
+"I am of her mind, sir.  Is there nothing more difficult you will be
+so good as give me to do?"
+
+"No; there is only one order more, and that will be easier still to
+such a woman as you.  I commit to your care the name of Raynal.  It
+is not so high a name as yours, but it is as honest.  I am proud of
+it: I am jealous of it.  I shall guard it for you in Egypt: you
+guard it in France for me."
+
+"With my life," cried Josephine, lifting her eyes and her hand to
+heaven.
+
+Soon after this Raynal ordered his charger.
+
+The baroness began to cry.  "The young people may hope to see you
+again," said she; "but there are two chances against your poor old
+mother."
+
+"Courage, mother!" cried the stout soldier.  "No, no; you won't play
+me such a trick: once is enough for that game."
+
+"Brother!" cried Rose, "do not go without kissing your little
+sister, who loves you and thanks you."  He kissed her.  "Bravo,
+generous soul!" she cried, with her arms round his neck.  "God
+protect you, and send you back safe to us!"
+
+"Amen!" cried all present by one impulse, even the cold notary.
+
+Raynal's mustache quivered.  He kissed Josephine hastily on the
+brow, the baroness on both cheeks; shook the men's hands warmly but
+hastily, and strode out without looking behind him.  He was moved
+for once.
+
+They all followed him to the door of the house.  He was tightening
+his horse's girths.  He flung himself with all the resolution of his
+steel nature into the saddle, and, with one grand wave of his cocked
+hat to the tearful group, he spurred away for Egypt.
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+
+The baroness took the doctor a-shopping; she must buy Rose a gray
+silk.  In doing this she saw many other tempting things.  I say no
+more.
+
+But the young ladies went up to Beaurepaire in the other carriage,
+for Josephine wished to avoid the gaze of the town, and get home and
+be quiet.  The driver went very fast.  He had drunk the bride's
+health at the mayor's, item the bridegroom's, the bridesmaid's, the
+mayor's, etc., and "a spur in the head is worth two in the heel,"
+says the proverb.  The sisters leaned back on the soft cushions, and
+enjoyed the smooth and rapid motion once so familiar to them, so
+rare of late.
+
+Then Rose took her sister gently to task for having offered to go to
+Egypt.  She had forgotten her poor sister.
+
+"No, love," replied Josephine, "did you not see I dared not look
+towards you?  I love you better than all the world; but this was my
+duty.  I was his wife: I had no longer a feeble inclination and a
+feeble disinclination to decide between, but right on one side,
+wrong on the other."
+
+"Oh! I know where your ladyship's strength lies: my force is--in--my
+inclinations."
+
+"Yes, Rose," continued Josephine thoughtfully, "duty is a great
+comfort: it is so tangible; it is something to lay hold of for life
+or death; a strong tower for the weak but well disposed."
+
+Rose assented, and they were silent a minute; and when she spoke
+again it was to own she loved a carriage.  "How fast we glide!  Now
+lean back with me, and take my hand, and as we glide shut your eyes
+and think: whisper me all your feelings, every one of them."
+
+"Well, then," said Josephine, half closing her eyes, "in the first
+place I feel a great calm, a heavenly calm.  My fate is decided.  No
+more suspense.  My duties are clear.  I have a husband I am proud
+of.  There is no perfidy with him, no deceit, no disingenuousness,
+no shade.  He is a human sun.  He will make me a better, truer
+woman, and I him a happier man.  Yes, is it not nice to think that
+great and strong as he is I can teach him a happiness he knows not
+as yet?"  And she smiled with the sense of her delicate power, but
+said no more; for she was not the one to talk much about herself.
+But Rose pressed her.  "Yes, go on, dear," she said, "I seem to see
+your pretty little thoughts rising out of your heart like a bubbling
+fountain: go on."
+
+Thus encouraged, Josephine thought on aloud, "And then, gratitude!"
+said she.  "I have heard it said, or read it somewhere, that
+gratitude is a burden: I cannot understand that sentiment; why, to
+me gratitude is a delight, gratitude is a passion.  It is the
+warmest of all the tender feelings I have for dear Monsieur Raynal.
+I feel it glow here, in my bosom.  I think I shall love him as I
+ought long before he comes back."
+
+"BEFORE?"
+
+"Yes," murmured Josephine, her eyes still half closed.  "His virtues
+will always be present to me.  His little faults of manner will not
+be in sight.  Good Raynal!  The image of those great qualities I
+revere so, perhaps because I fail in them myself, will be before my
+mind; and ere he comes home I shall love him dearly.  I'll tell you
+one reason why I wished to go home at once was--no--you must guess."
+
+"Guess?" said Rose, contemptuously.  "As if I did not see it was to
+put on your gray silk."
+
+Josephine smiled assent, and said almost with fervor, "Good Raynal!
+I feel prouder of his honest name than of our noble one.  And I am
+so calm, dear, thanks to you, so tranquil; so pleased that my
+mother's mind is at rest, so convinced all is for the best, so
+contented with my own lot; so hap--py."
+
+A gentle tear stole from beneath her long lashes.  Rose looked at
+her wistfully: then laid her cheek to hers.  They leaned back hand
+in hand, placid and silent.
+
+The carriage glided fast.  Beaurepaire was almost in sight.
+
+Suddenly Josephine's hand tightened on Rose's, and she sat up in the
+carriage like a person awakened from a strange dream.
+
+"What is it?" asked Rose.
+
+"Some one in uniform."
+
+"Oh, is that all?  Ah! you thought it was a message from Raynal."
+
+"Oh! no! on foot--walking very slowly.  Coming this way, too.
+Coming this way!" and she became singularly restless, and looked
+round in the carriage.  It was one of those old chariots with no
+side windows, but a peep hole at the back.  This aperture, however,
+had a flap over it.  Josephine undid the flap with nimble though
+agitated fingers; and saw--nothing.  The road had taken a turn.
+"Oh," said Rose, carelessly, "for that matter the roads are full of
+soldiers just now."
+
+"Ay, but not of officers on foot."
+
+Rose gave her such a look, and for the first time this many a day
+spoke sternly to her, and asked her what on earth she had to do with
+uniforms or officers except one, the noblest in the world, her
+husband.
+
+A month ago that word was almost indifferent to Josephine, or rather
+she uttered it with a sort of mild complacency.  Now she started at
+it, and it struck chill upon her.  She did not reply, however, and
+the carriage rolled on.
+
+"He seemed to be dragging himself along."  This was the first word
+Josephine had spoken for some time.  "Oh, did he?" replied Rose
+carelessly; "well, let him.  Here we are, at home."
+
+"I am glad of it," said Josephine, "very glad."
+
+On reaching Beaurepaire she wanted to go up-stairs at once and put
+on her gray gown.  But the day was so delightful that Rose begged
+her to stroll in the Pleasaunce for half an hour and watch for their
+mother's return.  She consented in an absent way, and presently
+began to walk very fast, unconscious of her companion.  Rose laid a
+hand upon her playfully to moderate her, and found her skin burning.
+
+"Why, what is the matter?" said she, anxiously.
+
+"Nothing, nothing," was the sharp reply.
+
+"There's a fretful tone; and how excited you look, and feel too.
+Well, I thought you were unnaturally calm after such an event."
+
+"I only saw his back," said Josephine.  "Did not you see him?"
+
+"See who?  Oh, that tiresome officer.  Why, how much more are we to
+hear about him?  I don't believe there WAS one."
+
+At this moment a cocked hat came in sight, bobbing up and down above
+the palings that divided the park from the road.  Josephine pointed
+to it without a word.
+
+Rose got a little cross at being practically confuted, and said
+coldly, "Come, let us go in; the only cocked hat we can see is on
+the way to Paris."
+
+Josephine assented eagerly.  But she had not taken two steps towards
+the house ere she altered her mind, and said she felt faint, she
+wanted air; no, she should stay out a little longer.  "Look, Rose,"
+said she, in a strangely excited way, "what a shame!  They put all
+manner of rubbish into this dear old tree: I will have it all turned
+out."  And she looked with feigned interest into the tree: but her
+eyes seemed turned inward.
+
+Rose gave a cry of surprise.  "He is waving his hat to me!  What on
+earth does that mean?"
+
+"Perhaps he takes you for me," said Josephine.
+
+"Who is it?  What do you mean?"
+
+"IT IS HE!  I knew his figure at a glance."  And she blushed and
+trembled with joy; she darted behind the tree and peered round at
+him unseen: turning round a moment she found Rose at her back pale
+and stern.  She looked at her, and said with terrible simplicity,
+"Ah, Rose, I forgot."
+
+"Are you mad, Josephine?  Into the house this moment; if it IS he, I
+will receive him and send him about his business."
+
+But Josephine stood fascinated, and pale as ashes; for now the
+cocked hat stopped, and a pale face with eyes whose eager fire shone
+even at that distance, rose above the palings.  Josephine crouched
+behind Rose, and gasped out, "Something terrible is coming,
+terrible! terrible!"
+
+"Say something hateful," said Rose, trembling in her turn, but only
+with anger.  "The heartless selfish traitor!  He never notices you
+till you are married to the noblest of mankind; and then he comes
+here directly to ruin your peace.  No; I have altered my mind.  He
+shall not see you, of course; but YOU shall hear HIM.  I'll soon
+make you know the wretch and loathe him as I do.  There, now he has
+turned the corner; hide in the oak while he is out of sight.  Hide,
+quick, quick."  Josephine obeyed mechanically; and presently,
+through that very aperture whence her sister had smiled on her lover
+she hissed out, in a tone of which one would not have thought her
+capable, "Be wise, be shrewd; find out who is the woman that has
+seduced him from me, and has brought two wretches to this.  I tell
+you it is some wicked woman's doing.  He loved me once."
+
+"Not so loud!--one word: you are a wife.  Swear to me you will not
+let him see you, come what may."
+
+"Oh! never! never!" cried Josephine with terror.  "I would rather
+die.  When you have heard what he has to say, then tell him I am
+dead.  No, tell him I adore my husband, and went to Egypt this day
+with him.  Ah! would to God I had!"
+
+"Sh! sh!"
+
+"Sh!"
+
+Camille was at the little gate.
+
+Rose stood still, and nerved herself in silence.  Josephine panted
+in her hiding-place.
+
+Rose's only thought now was to expose the traitor to her sister, and
+restore her peace.  She pretended not to see Camille till he was
+near her.  He came eagerly towards her, his pale face flushing with
+great joy, and his eyes like diamonds.
+
+"Josephine!  It is not Josephine, after all," said he.  "Why, this
+must be Rose, little Rose, grown up to a fine lady, a beautiful
+lady."
+
+"What do you come here for, sir?" asked Rose in a tone of icy
+indifference.
+
+"What do I come here for? is that the way to speak to me? but I am
+too happy to mind.  Dear Beaurepaire! do I see you once again!"
+
+"And madame?"
+
+"What madame?"
+
+"Madame Dujardin that is or was to be."
+
+"This is the first I have ever heard of her," said Camille, gayly.
+
+"This is odd, for we have heard all about it."
+
+"Are you jesting?"
+
+"No."
+
+"If I understand you right, you imply that I have broken faith with
+Josephine?"
+
+"Certainly."
+
+"Then you lie, Mademoiselle Rose de Beaurepaire."
+
+"Insolent!"
+
+"No.  It is you who have insulted your sister as well as me.  She
+was not made to be deserted for meaner women.  Come, mademoiselle,
+affront me, and me alone, and you shall find me more patient.  Oh!
+who would have thought Beaurepaire would receive me thus?"
+
+"It is your own fault.  You never sent her a line for all these
+years."
+
+"Why, how could I?"
+
+"Well, sir, the information you did not supply others did.  We know
+that you were seen in a Spanish village drinking between two
+guerillas."
+
+"That is true," said Camille.
+
+"An honest French soldier fired at you.  Why, he told us so himself."
+
+"He told you true," said Camille, sullenly.  "The bullet grazed my
+hand; see, here is the mark.  Look!"  She did look, and gave a
+little scream; but recovering herself, said she wished it had gone
+through his heart.  "Why prolong this painful interview?" said she;
+"the soldier told us all."
+
+"I doubt that," said Camille.  "Did he tell you that under the table
+I was chained tight down to the chair I sat in?  Did he tell you
+that my hand was fastened to a drinking-horn, and my elbow to the
+table, and two fellows sitting opposite me with pistols quietly
+covering me, ready to draw the trigger if I should utter a cry?  Did
+he tell you that I would have uttered that cry and died at that
+table but for one thing, I had promised her to live?"
+
+"Not he; he told me nothing so incredible.  Besides, what became of
+you all these years?  You are a double traitor, to your country and
+to her."
+
+Camille literally gasped for breath.  "You are a most cruel young
+lady to insult me so," said he, and scalding tears forced themselves
+from his eyes.
+
+Rose eyed him with merciless scorn.
+
+He fought manfully against this weakness, with which his wound and
+his fatigue had something to do, as well as Rose's bitter words; and
+after a gallant struggle he returned her her haughty stare, and
+addressed her thus: "Mademoiselle, I feel myself blush, but it is
+for you I blush, not for myself.  This is what BECAME of me.  I went
+out alone to explore; I fell into an ambuscade; I shot one of the
+enemy, and pinked another, but my arm being broken by a bullet, and
+my horse killed under me, the rascals got me.  They took me about,
+tried to make a decoy of me as I have told you, and ended by
+throwing me into a dungeon.  They loaded me with chains, too, though
+the walls were ten feet thick, and the door iron, and bolted and
+double-bolted outside.  And there for months and years, in spite of
+wounds, hunger, thirst, and all the tortures those cowards made me
+suffer, I lived, because, Rose, I had promised some one at that gate
+there (and he turned suddenly and pointed to it) that I would come
+back alive.  At last, one night, my jailer came to my cell drunk.  I
+seized him by the throat and throttled him till he was insensible;
+his keys unlocked my fetters, and locked him in the cell, and I got
+safely outside.  But there a sentinel saw me, and fired at me.  He
+missed me but ran after me, and caught me.  You see I was stiff,
+confined so long.  He gave me a thrust of his bayonet; I flung my
+heavy keys fiercely in his face; he staggered; I wrested his piece
+from him, and disabled him."
+
+"Ah!"
+
+"I crossed the frontier in the night, and got to Bayonne; and
+thence, day and night, to Paris.  There I met a reward for all my
+anguish.  They gave me the epaulets of a colonel.  See, here they
+are.  France does not give these to traitors, young lady."  He held
+them out to her in both hands.  She eyed them half stupidly; all her
+thoughts were on the oak-tree hard by.  She began to shudder.
+Camille was telling the truth.  She felt that; she saw it; and
+Josephine was hearing it.  "Ay! look at them, you naughty girl,"
+said Camille, trying to be jocose over it all with his poor
+trembling lip.  He went on to say that from the moment he had left
+dark Spain, and entered fair France everybody was so kind, so
+sympathizing.  "They felt for the poor worn soldier coming back to
+his love.  All but you, Rose.  You told me I was a traitor to her
+and to France."
+
+"I was told so," said Rose, faintly.  She was almost at her wits'
+end what to say or do.
+
+"Well, are you sorry or not sorry for saying such a cruel thing to a
+poor fellow?"
+
+"Sorry, very sorry," whispered Rose.  She could not persist in
+injustice, yet she did not want Josephine to hear.
+
+"Then say no more about it; there's my hand.  You are not a soldier,
+and did not know what you were talking about."
+
+"I am very sorry I spoke so harshly to you.  But you understand.
+How you look; how you pant."
+
+"There, I will show you I forgive you.  These epaulets, dear, I have
+never put them on.  I said, no; Josephine shall put them on for me.
+I will take honor as well as happiness from her dear hand.  But you
+are her sister, and what are epaulets compared with what she will
+give me?  You shall put them on, dear.  Come, then you will be sure
+I bear no malice."
+
+Rose, faint at heart, consented in silence, and fastened on the
+epaulets.  "Yes, Camille!" she cried, with sudden terror, "think of
+glory, now; nothing but glory."
+
+"No one thinks of it more.  But to-day how can I think of it, how
+can I give her a rival?  To-day I am all love.  Rose, no man ever
+loved a human creature as I love Josephine.  Your mother is well,
+dear?  All are well at Beaurepaire?  Oh, where is she all this time?
+in the house?"  He was moving quickly towards the house; but Rose
+instinctively put out her hand to stop him.  He recoiled a little
+and winced.
+
+"What is the matter?" cried she.
+
+"Nothing, dear girl; you put your hand on my wound, that is all.
+What is that noise in the tree?  Anybody listening to us?"
+
+"I'll see," said Rose, with all a woman's wit, and whipped hastily
+round to hinder Camille from going.  She found Josephine white as
+death, apparently fainting, and clutching at the tree convulsively
+with her nails.  Such was the intensity of the situation that she
+left her beloved sister in that piteous state, and even hoped she
+would faint dead away, and so hear no more.  She came back white,
+and told Camille it was only a bird got into the tree.  "And to
+think you should be wounded," said she, to divert his attention from
+the tree.
+
+"Yes," said he, "and it is rather inflamed, and has worried me all
+the way.  You need not go telling Josephine, though.  They wanted me
+to stop and lay up at Bayonne.  How could I?  And again at Paris.
+How could I?  They said, 'You will die.'--'Not before I get to
+Beaurepaire,' said I.  I could bear the motion of a horse no longer,
+so at the nearest town I asked for a carriage.  Would you believe
+it? both his carriages were OUT AT A WEDDING.  I could not wait till
+they came back.  I had waited an eternity.  I came on foot.  I
+dragged my self along; the body was weak, but the heart was strong.
+A little way from here my wound seemed inclined to open.  I pressed
+it together tight with my hand; you see I could not afford to lose
+any more blood, and so struggled on.  'Die?' said I, 'not before
+Beaurepaire.'  And, O Rose! now I could be content to die--at her
+feet; for I am happy.  Oh! I am happy beyond words to utter.  What I
+have gone through!  But I kept my word, and this is Beaurepaire.
+Hurrah!" and his pale cheek flushed, and his eye gleamed, and he
+waved his hat feebly over his head, "hurrah! hurrah! hurrah!"
+
+"Oh, don't!--don't!--don't!" cried Rose wild with pity and dismay.
+
+"How can I help?--I am mad with joy--hurrah! hurrah! hurrah!"
+
+"No! no! no! no! no!"
+
+"What is the matter?"
+
+"And must I stab you worse than all your enemies have stabbed you?"
+sighed Rose, and tears of womanly pity now streamed down her cheeks.
+
+Camille's mind began to misgive him.  What was become of Josephine?
+she did not appear.  He faltered out, "Your mother is well; all are
+well I hope.  Oh, where is she?" and receiving no reply, began to
+tremble visibly with the fear of some terrible calamity.
+
+Rose, with a sister fainting close by, and this poor lover trembling
+before her, lost all self-command, and began to wring her hands and
+cry wildly.  "Camille," she almost screamed, "there is but one thing
+for you to do; leave Beaurepaire on the instant: fly from it; it is
+no place for you."
+
+"She is dead," said Camille, very quietly.
+
+When he said that, with an unnatural and monotonous calm such as
+precedes deliberate suicide, it flashed in one moment across Rose
+that it was much best he should think so.
+
+She did not reply; but she drooped her head and let him think it.
+
+"She would have come to me ere this if she was alive," said he.
+"You are all in white: they mourn in white for angels like her, that
+go to heaven, virgins.  Oh! I was blind.  You might have told me at
+once; you see I can bear it.  What does it matter to one who loves
+as I love?  It is only to give her one more proof I lived only for
+her.  I would have died a hundred times but for my promise to her.
+Yes, I am coming, love; I am coming."
+
+He fell on his knees and smiled, and whispered, "I am coming,
+Josephine, I am coming."
+
+A sob and a moan as of a creature dying in anguish answered him.
+
+Rose screamed with terror when she heard it.
+
+Camille rose to his feet, awestruck.  "That was her voice, behind
+this tree," he whispered.
+
+"No, no," cried Rose; "it was me."
+
+But at that moment a rustle and a rush was heard of some one darting
+out of the tree.
+
+Camille darted furiously round it in the same direction.  Rose tried
+to stop him, but was too late.  The next moment Raynal's wife was in
+his arms.
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+
+Josephine wrestled long and terribly with nature in that old oak-
+tree.  But who can so struggle forever?  Anguish, remorse, horror,
+despair, and love wrenched her to and fro; and O mysterious human
+heart! gleams of a mad fitful joy shot through her, coming quick as
+lightning, going as quickly, and leaving the despair darker.  And
+then the fierce struggle of the soul to make itself heard!  More
+than once she had to close her mouth with her hand: more than once
+she seized her throat not to cry out.  But as the struggle endured,
+she got weaker and weaker, and nature mightier and mightier.  And
+when the wounded hero fell on his knees so close to her; when he who
+had resisted death so bravely for her, prepared to give up life
+calmly for her, her bosom rose beyond all control: it seemed to fill
+to choking, then to split wide open and give the struggling soul
+passage in one gasping sob and heart-stricken cry.  Could she have
+pent this in she must have died.
+
+It betrayed her.  She felt it had: so then came the woman's
+instinct--flight: the coward's impulse--flight: the chaste wife's
+inspiration--flight.  She rushed from her hiding-place and made
+wildly for the house.
+
+But, unluckily, Camille was at that moment darting round the tree:
+she ran right into the danger she meant to flee.  He caught her in
+his arms.  He held her irresistibly.  "I have got her; I have got
+her," he shouted in wild triumph.  "No! I will not let you go.  None
+but God shall ever take you from me, and he has spared you to me.
+You are not dead: you have kept faith as I have: you have lived.
+See! look at me.  I am alive, I am well, I am happy.  I told Rose
+that I suffered.  If I had suffered I should remember it.  It is all
+gone at sight of you, my love! my love!  Oh, my Josephine! my love!"
+
+His arm was firm round her waist.  His glowing eyes poured love upon
+her.  She felt his beating heart.
+
+All that passed in her then, what mortal can say?  She seemed two
+women: that part of her which could not get away from his strong arm
+lost all strength to resist, it yielded and thrilled under his
+embrace, her bosom heaving madly: all that was free writhed away
+from him; her face was averted with a glare of terror, and both her
+hands put up between his eyes and it.
+
+"You turn away your head.  Rose, she turns away.  Speak for me.
+Scold her; for I don't know how to scold her.  No answer from
+either; oh, what has turned your hearts against me so?"
+
+"Camille," cried Rose--the tears streaming down her cheeks--"my poor
+Camille! leave Beaurepaire.  Oh, leave it at once."
+
+Returned towards her with a look of inquiry.
+
+At that Josephine, like some feeble but nimble wild creature on whom
+a grasp has relaxed, writhed away from him and got free: "Farewell!
+Farewell!" she cried, in despair's own voice, and made swiftly for
+the house.
+
+Camille stood aghast, and did not follow her.
+
+Now ere she had gone many steps who should meet her right in front
+but Jacintha.
+
+"Madame Raynal, the baroness's carriage is just in sight.  I thought
+you'd like to know."  Then she bawled proudly to Rose, "I was the
+first to call her madame;" and off went Jacintha convinced she had
+done something very clever.
+
+This blow turned those three to stone.
+
+Josephine had no longer the power or the wish to fly.  "Better so,"
+she thought, and she stood cowering.
+
+The great passions that had spoken so loud were struck dumb, and a
+deep silence fell upon the place.  Madame Raynal's quivering eye
+turned slowly and askant towards Camille, but stopped in terror ere
+it could see him.  For she knew by this fearful stillness that the
+truth was creeping on Camille.  And so did Rose.
+
+At last Camille spoke one word in a low whisper.
+
+"Madame?"
+
+Dead silence.
+
+"White? both in white?"
+
+Rose came between him and Josephine, and sobbed out, "Camille, it
+was our doing.  We drove her to it.  O sir, look how afraid of you
+she is.  Do not reproach her, if you are a man."
+
+He waved her out of his way as if she had been some idle feather,
+and almost staggered up to Josephine.
+
+"It is for you to speak, my betrothed: are you married?"
+
+The poor creature, true to her nature, was thinking more of him than
+herself.  Even in her despair it flashed across her, "If he knew
+all, he too would be wretched for life.  If I let him think ill of
+me he may be happy one day."  She cowered the picture of sorrow and
+tongue-tied guilt.
+
+"Are you a wife?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+He winced and quivered as if a bullet had pierced him.
+
+"This is how I came to be suspected; she I loved was false."
+
+"Yes, Camille."
+
+"No, no!" cried Rose; "don't believe HER: she never suspected you.
+We have brought her to this, we alone."
+
+"Be silent, Rose! oh, be silent!" gasped Josephine.
+
+"I lived for you: I would have died for you; you could not even wait
+for me."
+
+A low moan, but not a word of excuse.
+
+"What can I do for you now?"
+
+"Forget me, Camille," said she despairingly, doggedly.
+
+"Forget you? never, never! there is but one thing I can do to show
+you how I loved you: I will forgive you, and begone.  Whither shall
+I go? whither shall I go now?"
+
+"Camile, your words stab her."
+
+"Let none speak but I," said Camille; "none but I have the right to
+speak.  Poor weak angel that loved yet could not wait: I forgive
+you.  Be happy, if you can; I bid you be hap-py."
+
+The quiet, despairing tones died away, and with them life seemed to
+end to her, and hope to go out.  He turned his back quickly on her.
+He cried hoarsely, "To the army!  Back to the army, and a soldier's
+grave!"  Then with a prodigious effort he drew himself haughtily up
+in marching attitude.  He took three strides, erect and fiery and
+bold.
+
+At the next something seemed to snap asunder in the great heart, and
+the worn body that heart had held up so long, rolled like a dead log
+upon the ground with a tremendous fall.
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+
+The baroness and Aubertin were just getting out of their carriage,
+when suddenly they heard shrieks of terror in the Pleasaunce.  They
+came with quaking hearts as fast as their old limbs would carry
+them.  They found Rose and Josephine crouched over the body of a
+man, an officer.
+
+Rose was just tearing open his collar and jacket.  Dard and Jacintha
+had run from the kitchen at the screams.  Camille lay on his back,
+white and motionless.
+
+The doctor was the first to come up.  "Who! what is this?  I seem to
+know his face."  Then shaking his head, "Whoever it is, it is a bad
+case.  Stand away, ladies.  Let me feel his pulse."
+
+Whilst the old man was going stiffly down on one knee, Jacintha
+uttered a cry of terror.  "See, see! his shirt! that red streak!
+Ah, ah! it is getting bigger and bigger:" and she turned faint in a
+moment, and would have fallen but for Dard.
+
+The doctor looked.  "All the better," said he firmly.  "I thought he
+was dead.  His blood flows; then I will save him.  Don't clutch me
+so, Josephine; don't cling to me like that.  Now is the time to show
+your breed: not turn sick at the sight of a little blood, like that
+foolish creature, but help me save him."
+
+"Take him in-doors," cried the baroness.
+
+"Into our house, mamma?" gasped Rose; "no, no."
+
+"What," said the baroness, "a wounded soldier who has fought for
+France! leave him to lie and die outside my door: what would my son
+say to that?  He is a soldier himself."
+
+Rose cast a hasty look at Josephine.  Josephine's eyes were bent on
+the ground, and her hands clenched and trembling.
+
+"Now, Jacintha, you be off," said the doctor.  "I can't have cowards
+about him to make the others as bad.  Go and stew down a piece of
+good beef for him.  Stew it in red wine and water."
+
+"That I will: poor thing!"
+
+"Why, I know him," said the baroness suddenly; "it is an old
+acquaintance, young Dujardin: you remember, Josephine.  I used to
+suspect him of a fancy for you, poor fellow!  Why, he must have come
+here to see us, poor soul."
+
+"No matter who it is; it is a man.  Now, girls, have you courage,
+have you humanity?  Then come one on each side of him and take hands
+beneath his back, while I lift his head and Dard his legs."
+
+"And handle him gently whatever you do," said Dard.  "I know what it
+is to be wounded."
+
+These four carried the lifeless burden very slowly and gently across
+the Pleasaunce to the house, then with more difficulty and caution
+up the stairs.
+
+All the while the sisters' hands griped one another tight beneath
+the lifeless burden, and spoke to one another.  And Josephine's arm
+upheld tenderly but not weakly the hero she had struck down.  She
+avoided Rose's eye, her mother's, and even the doctor's: one gasping
+sob escaped her as she walked with head half averted, and vacant,
+terror-stricken eyes, and her victim on her sustaining arm.
+
+The doctor selected the tapestried chamber for him as being most
+airy.  Then he ordered the women out, and with Dard's help undressed
+the still insensible patient.
+
+Josephine sat down on the stairs in gloomy silence, her eyes on the
+ground, like one waiting for her deathblow.
+
+Rose, sick at heart, sat silent too at some distance.  At last she
+said faintly, "Have we done well?"
+
+"I don't know," said Josephine doggedly.  Her eyes never left the
+ground.
+
+"We could not let him die for want of care."
+
+"He will not thank us.  Better for him to die than live.  Better for
+me."
+
+At this instant Dard came running down.  "Good news, mesdemoiselles,
+good news! the wound runs all along; it is not deep, like mine was.
+He has opened his eyes and shut them again.  The dear good doctor
+stopped the blood in a twinkle.  The doctor says he'll be bound to
+save him.  I must run and tell Jacintha.  She is taking on in the
+kitchen."
+
+Josephine, who had risen eagerly from her despairing posture,
+clasped her hands together, then lifted up her voice and wept.  "He
+will live! he will live!"
+
+When she had wept a long while, she said to Rose, "Come, sister,
+help your poor Josephine."
+
+"Yes, love, what shall we do?"
+
+"My duty," faltered Josephine.  "An hour ago it seemed so sweet,"
+and she fell to weeping patiently again.  They went to Josephine's
+room.  She crept slowly to a wardrobe, and took out a gray silk
+dress.
+
+"Oh, never mind for to-day," cried Rose.
+
+"Help me, Rose.  It is for myself as well; to remind me every moment
+I am Madame Raynal."
+
+They put the gray gown on her, both weeping patiently.  It will be
+known at the last day, all that honest women have suffered weeping
+silently in this noisy world.
+
+
+Camille soon recovered his senses and a portion of his strength:
+then the irritation of his wound brought on fever.  This in turn
+retired before the doctor's remedies and a sound constitution, but
+it left behind it a great weakness and general prostration.  And in
+this state the fate of the body depends greatly on the mind.
+
+The baroness and the doctor went constantly to see him, and soothe
+him: he smiled and thanked them, but his eager eyes watched the door
+for one who came not.
+
+When he got well enough to leave his bed the largest couch was sent
+up to him from the saloon; a kind hand lined the baron's silk
+dressing-gown for him warm and soft and nice; and he would sit or
+lie on his couch, or take two turns in the room leaning upon Rose's
+shoulder, and glad of the support; and he looked piteously in her
+eyes when she came and when she went.  Rose looked down; she could
+do nothing, she could say nothing.
+
+With his strength, Camille lost a portion of his pride: he pined for
+a sight of her he no longer respected; pined for her, as the thirsty
+pine for water in Sahara.
+
+At last one day he spoke out.  "How kind you are to me, Rose! how
+kind you all are--but one."
+
+He waited in hopes she would say something, but she held her tongue.
+
+"At least tell me why it is.  Is she ashamed?  Is she afraid?"
+
+"Neither."
+
+"She hates me: it is true, then, that we hate those whom we have
+wounded.  Cruel, cruel Josephine!  Oh, heart of marble against which
+my heart has wrecked itself forever!"
+
+"No, no!  She is anything but cruel: but she is Madame Raynal."
+
+"Ah! I forgot.  But have I no claim on her?  Nearly four years she
+has been my betrothed.  What have I done?  Was I ever false to her?
+I could forgive her for what she has done to me, but she cannot
+forgive me.  Does she mean never to see me again?"
+
+"Ask yourself what good could come of it."
+
+"Very well," said Camille, with a malicious smile.  "I am in her
+way.  I see what she wants; she shall have it."
+
+Rose carried these words to Josephine.  They went through her like a
+sword.
+
+Rose pitied her.  Rose had a moment's weakness.
+
+"Let us go to him," she said; "anything is better than this."
+
+"Rose, I dare not," was the wise reply.
+
+But the next day early, Josephine took Rose to a door outside the
+house, a door that had long been disused.  Nettles grew before it.
+She produced a key and with great difficulty opened this door.  It
+led to the tapestried chamber, and years ago they used to steal up
+it and peep into the room.
+
+Rose scarcely needed to be told that she was to watch Camille, and
+report to her.  In truth, it was a mysterious, vague protection
+against a danger equally mysterious.  Yet it made Josephine easier.
+But so unflinching was her prudence that she never once could be
+prevailed on to mount those stairs, and peep at Camille herself.  "I
+must starve my heart, not feed it," said she.  And she grew paler
+and more hollow-eyed day by day.
+
+Yet this was the same woman who showed such feebleness and
+irresolution when Raynal pressed her to marry him.  But then dwarfs
+feebly drew her this way and that.  Now giants fought for her.
+Between a feeble inclination and a feeble disinclination her dead
+heart had drifted to and fro.  Now honor, duty, gratitude,--which
+last with her was a passion,--dragged her one way: love, pity, and
+remorse another.
+
+Not one of these giants would relax his grasp, and nothing yielded
+except her vital powers.  Yes; her temper, one of the loveliest
+Heaven ever gave a human creature, was soured at times.
+
+Was it a wonder?  There lay the man she loved pining for her;
+cursing her for her cruelty, and alternately praying Heaven to
+forgive him and to bless her: sighing, at intervals, all the day
+long, so loud, so deep, so piteously, as if his heart broke with
+each sigh; and sometimes, for he little knew, poor soul, that any
+human eye was upon him, casting aside his manhood in his despair,
+and flinging himself on the very floor, and muffling his head, and
+sobbing; he a hero.
+
+And here was she pining in secret for him who pined for her?  "I am
+not a woman at all," said she, who was all woman.  "I am crueller to
+him than a tiger or any savage creature is to the victim she tears.
+I must cure him of his love for me; and then die; for what shall I
+have to live for?  He weeps, he sighs, he cries for Josephine."
+
+Her enforced cruelty was more contrary to this woman's nature than
+black is to white, or heat to cold, and the heart rebelled furiously
+at times.  As when a rock tries to stem a current, the water fights
+its way on more sides than one, so insulted nature dealt with
+Josephine.  Not only did her body pine, but her nerves were
+exasperated.  Sudden twitches came over her, that almost made her
+scream.  Her permanent state was utter despondency, but across it
+came fitful flashes of irritation; and then she was scarce mistress
+of herself.
+
+Wherefore you, who find some holy woman cross and bitter, stop a
+moment before you sum her up vixen and her religion naught: inquire
+the history of her heart: perhaps beneath the smooth cold surface of
+duties well discharged, her life has been, or even is, a battle
+against some self-indulgence the insignificant saint's very blood
+cries out for: and so the poor thing is cross, not because she is
+bad, but because she is better than the rest of us; yet only human.
+
+Now though Josephine was more on her guard with the baroness than
+with Rose, or the doctor, or Jacintha, her state could not
+altogether escape the vigilance of a mother's eye.
+
+But the baroness had not the clew we have; and what a difference
+that makes!  How small an understanding, put by accident or
+instruction on the right track, shall run the game down!  How great
+a sagacity shall wander if it gets on a false scent!
+
+"Doctor," said the baroness one day, "you are so taken up with your
+patient you neglect the rest of us.  Do look at Josephine!  She is
+ill, or going to be ill.  She is so pale, and so fretful, so
+peevish, which is not in her nature.  Would you believe it, doctor,
+she snaps?"
+
+"Our Josephine snap?  This is new."
+
+"And snarls."
+
+"Then look for the end of the world."
+
+"The other day I heard her snap Rose: and this morning she half
+snarled at me, just because I pressed her to go and console our
+patient.  Hush! here she is.  My child, I am accusing you to the
+doctor.  I tell him you neglect his patient: never go near him."
+
+"I will visit him one of these days," said Josephine, coldly.
+
+"One of these days," said the baroness, shocked.  "You used not to
+be so hard-hearted.  A soldier, an old comrade of your husband's,
+wounded and sick, and you alone never go to him, to console him with
+a word of sympathy or encouragement."
+
+Josephine looked at her mother with a sort of incredulous stare.
+Then, after a struggle, she replied with a tone and manner so
+spiteful and icy that it would have deceived even us who know her
+had we heard it.  "He has plenty of nurses without me."  She added,
+almost violently, "My husband, if he were wounded, would not have so
+many, perhaps not have one."
+
+With this she rose and went out, leaving them aghast.  She sat down
+in the passage on a window-seat, and laughed hysterically.  Rose
+heard her and ran to her.  Josephine told her what her mother had
+said to her.  Rose soothed her.  "Never mind, you have your sister
+who understands you: don't you go back till they have got some other
+topic."
+
+Rose out of curiosity went in, and found a discussion going on.  The
+doctor was fathoming Josephine, for the benefit of his companion.
+
+"It is a female jealousy, and of a mighty innocent kind.  We are so
+taken up with this poor fellow, she thinks her soldier is forgotten."
+
+"Surely, doctor, our Josephine would not be so unreasonable, so
+unjust," suggested her mother.
+
+"She belongs to a sex, be it said without offending you, madame,
+among whose numberless virtues justice does not fill a prominent
+place."
+
+The baroness shook her head.  "That is not it.  It is a piece of
+prudery.  This young gentleman was a sort of admirer of hers, though
+she did not admire him much, as far as I remember.  But it was four
+years ago; and she is married to a man she loves, or is going to
+love."
+
+"Well, but, mamma, a trifling excess of delicacy is surely
+excusable."  This from Rose.
+
+"No, no; it is not delicacy; it is prudery.  And when people are
+sick and suffering, an honest woman should take up her charity and
+lay down her prudery, or her coquetry: two things that I suspect are
+the same thing in different shapes."
+
+Here Jacintha came in.  "Mademoiselle, here is the colonel's broth;
+Madame Raynal has flavored it for him, and you are to take it up to
+him, and keep him company while he eats it."
+
+"Come," cried the baroness, "my lecture has not been lost."
+
+Rose followed Jacintha up-stairs.
+
+Rose was heart and head on Raynal's side.
+
+She had deceived him about Josephine's attachment, and felt all the
+more desirous to guard him against any ill consequences of it.  Then
+he had been so generous to her: he had left her her sister, who
+would have gone to Egypt, and escaped this misery, but for her.
+
+But on the other hand,
+
+
+                                         --Gentle pity
+     Tugged at her heartstrings with complaining cries.
+
+
+This watching of Camille saddened even her.  When she was with him
+his pride bore him up: but when he was alone as he thought, his
+anguish and despair were terrible, and broke out in so many ways
+that often Rose shrank in terror from her peep hole.
+
+She dared not tell Josephine the half of what she saw: what she did
+tell her agitated her so terribly: and often Rose had it on the tip
+of her tongue to say, "Do pray go and see if you can say nothing
+that will do him good;" but she fought the impulse down.  This
+battle of feeling, though less severe than her sister's, was
+constant; it destroyed her gayety.  She, whose merry laugh used to
+ring like chimes through the house, never laughed now, seldom
+smiled, and often sighed.
+
+Dr. Aubertin was the last to succumb to the deep depression, but his
+time came: and he had been for a day or two as grave and as sad as
+the rest, when one day that Rose was absent, spying on Camille, he
+took the baroness and Josephine into his confidence; and
+condescended finally to ask their advice.
+
+"It is humiliating," said he, "after all my experience, to be
+obliged to consult unprofessional persons.  Forty years ago I should
+have been TOO WISE to do so.  But since then I have often seen
+science baffled and untrained intelligences throw light upon hard
+questions: and your sex in particular has luminous instincts and
+reads things by flashes that we men miss with a microscope.  Our
+dear Madame Raynal suspected that plausible notary, and to this day
+I believe she could not tell us why."
+
+Josephine admitted as much very frankly.
+
+"There you see," said the doctor.  "Well, then, you must help me in
+this case.  And this time I promise to treat your art with more
+respect."
+
+"And pray who is it she is to read now?" asked the baroness.
+
+"Who should it be but my poor patient?  He puzzles me.  I never knew
+a patient so faint-hearted."
+
+"A soldier faint-hearted!" exclaimed the baroness.  "To be sure
+these men that storm cities, and fire cannon, and cut and hack one
+another with so much spirit, are poor creatures compared with us
+when they have to lie quiet and suffer."
+
+The doctor walked the room in great excitement.  "It is not his
+wound that is killing him, there's something on his mind.  You,
+Josephine, with your instincts do help me: do pray, for pity's sake,
+throw off that sublime indifference you have manifested all along to
+this man's fate."
+
+"She has not," cried the baroness, firing up.  "Did I not see her
+lining his dressing-gown for him? and she inspects everything that
+he eats: do you not?"
+
+"Yes, mother."  She then suggested in a faltering voice that time
+would cure the patient, and time alone.
+
+"Time! you speak as if time was a quality: time is only a measure of
+events, favorable or unfavorable; it kills as many as it cures."
+
+"Why, you surely would not imply his life is in any danger?"  This
+was the baroness.
+
+"Madame, if the case was not grave, should I take this unusual step?
+I tell you if some change does not take place soon, he will be a
+dead man in another fortnight.  That is all TIME will do for him."
+
+The baroness uttered an exclamation of pity and distress.  Josephine
+put her hand to her bosom, and a creeping horror came over her, and
+then a faintness.  She sat working mechanically, and turning like
+ice within.  After a few minutes of this, she rose with every
+appearance of external composure and left the room.  In the passage
+she met Rose coming hastily towards the salon laughing: the first
+time she had laughed this many a day.  Oh, what a contrast between
+the two faces that met there--the one pale and horror stricken, the
+other rosy and laughing!
+
+"Well, dear, at last I am paid for all my trouble, and yours, by a
+discovery; he never drinks a drop of his medicine; he pours it into
+the ashes under the grate; I caught him in the fact."
+
+"Then this is too much: I can resist no longer.  Come with me," said
+Josephine doggedly.
+
+"Where?"
+
+"To him."
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+
+Josephine paused on the landing, and laid her hand on Rose's
+shoulder.  It was so cold it made Rose shudder, and exacted a
+promise from her not to contradict a word she should say to Camille.
+"I do not go to him for my pleasure, but for his life," she said; "I
+must deceive him and save him; and then let me lie down and die."
+
+"Oh, that the wretch had never been born!" cried Rose, in despair.
+But she gave the required promise, and offered to go and tell
+Camille Josephine was coming to visit him.
+
+But Josephine declined this.  "No," said she; "give me every
+advantage; I must think beforehand every word I shall say; but take
+him by surprise, coward and doubleface that I am."
+
+Rose knocked at the door.  A faint voice said, "Come in."  The
+sisters entered the room very softly.  Camille sat on the sofa, his
+head bowed over his hands.  A glance showed Josephine that he was
+doggedly and resolutely thrusting himself into the grave.  Thinking
+it was only Rose--for he had now lost all hope of seeing Josephine
+come in at the door--he never moved.  Some one glided gently but
+rapidly up to him.  He looked up.  Josephine was kneeling to him.
+
+He lifted his head with a start, and trembled all over.
+
+She whispered, "I am come to you to beg your pity; to appeal to your
+generosity; to ask a favor; I who deserve so little of you."
+
+"You have waited a long time," said Camille, agitated greatly; "and
+so have I."
+
+"Camille, you are torturing one who loved you once, and who has been
+very weak and faithless, but not so wicked as she appears."
+
+"How am I torturing you?"
+
+"With remorse; do I not suffer enough?  Would you make me a
+murderess?"
+
+"Why have you never been near me?" retorted Camille.  "I could
+forgive your weakness, but not your heartlessness."
+
+"It is my duty.  I have no right to seek your society.  If you
+really want mine, you have only to get well, and so join us down-
+stairs a week or two before you leave us."
+
+"How am I to get well?  My heart is broken."
+
+"Camille, be a man.  Do not fling away a soldier's life because a
+fickle, worthless woman could not wait for you.  Forgive me like a
+man, or else revenge yourself like a man.  If you cannot forgive me,
+kill me.  See, I kneel at your feet.  I will not resist you.  Kill
+me."
+
+"I wish I could.  Oh! if I could kill you with a look and myself
+with a wish!  No man should ever take you from me, then.  We would
+be together in the grave at this hour.  Do not tempt me, I say;" and
+he cast a terrible look of love, and hatred, and despair upon her.
+Her purple eye never winced; it poured back tenderness and affection
+in return.  He saw and turned away with a groan, and held out his
+hand to her.  She seized it and kissed it.  "You are great, you are
+generous; you will not strike me as a woman strikes; you will not
+die to drive me to despair."
+
+"I see," said he, more gently, "love is gone, but pity remains.  I
+thought that was gone, too."
+
+"Yes, Camille," said Josephine, in a whisper, "pity remains, and
+remorse and terror at what I have done to a man of whom I was never
+worthy."
+
+"Well, madame, as you have come at last to me, and even do me the
+honor to ask me a favor--I shall try--if only out of courtesy--to--
+ah, Josephine! Josephine! when did I ever refuse you anything?"
+
+At this Josephine sank into a chair, and burst out crying.  Camille,
+at this, began to cry too; and the two poor things sat a long way
+from one another, and sobbed bitterly.
+
+The man, weakened as he was, recovered his quiet despair first.
+
+"Don't cry so," said he.  "But tell me what is your will, and I
+shall obey you as I used before any one came between us."
+
+"Then, live, Camille.  I implore you to live."
+
+"Well, Josephine, since you care about it, I will try and live.  Why
+did not you come before and ask me?  I thought I was in your way.  I
+thought you wanted me dead."
+
+Josephine cast a look of wonder and anguish on Camille, but she said
+nothing.  She rang the bell, and, on Jacintha coming up, despatched
+her to Dr. Aubertin for the patient's medicine.
+
+"Tell the doctor," said she, "Colonel Dujardin has let fall the
+glass."  While Jacintha was gone, she scolded Camille gently.  "How
+could you be so unkind to the poor doctor who loves you so?  Only
+think: to throw away his medicines!  Look at the ashes; they are
+wet.  Camille, are you, too, becoming disingenuous?"
+
+Jacintha came in with the tonic in a glass, and retired with an
+obeisance.  Josephine took it to Camille.
+
+"Drink with me, then," said he, "or I will not touch it."  Josephine
+took the glass.  "I drink to your health, Camille, and to your
+glory; laurels to your brow, and some faithful woman to your heart,
+who will make you forget this folly: it is for her I am saving you."
+She put the glass with well-acted spirit to her lips; but in the
+very action a spasm seized her throat and almost choked her; she
+lowered her head that he might not see her face, and tried again;
+but the tears burst from her eyes and ran into the liquid, and her
+lips trembled over the brim, and were paralyzed.
+
+"No, no! give it me!" he cried; "there is a tear of yours in it."
+He drank off the bitter remedy now as if it had been nectar.
+
+Josephine blushed.
+
+"If you wanted me to live, why did you not come here before?"
+
+"I did not think you would be so foolish, so wicked, so cruel as to
+do what you have been doing."
+
+"Come and shine upon me every day, and you shall have no fresh cause
+of complaint; things flourish in the sunshine that die in the dark:
+Rose, it is as if the sun had come into my prison; you are pale, but
+you are beautiful as ever--more beautiful; what a sweet dress! so
+quiet, so modest, it sets off your beauty instead of vainly trying
+to vie with it."  With this he put out his hand and took her gray
+silk dress, and went to kiss it as a devotee kisses the altar steps.
+
+She snatched it away with a shudder.
+
+"Yes, you are right," said she; "thank you for noticing my dress; it
+is a beautiful dress--ha! ha!  A dress I take a pride in wearing,
+and always shall, I hope.  I mean to be buried in it.  Come, Rose.
+Thank you, Camille; you are very good, you have once more promised
+me to live.  Get well; come down-stairs; then you will see me every
+day, you know--there is a temptation.  Good-by, Camille!--are you
+coming, Rose?  What are you loitering for?  God bless you, and
+comfort you, and help you to forget what it is madness to remember!"
+
+With these wild words she literally fled; and in one moment the room
+seemed to darken to Camille.
+
+Outside the door Josephine caught hold of Rose.  "Have I committed
+myself?"
+
+"Over and over again.  Do not look so terrified; I mean to me, but
+not to him.  How blind he is! and how much better you must know him
+than I do to venture on such a transparent deceit.  He believes
+whatever you tell him.  He is all ears and no eyes.  Yes, love, I
+watched him keenly all the time.  He really thinks it is pity and
+remorse, nothing more.  My poor sister, you have a hard life to
+lead, a hard game to play; but so far you have succeeded; yet could
+look poor Raynal in the face if he came home to-day."
+
+"Then God be thanked!" cried Josephine.  "I am as happy to-day as I
+can ever hope to be.  Now let us go through the farce of dressing--
+it is near dinner-time--and then the farce of talking, and, hardest
+of all, the farce of living."
+
+From that hour Camille began to get better very slowly, yet
+perceptibly.
+
+The doctor, afraid of being mistaken, said nothing for some days,
+but at last he announced the good news at the dinner-table.  "He is
+to come down-stairs in three days," added the doctor.
+
+But I am sorry to say that as Camille's body strengthened some of
+the worst passions in our nature attacked him.  Fierce gusts of hate
+and love combined overpowered this man's high sentiments of honor
+and justice, and made him clench his teeth, and vow never to leave
+Beaurepaire without Josephine.  She had been his four years before
+she ever saw this interloper, and she should be his forever.  Her
+love would soon revive when they should meet every day, and she
+would end by eloping with him.
+
+Then conscience pricked him, and reminded him how and why Raynal had
+married her: for Rose had told him all.  Should he undermine an
+absent soldier, whose whole conduct in this had been so pure, so
+generous, so unselfish?
+
+But this was not all.  As I have already hinted, he was under a
+great personal obligation to his quondam comrade Raynal.  Whenever
+this was vividly present to his mind, a great terror fell on him,
+and he would cry out in anguish, "Oh! that some angel would come to
+me and tear me by force from this place!"  And the next moment
+passion swept over him like a flood, and carried away all his
+virtuous resolves.  His soul was in deep waters; great waves drove
+it to and fro.  Perilous condition, which seldom ends well.  Camille
+was a man of honor.  In no other earthly circumstance could he have
+hesitated an instant between right and wrong.  But such natures,
+proof against all other temptations, have often fallen, and will
+fall, where sin takes the angel form of her they love.  Yet, of all
+men, they should pray for help to stand; for when they fall they
+still retain one thing that divides them from mean sinners.
+
+Remorse, the giant that rends the great hearts which mock at fear.
+
+The day came in which the doctor had promised his patient he should
+come down-stairs.  First his comfortable sofa was taken down into
+the saloon for his use: then the patient himself came down leaning
+on the doctor's arm, and his heart palpitating at the thought of the
+meeting.  He came into the room; the baroness was alone.  She
+greeted him kindly, and welcomed him.  Rose came in soon after and
+did the same.  But no Josephine.  Camille felt sick at heart.  At
+last dinner was announced; "She will surely join us at dinner,"
+thought he.  He cast his eyes anxiously on the table; the napkins
+were laid for four only.  The baroness carelessly explained this to
+him as they sat down.  "Madame Raynal dines in her own room.  I am
+sorry to say she is indisposed."
+
+Camille muttered polite regrets: the rage of disappointment drove
+its fangs into him, and then came the heart-sickness of hope
+deferred.  The next day he saw her, but could not get a word with
+her alone.  The baroness tortured him another way.  She was full of
+Raynal.  She loved him.  She called him her son; was never weary of
+descanting on his virtues to Camille.  Not a day passed that she did
+not pester Camille to make a calculation as to the probable period
+of his return, and he was obliged to answer her.  She related to him
+before Josephine and Rose, how this honest soldier had come to them
+like a guardian angel and saved the whole family.  In vain he
+muttered that Rose had told him.
+
+"Let me have the pleasure of telling it you my way," cried she, and
+told it diffusely, and kept him writhing.
+
+The next thing was, Josephine had received no letter from him this
+month; the first month he had missed.  In vain did Rose represent
+that he was only a few days over his time.  The baroness became
+anxious, communicated her anxieties to Camille among the rest; and,
+by a torturing interrogatory, compelled him to explain to her before
+Josephine and them all, that ships do not always sail to a day, and
+are sometimes delayed.  But oh! he winced at the man's name; and
+Rose observed that he never mentioned it, nor acknowledged the
+existence of such a person as Josephine's husband, except when
+others compelled him.  Yet they were acquainted; and Rose sometimes
+wondered that he did not detract or sneer.
+
+"I should," said she; "I feel I should."
+
+"He is too noble," said Josephine, "and too wise.  For, if he did, I
+should respect him less, and my husband more than I do--if
+possible."
+
+Certainly Camille was not the sort of nature that detracts, but the
+reason he avoided Raynal's name was simply that his whole internal
+battle was to forget such a man existed.  From this dream he was
+rudely awakened every hour since he joined the family, and the wound
+his self-deceiving heart would fain have skinned over, was torn
+open.  But worse than this was the torture of being tantalized.  He
+was in company with Josephine, but never alone.  Even if she left
+the room for an instant, Rose accompanied her and returned with her.
+Camille at last began to comprehend that Josephine had decided there
+should be no private interviews between her and him.  Thus, not only
+the shadow of the absent Raynal stood between them, but her mother
+and sister in person, and worst of all, her own will.  He called her
+a cold-blooded fiend in his rage.  Then the thought of all her
+tenderness and goodness came to rebuke him.  But even in rebuking it
+maddened him.  "Yes, it is her very nature to love; but since she
+can make her heart turn whichever way her honor bids, she will love
+her husband; she does not now; but sooner or later she will.  Then
+she will have children--(he writhed with anguish and fury at this
+thought)--loving ties between him and her.  He has everything on his
+side.  I, nothing but memories she will efface from her heart.  Will
+efface?  She must have effaced them, or she could not have married
+him."  I know no more pitiable state of mind than to love and hate
+the same creature.  But when the two feelings are both intense, and
+meet in an ardent bosom, such a man would do well to spend a day or
+two upon his knees, praying for grace divine.  For he who with all
+his soul loves and hates one woman is next door to a maniac, and is
+scarcely safe an hour together from suicide or even from homicide;
+this truth the newspapers tell us, by examples, every month; but are
+wonderfully little heeded, because newspapers do not, nor is it
+their business to, analyze and dwell upon the internal feelings of
+the despairing lover, whose mad and bloody act they record.  With
+such a tempest in his heart did Camille one day wander into the
+park.  And soon an irresistible attraction drew him to the side of
+the stream that flowed along one side of it.  He eyed it gloomily,
+and wherever the stagnant water indicated a deeper pool than usual
+he stopped, and looked, and thought, "How calm and peaceful you
+are!"
+
+He sat down at last by the water-side, his eyes bent on a calm,
+green pool.
+
+It looked very peaceful; and it could give peace.  He thought, oh!
+what a blessing; to be quit of rage, jealousy, despair, and life,
+all in a minute!
+
+Yet that was a sordid death for a soldier to die, who had seen great
+battles.  Could he not die more nobly than that?  With this he
+suddenly felt in his pocket; and there sure enough fate had placed
+his pistols.  He had put them into this coat; and he had not worn
+this coat until to-day.  He had armed himself unconsciously.  "Ah!"
+said he; "it is to be; all these things are preordained."  (This
+notion of fate has strengthened many a fatal resolution.)  Then he
+had a cruel regret.  To die without a word; a parting word.  Then he
+thought to himself, it was best so; for perhaps he should have taken
+her with him.
+
+"Sir! colonel!" uttered a solemn voice behind him.
+
+Absorbed and strung up to desperation as he was, this voice seemed
+unnaturally loud, and discordant with Camille's mood; a sudden
+trumpet from the world of small things.
+
+It was Picard, the notary.
+
+"Can you tell me where Madame Raynal is?"
+
+"No.  At the chateau, I suppose."
+
+"She is not there; I inquired of the servant.  She was out.  You
+have not seen her, colonel?"
+
+"Not I; I never see her."
+
+"Then perhaps I had better go back to the chateau and wait for her:
+stay, are you a friend of the family?  Colonel, suppose I were to
+tell you, and ask you to break it to Madame Raynal, or, better
+still, to the baroness, or Mademoiselle Rose."
+
+"Monsieur," said Camille coldly, "charge me with no messages, for I
+cannot deliver them.  I AM GOING ANOTHER WAY."
+
+"In that case, I will go to the chateau once more; for what I have
+to say must be heard."
+
+Picard returned to the chateau wondering at the colonel's strange
+manner.
+
+Camille, for his part, wondered that any one could be so mad as to
+talk to him about trifles; to him, a man standing on the brink of
+eternity.  Poor soul, it was he who was mad and unlucky.  He should
+have heard what Picard had to say.  The very gentleness and
+solemnity of manner ought to have excited his curiosity.
+
+He watched Picard's retiring form.  When he was out of sight, then
+he turned round and resumed his thoughts as if Picard had been no
+more than a fly that had buzzed and then gone.
+
+"Yes, I should have taken her with me," he said.  He sat gloomy and
+dogged like a dangerous maniac in his cell; never moved, scarce
+thought for more than half an hour; but his deadly purpose grew in
+him.  Suddenly he started.  A lady was at the style, about a hundred
+yards distant.  He trembled.  It was Josephine.
+
+She came towards him slowly, her eyes bent on the ground in a deep
+reverie.  She stopped about a stone's throw from him, and looked at
+the river long and thoughtfully; then casting her eye around, she
+caught sight of Camille.  He watched her grimly.  He saw her give a
+little start, and half turn round; but if this was an impulse to
+retreat, it was instantly suppressed; for the next moment she
+pursued her way.
+
+Camille stood gloomy and bitter, awaiting her in silence.  He
+planted himself in the middle of the path, and said not a word.
+
+She looked him all over, and her color came and went.
+
+"Out so far as this," she said kindly; "and without your cap."
+
+He put his hand to his head, and discovered that he was bareheaded.
+
+"You will catch your death of cold.  Come, let us go in and get your
+cap."
+
+She made as if she would pass him.  He planted himself right before
+her.
+
+"No."
+
+"Camille!"
+
+"Why do you shun me as if I was a viper?"
+
+"I do not shun you.  I but avoid conferences that can lead to no
+good; it is my duty."
+
+"You are very wise; cold-hearted people can be wise."
+
+"Am I cold-hearted, Camille?"
+
+"As marble."
+
+She looked him in the face; the water came into her eyes; after
+awhile she whispered, sorrowfully, "Well, Camille, I am."
+
+"But with all your wisdom and all your coldness," he went on to say,
+"you have made a mistake; you have driven me to madness and
+despair."
+
+"Heaven forbid!" said she.
+
+"Your prayer comes too late; you have done it."
+
+"Camille, let me go to the oratory, and pray for you.  You terrify
+me."
+
+"It is no use.  Heaven has no mercy for me.  Take my advice; stay
+where you are; don't hurry; for what remains of your life you gave
+to pass with me, do you understand that?"
+
+"Ah!"  And she turned pale.
+
+"Can you read my riddle?"
+
+She looked him in the face.  "I can read your eyes, and I know you
+love me.  I think you mean to kill me.  I have heard men kill the
+thing they love."
+
+"Of course they do; sooner than another should have it, they kill
+it--they kill it."
+
+"God has not made them patient like us women.  Poor Camille!"
+
+"Patience dies when hope dies.  Come, Madame Raynal, say a prayer,
+for you are going to die."
+
+"God bless you, Camille!" said the poor girl, putting her hands
+together in her last prayer.  At this sweet touch of affection,
+Camille hung his head, and sobbed.  Then suddenly lashing himself
+into fury, he cried,--
+
+"You are my betrothed! you talk of duty; but you forget your duty to
+me.  Are you not my betrothed this four years?  Answer me that."
+
+"Yes, Camille, I was."
+
+"Did I not suffer death a hundred times for you, to keep faith with
+you, you cold-blooded traitress with an angel's face?"
+
+"Ah, Camille! can you speak so bitterly to me?  Have I denied your
+right to kill me?  You shall never dishonor me, but you shall kill
+me, if it is your pleasure.  I do not resist.  Why, then, speak to
+me like that; must the last words I hear from your mouth be words of
+anger, cruel Camille?"
+
+"I was wrong.  But it is so hard to kill her I love in cold blood.
+I want anger as well as despair to keep me to it.  Come, turn your
+head away from me, and all our troubles shall end."
+
+"No, Camille, let me look at you.  Then you will be the last thing I
+shall see on earth."
+
+At this he hesitated a moment; then, with a fierce stamp at what he
+thought was weakness, he levelled a pistol at her.
+
+She put up her hands with a piteous cry, "Oh! not my face, Camille!
+pray do not disfigure my face.  Here--kill me here--in my bosom--my
+heart that loved you well, when it was no sin to love you."
+
+"I can't shoot you.  I can't spill your blood.  The river will end
+all, and not disfigure your beauty, that has driven me mad, and cost
+you, poor wretch, your life."
+
+"Thank you, dear Camille.  The water does not frighten me as a
+pistol does; it will not hurt me; it will only kill me."
+
+"No, it is but a plunge, and you will be at peace forever; and so
+shall I.  Come, take my hand, Madame Raynal, Madame Raynal."
+
+She gave him her hand with a look of infinite love.  She only said,
+"My poor mother!"  That word did not fall to the ground.  It flashed
+like lightning at night across the demented lover, and lighted up
+his egotism (suicide, like homicide, is generally a fit of maniacal
+egotism), even to his eyes blinded by fury.
+
+"Wretch that I am," he shrieked.  "Fly, Josephine, fly! escape this
+moment, that my better angel whispers to me.  Do you hear? begone,
+while it is time."
+
+"I will not leave you, Camille."
+
+"I say you shall.  Go to your mother and Rose; go to those you love,
+and I can pity; go to the chapel and thank Heaven for your escape."
+
+"Yes, but not without you, Camille.  I am afraid to leave you."
+
+"You have more to fear if you stay.  Well, I can't wait any longer.
+Stay, then, and live; and learn from me how to love Jean Raynal."
+
+He levelled the pistol at himself.
+
+Josephine threw herself on him with a cry, and seized his arm.  With
+the strength excitement lent her she got the better, and all but
+overpowered him.  But, as usual, the man's strength lasted longer,
+and with a sustained effort he threw her off; then, pale and
+panting, raised the pistol to take his life.  This time she moved
+neither hand nor foot; but she palsied his rash hand with a word.
+
+"No; I LOVE YOU."
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+
+
+There lie the dead corpses of those words on paper; but my art is
+powerless to tell you how they were uttered, those words, potent as
+a king's, for they saved a life.
+
+They were a cry of terror and a cry of reproach and a cry of love
+unfathomable.
+
+The weapon shook in his hand.  He looked at her with growing
+astonishment and joy; she at him fixedly and anxiously, her hands
+clasped in supplication.
+
+"As you used to love me?"
+
+"More, far more.  Give me the pistol.  I love you, dearest.  I love
+you."
+
+At these delicious words he lost all power of resistance, she saw;
+and her soft and supple hand stole in and closed upon his, and
+gently withdrew the weapon, and threw it into the water.  "Good
+Camille! now give me the other."
+
+"How do you know there is another?"
+
+"I know you are not the man to kill a woman and spare yourself.
+Come."
+
+"Josephine, have pity on me, do not deceive me; pray do not take
+this, my only friend, from me, unless you really love me."
+
+"I love you; I adore you," was her reply.
+
+She leaned her head on his shoulder, but with her hand she sought
+his, and even as she uttered those loving words she coaxed the
+weapon from his now unresisting grasp.
+
+"There, it is gone; you are saved from death--saved from crime."
+And with that, the danger was over, she trembled for the first time,
+and fell to sobbing hysterically.
+
+He threw himself at her knees, and embraced them again and again,
+and begged her forgiveness in a transport of remorse and self-
+reproach.
+
+She looked down with tender pity on him, and heard his cries of
+penitence and shame.
+
+"Rise, Camille, and go home with me," said she faintly.
+
+"Yes, Josephine."
+
+They went slowly and in silence.  Camille was too ashamed and
+penitent to speak; too full of terror too at the abyss of crime from
+which he had been saved.  The ancients feigned that a virgin could
+subdue a lion; perhaps they meant that a pure gentle nature can
+subdue a nature fierce but generous.  Lion-like Camille walked by
+Josephine's side with his eyes bent on the ground, the picture of
+humility and penitence.
+
+"This is the last walk you and I shall take together," said
+Josephine solemnly.
+
+"I know it," said he humbly.  "I have forfeited all right to be by
+your side."
+
+"My poor, lost love," sighed Josephine, "will you never understand
+me?  You never stood higher in my esteem than at this moment.  It is
+the avowal you have forced from ME that parts us.  The man to whom I
+have said 'I'--must not remain beneath my husband's roof.  Does not
+your sense of honor agree with mine?"
+
+"It does," faltered he.
+
+"To-morrow you must leave the chateau."
+
+"I will obey you."
+
+"What, you do not resist, you do not break my heart by complaints,
+by reproaches?"
+
+"No, Josephine, all is changed.  I thought you unfeeling: I thought
+you were going to be HAPPY with him; that was what maddened me."
+
+"I pray daily YOU may be happy, no matter how.  But you and I are
+not alike, dear as we are to one another.  Well, do not fear: I
+shall never be happy--will that soothe you, Camille?"
+
+"Yes, Josephine, all is changed; the words you have spoken have
+driven the fiends out of my heart.  I have nothing to do now but to
+obey, you to command: it is your right.  Since you love me a little
+still, dispose of me.  Bid me live: bid me die: bid me stay: bid me
+go.  I shall never disobey the angel who loves me, my only friend
+upon the earth."
+
+A single deep sob from Josephine was all the answer.
+
+Then he could not help asking her why she had not trusted him?
+
+"Why did you not say to me long ago, 'I love you, but I am a wife;
+my husband is an honest soldier, absent, and fighting for France: I
+am the guardian of his honor and my own; be just, be generous, be
+self-denying; depart and love me only as angels love'?  Perhaps this
+might have helped me to show you that I too am a man of honor."
+
+"Perhaps I was wrong," sighed Josephine.  "I think I should have
+trusted more to you.  But then, who would have thought you could
+really doubt my love?  You were ill; I could not bear you to go till
+you were well, quite well.  I saw no other way to keep you but this,
+to treat you with feigned coldness.  You saw the coldness, but not
+what it cost me to maintain it.  Yes, I was unjust; and inconsiderate,
+for I had many furtive joys to sustain me: I had you in my house
+under my care--that thought was always sweet--I had a hand in
+everything that was for your good, for your comfort.  I helped
+Jacintha make your soup and your chocolate every day.  I had the
+delight of lining the dressing-gown you were to wear.  I had always
+some little thing or other to do for you.  These kept me up: I forgot
+in my selfishness that you had none of these supports, and that I
+was driving you to despair.  I am a foolish, disingenuous woman:
+I have been very culpable.  Forgive me!"
+
+"Forgive you, angel of purity and goodness?  I alone am to blame.
+What right had I to doubt your heart?  I knew the whole story of
+your marriage; I saw your sweet pale face; but I was not pure enough
+to comprehend angelic virtue and unselfishness.  Well, I am brought
+to my senses.  There is but one thing for me to do--you bade me
+leave you to-morrow."
+
+"I was very cruel."
+
+"No! not cruel, wise.  But I will be wiser.  I shall go to-night."
+
+"To-night, Camille?" said Josephine, turning pale.
+
+"Ay! for to-night I am strong; to-morrow I may be weak.  To-night
+everything thrusts me on the right path.  To-morrow everything will
+draw me from it.  Do not cry, beloved one; you and I have a hard
+fight.  We must be true allies; whenever one is weak, then is the
+time for the other to be strong.  I have been weaker than you, to my
+shame be it said; but this is my hour of strength.  A light from
+heaven shows me my path.  I am full of passion, but like you I have
+honor.  You are Raynal's wife, and--Raynal saved my life."
+
+"Ah! is it possible?  When? where? may Heaven bless him for it!"
+
+"Ask HIM; and say I told you of it--I have not strength to tell it
+you, but I will go to-night."
+
+Then Josephine, who had resisted till all her strength was gone,
+whispered with a blush that it was too late to get a conveyance.
+
+"I need none to carry my sword, my epaulets, and my love for you.  I
+shall go on foot."
+
+Josephine said nothing, but she began to walk slower and slower.
+And so the unfortunate pair came along creeping slowly with drooping
+heads towards the gate of the Pleasaunce.  There their last walk in
+this world must end.  Many a man and woman have gone to the scaffold
+with hearts less heavy and more hopeful than theirs.
+
+"Dry your eyes, Josephine," said Camille with a deep sigh.  "They
+are all out on the Pleasaunce."
+
+"No, I will not dry my eyes," cried Josephine, almost violently.  "I
+care for nothing now."
+
+The baroness, the doctor, and Rose, were all in the Pleasaunce: and
+as the pair came in, lo! every eye was bent on Josephine.
+
+She felt this, and her eyes sought the ground: benumbed as she was
+with despondency, she began now to dread some fresh stroke or other.
+
+Camille felt doubly guilty and confused.  How they all look at us,
+he thought.  Do they know what a villain I have been?  He determined
+to slip away, and pack up, and begone.  However, nobody took any
+notice of him.  The baroness drew Josephine apart.  And Rose
+followed her mother and sister with eyes bent on the ground.
+
+There was a strange solemnity about them all.
+
+Aubertin remained behind.  But even he took no notice of Camille,
+but walked up and down with his hands behind him, and a sad and
+troubled face.  Camille felt his utter desolation.  He was nothing
+to any of them.  He resolved to go at once, and charge Aubertin with
+his last adieus to the family.  It was a wise and manly resolve.  He
+stopped Aubertin in the middle of his walk, and said in a faint
+voice of the deepest dejection,--
+
+"Doctor, the time is come that I must once more thank you for all
+your goodness to me, and bid you all farewell."
+
+"What, going before your strength is re-established?" said the
+doctor politely, but not warmly.
+
+"I am out of all danger, thanks to your skill."
+
+"Colonel, at another time I should insist upon your staying a day or
+two longer; but now I think it would be unadvisable to press you to
+stay.  Ah, colonel, you came to a happy house, but you leave a sad
+one.  Poor Madame Raynal!"
+
+"Sir!"
+
+"You saw the baroness draw her aside."
+
+"Y-yes."
+
+"By this time she knows it."
+
+"In Heaven's name what do you mean?" asked Camille.
+
+"I forgot; you are not aware of the calamity that has fallen upon
+our beloved Josephine; on the darling of the house."
+
+Camille turned cold with vague apprehension.  But he contrived to
+stammer out, "No; tell me! for Heaven's sake tell me."
+
+The doctor thus pressed revealed all in a very few words.  "My poor
+friend," said he solemnly, "her husband--is dead."
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV.
+
+
+The baroness, as I have said, drew Josephine aside, and tried to
+break to her the sad news: but her own grief overcame her, and
+bursting into tears she bewailed the loss of her son.  Josephine was
+greatly shocked.  Death!--Raynal dead--her true, kind friend dead--
+her benefactor dead.  She clung to her mother's neck, and sobbed
+with her.  Presently she withdrew her face and suddenly hid it in
+both her hands.
+
+She rose and kissed her mother once more: and went to her own room:
+and then, though there was none to see her, she hid her wet, but
+burning, cheeks in her hands.
+
+Josephine confined herself for some days to her own room, leaving it
+only to go to the chapel in the park, where she spent hours in
+prayers for the dead and in self-humiliation.  Her "tender
+conscience" accused herself bitterly for not having loved this
+gallant spirit more than she had.
+
+Camille realized nothing at first; he looked all confused in the
+doctor's face, and was silent.  Then after awhile he said, "Dead?
+Raynal dead?"
+
+"Killed in action."
+
+A red flush came to Camille's face, and his eyes went down to the
+ground at his very feet, nor did he once raise them while the doctor
+told him how the sad news had come.  "Picard the notary brought us
+the Moniteur, and there was Commandant Raynal among the killed in a
+cavalry skirmish."  With this, he took the journal from his pocket,
+and Camille read it, with awe-struck, and other feelings he would
+have been sorry to see analyzed.  He said not a word; and lowered
+his eyes to the ground.
+
+"And now," said Aubertin, "you will excuse me.  I must go to my poor
+friend the baroness.  She had a mother's love for him who is no
+more: well she might."
+
+Aubertin went away, and left Dujardin standing there like a statue,
+his eyes still glued to the ground at his feet.
+
+The doctor was no sooner out of sight, than Camille raised his eyes
+furtively, like a guilty person, and looked irresolutely this way
+and that: at last he turned and went back to the place where he had
+meditated suicide and murder; looked down at it a long while, then
+looked up to heaven--then fell suddenly on his knees: and so
+remained till night-fall.  Then he came back to the chateau.
+
+He whispered to himself, "And I am afraid it is too late to go away
+to-night."  He went softly into the saloon.  Nobody was there but
+Rose and Aubertin.  At sight of him Rose got up and left the room.
+But I suppose she went to Josephine; for she returned in a few
+minutes, and rang the bell, and ordered some supper to be brought up
+for Colonel Dujardin.
+
+"You have not dined, I hear," said she, very coldly.
+
+"I was afraid you were gone altogether," said the doctor: then
+turning to Rose, "He told me he was going this evening.  You had
+better stay quiet another day or two," added he, kindly.
+
+"Do you think so?" said Camille, timidly.
+
+He stayed upon these terms.  And now he began to examine himself.
+"Did I wish him dead?  I hope I never formed such a thought!  I
+don't remember ever wishing him dead."  And he went twice a day to
+that place by the stream, and thought very solemnly what a terrible
+thing ungoverned passion is; and repented--not eloquently, but
+silently, sincerely.
+
+But soon his impatient spirit began to torment itself again.  Why
+did Josephine shun him now?  Ah! she loved Raynal now that he was
+dead.  Women love the thing they have lost; so he had heard say.  In
+that case, the very sight of him would of course be odious to her:
+he could understand that.  The absolute, unreasoning faith he once
+had in her had been so rudely shaken by her marriage with Raynal,
+that now he could only believe just so much as he saw, and he saw
+that she shunned him.
+
+He became moody, sad, and disconsolate: and as Josephine shunned
+him, so he avoided all the others, and wandered for hours by
+himself, perplexed and miserable.  After awhile, he became conscious
+that he was under a sort of surveillance.  Rose de Beaurepaire, who
+had been so kind to him when he was confined to his own room, but
+had taken little notice of him since he came down, now resumed her
+care of him, and evidently made it her business to keep up his
+heart.  She used to meet him out walking in a mysterious way, and in
+short, be always falling in with him and trying to cheer him up:
+with tolerable success.
+
+Such was the state of affairs when the party was swelled and matters
+complicated by the arrival of one we have lost sight of.
+
+Edouard Riviere retarded his cure by an impatient spirit: but he got
+well at last, and his uncle drove him in the cabriolet to his own
+quarters.  The news of the house had been told him by letter, but,
+of course, in so vague and general a way that, thinking he knew all,
+in reality he knew nothing.
+
+Josephine had married Raynal.  The marriage was sudden, but no doubt
+there was an attachment: he had some reason to believe in sudden
+attachments.  Colonel Dujardin, an old acquaintance, had come back
+to France wounded, and the good doctor had undertaken his cure: this
+incident appeared neither strange nor any way important.  What
+affected him most deeply was the death of Raynal, his personal
+friend and patron.  But when his tyrants, as he called the surgeon
+and his uncle, gave him leave to go home, all feelings were
+overpowered by his great joy at the prospect of seeing Rose.  He
+walked over to Beaurepaire, his arm in a sling, his heart beating.
+He was coming to receive the reward of all he had done, and all he
+had attempted.  "I will surprise them," thought he.  "I will see her
+face when I come in at the door: oh, happy hour! this pays for all."
+He entered the house without announcing himself; he went softly up
+to the saloon; to his great disappointment he found no one but the
+baroness: she received him kindly, but not with the warmth he
+expected.  She was absorbed in her new grief.  He asked timidly
+after her daughters.  "Madame Raynal bears up, for the sake of
+others.  You will not, however, see her: she keeps her room.  My
+daughter Rose is taking a walk, I believe."  After some polite
+inquiries, and sympathy with his accident, the baroness retired to
+indulge her grief, and Edouard thus liberated ran in search of his
+beloved.
+
+He met her at the gate of the Pleasaunce, but not alone.  She was
+walking with an officer, a handsome, commanding, haughty, brilliant
+officer.  She was walking by his side, talking earnestly to him.
+
+An arrow of ice shot through young Riviere; and then came a feeling
+of death at his heart, a new symptom in his young life.
+
+The next moment Rose caught sight of him.  She flushed all over and
+uttered a little exclamation, and she bounded towards him like a
+little antelope, and put out both her hands at once.  He could only
+give her one.
+
+"Ah!" she cried with an accent of heavenly pity, and took his hand
+with both hers.
+
+This was like the meridian sun coming suddenly on a cold place.  He
+was all happiness.
+
+When Josephine heard he was come her eye flashed, and she said
+quickly, "I will come down to welcome him--dear Edouard!"
+
+The sisters looked at one another.  Josephine blushed.  Rose smiled
+and kissed her.  She colored higher still, and said, "No, she was
+ashamed to go down."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Look at my face."
+
+"I see nothing wrong with it, except that it eclipses other
+people's, and I have long forgiven you that."
+
+"Oh, yes, dear Rose: look what a color it has, and a fortnight ago
+it was pale as ashes."
+
+"Never mind; do you expect me to regret that?"
+
+"Rose, I am a very bad woman."
+
+"Are you, dear? then hook this for me."
+
+"Yes, love.  But I sometimes think you would forgive me if you knew
+how hard I pray to be better.  Rose, I do try so to be as unhappy as
+I ought; but I can't, I can't.  My cold heart seems as dead to
+unhappiness as once it was to happiness.  Am I a heartless woman
+after all?"
+
+"Not altogether," said Rose dryly.  "Fasten my collar, dear, and
+don't torment yourself.  You have suffered much and nobly.  It was
+Heaven's will: you bowed to it.  It was not Heaven's will that you
+should be blighted altogether.  Bow in this, too, to Heaven's will:
+take things as they come, and do cease to try and reconcile feelings
+that are too opposite to live together."
+
+"Ah! these are such comfortable words, Rose; but mamma will see this
+dreadful color in my cheek, and what can I say to her?"
+
+"Ten to one it will not be observed; and if it should, I will say it
+is the excitement of seeing Edouard.  Leave all to me."
+
+Josephine greeted Edouard most affectionately, drew from him his
+whole history, and petted him and sympathized with him deliciously,
+and made him the hero of the evening.  Camille, who was not
+naturally of a jealous temper, bore this very well at first, but at
+last he looked so bitter at her neglect of him, that Rose took him
+aside to soothe him.  Edouard, missing the auditor he most valued,
+and seeing her in secret conference with the brilliant colonel, felt
+a return of the jealous pangs that had seized him at first sight of
+the man; and so they played at cross purposes.
+
+At another period of the evening the conversation became more
+general; and Edouard took a dislike to Colonel Dujardin.  A young
+man of twenty-eight nearly always looks on a boy of twenty-one with
+the air of a superior, and this assumption, not being an ill-natured
+one, is apt to be so easy and so undefined that the younger hardly
+knows how to resent or to resist it.  But Edouard was a little vain
+as we know; and the Colonel jarred him terribly.  His quick haughty
+eye jarred him.  His regimentals jarred him: they fitted like a
+glove.  His mustache and his manner jarred him, and, worst of all,
+his cool familiarity with Rose, who seemed to court him rather than
+be courted by him.  He put this act of Rose's to the colonel's
+account, according to the custom of lovers, and revenged himself in
+a small way by telling Josephine in her ear "that the colonel
+produced on his mind the effect of an intolerable puppy."
+
+Josephine colored up and looked at him with a momentary surprise.
+She said quietly, "Military men do give themselves some airs, but he
+is very amiable at bottom.  You must make a better acquaintance with
+him, and then he will reveal to you his nobler qualities."--"Oh! I
+have no particular desire," sneered unlucky Edouard.  Sweet as
+Josephine was, this was too much for her: she said nothing; but she
+quietly turned Edouard over to Aubertin, and joined Rose, and under
+cover of her had a sweet timid chat with her falsely accused.
+
+This occupied the two so entirely that Edouard was neglected.  This
+hurt his foible, and seemed to be so unkind on the very first day of
+his return that he made his adieus to the baroness, and marched off
+in dudgeon unobserved.
+
+Rose missed him first, but said nothing.
+
+When Josephine saw he was gone, she uttered a little exclamation,
+and looked at Rose.  Rose put on a mien of haughty indifference, but
+the water was in her eyes.
+
+Josephine looked sorrowful.
+
+When they talked over everything together at night, she reproached
+herself.  "We behaved ill to poor Edouard: we neglected him."
+
+"He is a little cross, ill-tempered fellow," said Rose pettishly.
+
+"Oh, no! no!"
+
+"And as vain as a peacock."
+
+"Has he not some right to be vain in this house?"
+
+"Yes,--no.  I am very angry with him.  I won't hear a word in his
+favor," said Rose pouting: then she gave his defender a kiss.  "Yes,
+dear," said Josephine, answering the kiss, and ignoring the words,
+"he is a dear; and he is not cross, nor so very vain, poor boy! now
+don't you see what it was?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Yes, you do, you little cunning thing: you are too shrewd not to
+see everything."
+
+"No, indeed, Josephine; do tell me, don't keep me waiting: I can't
+bear that."
+
+"Well, then--jealous!  A little."
+
+"Jealous?  Oh, what fun!  Of Camille?  Ha! ha!  Little goose!"
+
+"And," said Josephine very seriously, "I almost think he would be
+jealous of any one that occupied your attention.  I watched him more
+or less all the evening."
+
+"All the better.  I'll torment my lord."
+
+"Heaven forbid you should be so cruel."
+
+"Oh! I will not make him unhappy, but I'll tease him a little; it is
+not in nature to abstain."
+
+This foible detected in her lover, Rose was very gay at the prospect
+of amusement it afforded her.
+
+And I think I have many readers who at this moment are awaiting
+unmixed enjoyment and hilarity from the same source.
+
+I wish them joy of their prospect.
+
+Edouard called the next day: he wore a gloomy air.  Rose met this
+with a particularly cheerful one; on this, Edouard's face cleared
+up, and he was himself again; agreeable as this was, Rose felt a
+little disappointed.  "I am afraid he is not very jealous after
+all," thought she.
+
+Josephine left her room this day and mingled once more with the
+family.  The bare sight of her was enough for Camille at first, but
+after awhile he wanted more.  He wanted to be often alone with her;
+but several causes co-operated to make her shy of giving him many
+such opportunities: first, her natural delicacy, coupled with her
+habit of self-denial; then her fear of shocking her mother, and
+lastly her fear of her own heart, and of Camille, whose power over
+her she knew.  For Camille, when he did get a sweet word alone with
+her, seemed to forget everything except that she was his betrothed,
+and that he had come back alive to marry her.  He spoke to her of
+his love with an ardor and an urgency that made her thrill with
+happiness, but at the same time shrink with a certain fear and self-
+reproach.  Possessed with a feeling no stronger than hers, but
+single, he did not comprehend the tumult, the trouble, the daily
+contest in her heart.  The wind seemed to him to be always changing,
+and hot and cold the same hour.  Since he did not even see that she
+was acting in hourly fear of her mother's eye, he was little likely
+to penetrate her more hidden sentiments; and then he had not touched
+her key-note,--self-denial.
+
+Women are self-denying and uncandid.  Men are self-indulgent and
+outspoken.
+
+And this is the key to a thousand double misunderstandings; for
+believe me, good women are just as stupid in misunderstanding men as
+honest men are in misunderstanding women.
+
+To Camille, Josephine's fluctuations, joys, tremors, love, terror,
+modesty, seemed one grand total, caprice.  The component parts of it
+he saw not; and her caprice tortured him almost to madness.  Too
+penitent to give way again to violent passion, he gently fretted.
+His health retrograded and his temper began to sour.  The eye of
+timid love that watched him with maternal anxiety from under its
+long lashes saw this with dismay, and Rose, who looked into her
+sister's bosom, devoted herself once more to soothe him without
+compromising Josephine's delicacy.  Matters were not so bad but what
+a fine sprightly girl like Rose could cheer up a dejected but manly
+colonel; and Rose was generally successful.
+
+But then, unfortunately, this led to a fresh mystification.
+Riviere's natural jealousy revived, and found constant food in the
+attention Rose paid Camille, a brilliant colonel living in the house
+while he, poor wretch, lived in lodgings.  The false position of all
+the parties brought about some singular turns.  I give from their
+number one that forms a link, though a small one, in my narrative.
+
+One day Edouard came to tell Rose she was making him unhappy; he had
+her alone in the Pleasaunce; she received him with a radiant smile,
+and they had a charming talk,--a talk all about HIM: what the family
+owed him, etc.
+
+On this, his late jealousy and sense of injury seemed a thing of
+three years ago, and never to return.  So hard it is for the loving
+heart to resist its sun.
+
+Jacintha came with a message from the colonel: "Would it be
+agreeable to Mademoiselle Rose to walk with him at the usual hour?"
+
+"Certainly," said Rose.
+
+As Jacintha was retiring Edouard called to her to stop a minute.
+
+Then, turning to Rose, he begged her very ceremoniously to
+reconsider that determination.
+
+"What determination?"
+
+"To sacrifice me to this Colonel Dujardin."  Still politely, only a
+little grimly.
+
+Rose opened her eyes.  "Are you mad?" inquired she with quiet
+hauteur.
+
+"Neither mad nor a fool," was the reply.  "I love you too well to
+share your regard with any one, upon any terms; least of all upon
+these, that there is to be a man in the world at whose beck and call
+you are to be, and at whose orders you are to break off an interview
+with me.  Perdition!"
+
+"Dear Edouard, what folly!  Can you suspect me of discourtesy, as
+well as of--I know not what.  Colonel Dujardin will join us, that is
+all, and we shall take a little walk with him."
+
+"Not I.  I decline the intrusion; you are engaged with me, and I
+have things to say to you that are not fit for that puppy to hear.
+So choose between me and him, and choose forever."
+
+Rose colored.  "I should be very sorry to choose either of you
+forever; but for this afternoon I choose you."
+
+"Oh, thank you--my whole life shall prove my gratitude for this
+preference."
+
+Rose beckoned Jacintha, and sent her with an excuse to Colonel
+Dujardin.  She then turned with an air of mock submission to
+Edouard.  "I am at monsieur's ORDERS."
+
+Then this unhappy novice, being naturally good-natured, thanked her
+again and again for her condescension in setting his heart at rest.
+He proposed a walk, since his interference had lost her one.  She
+yielded a cold assent.  This vexed him, but he took it for granted
+it would wear off before the end of the walk.  Edouard's heart
+bounded, but he loved her too sincerely to be happy unless he could
+see her happy too; the malicious thing saw this, or perhaps knew it
+by instinct, and by means of this good feeling of his she revenged
+herself for his tyranny.  She tortured him as only a woman can
+torture, and as even she can torture only a worthy man, and one who
+loves her.  In the course of that short walk this inexperienced
+girl, strong in the instincts and inborn arts of her sex, drove pins
+and needles, needles and pins, of all sorts and sizes, through her
+lover's heart.
+
+She was everything by turns, except kind, and nothing for long
+together.  She was peevish, she was ostentatiously patient and
+submissive, she was inattentive to her companion and seemingly
+wrapped up in contemplation of absent things and persons, the
+colonel to wit; she was dogged, repulsive, and cold; and she never
+was herself a single moment.  They returned to the gate of the
+Pleasaunce.  "Well, mademoiselle," said Riviere very sadly, "that
+interloper might as well have been with us."
+
+"Of course he might, and you would have lost nothing by permitting
+me to be courteous to a guest and an invalid.  If you had not played
+the tyrant, and taken the matter into your own hands, I should have
+found means to soothe your jeal--I mean your vanity; but you
+preferred to have your own way.  Well, you have had it."
+
+"Yes, mademoiselle, you have given me a lesson; you have shown me
+how idle it is to attempt to force a young lady's inclinations in
+anything."
+
+He bade her good-day, and went away sorrowful.
+
+She cut Camille dead for the rest of the day.
+
+Next morning, early, Edouard called expressly to see her.
+"Mademoiselle Rose," said he, humbly, "I called to apologize for the
+ungentlemanly tone of my remonstrances yesterday."
+
+"Fiddle-dee," said Rose.  "Don't do it again; that is the best
+apology."
+
+"I am not likely to offend so again," said he sadly.  "I am going
+away.  I am sorry to say I am promoted; my new post is ten leagues.
+HE WILL HAVE IT ALL HIS OWN WAY NOW.  But perhaps it is best.  Were
+I to stay here, I foresee you would soon lose whatever friendly
+feeling you have for me."
+
+"Am I so changeable?  I am not considered so," remonstrated Rose,
+gently.
+
+Riviere explained; "I am not vain," said he, with that self-
+knowledge which is so general an attribute of human beings; "no man
+less so, nor am I jealous; but I respect myself, and I could never
+be content to share your time and your regard with Colonel Dujardin,
+nor with a much better man.  See now; he has made me arrogant.  Was
+I ever so before?"
+
+"No! no! no! and I forgive you now, my poor Edouard."
+
+"He has made you cold as ice to me."
+
+"No! that was my own wickedness and spitefulness."
+
+"Wickedness, spitefulness! they are not in your nature.  It is all
+that wretch's doing."
+
+Rose sighed, but she said nothing; for she saw that to excuse
+Camille would only make the jealous one more bitter against him.
+
+"Will you deign to write to me at my new post? once a month? in
+answer to my letters?"
+
+"Yes, dear.  But you will ride over sometimes to see us."
+
+"Oh, yes; but for some little time I shall not be able.  The duties
+of a new post."
+
+"Perhaps in a month--a fortnight?"
+
+"Sooner perhaps; the moment I hear that man is out of the house."
+
+Edouard went away, dogged and sad; Rose shut herself up in her
+room and had a good cry.  In the afternoon Josephine came and
+remonstrated with her.  "You have not walked with him at all to-day."
+
+"No; you must pet him yourself for once.  I hate the sight of him;
+it has made mischief between Edouard and me, my being so attentive
+to him.  Edouard is jealous, and I cannot wonder.  After all, what
+right have I to mystify him who honors me with his affection?"
+
+Then, being pressed with questions by Josephine, she related to her
+all that had passed between Edouard and her, word for word.
+
+"Poor Camille!" sighed Josephine the just.
+
+"Oh, dear, yes! poor Camille! who has the power to make us all
+miserable, and who does it, and will go on doing it until he is
+happy himself."
+
+"Ah! would to Heaven I could make him as happy as he deserves to
+be."
+
+"You could easily make him much happier than that.  And why not do
+it?"
+
+"O Rose," said Josephine, shocked, "how can you advise me so?"
+
+She then asked her if she thought it possible that Camille could be
+ignorant of her heart.
+
+"Josephine," replied Rose, angrily, "these men are absurd: they
+believe only what they see.  I have done what I can for you and
+Camille, but it is useless.  Would you have him believe you love
+him, you must yourself be kind to him; and it would be a charitable
+action: you would make four unhappy people happy, or, at least, put
+them on the road; NOW they are off the road, and, by what I have
+seen to-day, I think, if we go on so much longer, it will be too
+late to try to return.  Come, Josephine, for my sake!  Let me go and
+tell him you will consent--to all our happinesses.  There, the crime
+is mine."  And she ran off in spite of Josephine's faint and
+hypocritical entreaties.  She returns the next minute looking all
+aghast.  "It is too late," said she.  "He is going away.  I am sure
+he is, for he is packing up his things to go.  I spied through the
+old place and saw him.  He was sighing like a furnace as he strapped
+his portmanteau.  I hate him, of course, but I was sorry for him.  I
+could not help being.  He sighed so all the time, piteously."
+
+Josephine turned pale, and lifted her hands in surprise and dismay.
+
+"Depend on it, Josephine, we are wrong," said Rose, firmly: "these
+wretches will not stand our nonsense above a certain time: they are
+not such fools.  We are mismanaging: one gone, the other going; both
+losing faith in us."
+
+Josephine's color returned to her cheek, and then mounted high.
+Presently she smiled, a smile full of conscious power and furtive
+complacency, and said quietly, "He will not go."
+
+Rose was pleased, but not surprised, to hear her sister speak so
+confidently, for she knew her power over Camille.  "That is right,"
+said she, "go to him, and say two honest words: 'I bid you stay.'"
+
+"O Rose! no!"
+
+"Poltroon!  You know he would go down on his knees, and stay
+directly."
+
+"No: I should blush all my life before you and him.  I COULD not.  I
+should let him go sooner, almost.  Oh, no!  I will never ask a man
+to stay who wishes to leave me.  But just you go to him, and say
+Madame Raynal is going to take a little walk: will he do her the
+honor to be her companion?  Not a word more, if you love me."
+
+"I'll go.  Hypocrite!"
+
+
+Josephine received Camille with a bright smile.  She seemed in
+unusually good spirits, and overflowing with kindness and innocent
+affection.  On this his high gloomy brow relaxed, and all his
+prospects brightened as by magic.  Then she communicated to him a
+number of little plans for next week and the week after.  Among the
+rest he was to go with her and Rose to Frejus.  "Such a sweet place:
+I want to show it you.  You will come?"
+
+He hesitated a single moment: a moment of intense anxiety to the
+smiling Josephine.
+
+"Yes! he would come: it was a great temptation, he saw so little of
+her."
+
+"Well, you will see more of me now."
+
+"Shall I see you every day--alone, I mean?"
+
+"Oh, yes, if you wish it," replied Josephine, in an off-hand,
+indifferent way.
+
+He seized her hand and devoured it with kisses.  "Foolish thing!"
+murmured she, looking down on him with ineffable tenderness.
+"Should I not be always with you if I consulted my inclination?--let
+me go."
+
+"No! consult your inclination a little longer."
+
+"Must I?"
+
+"Yes; that shall be your punishment."
+
+"For what?  What have I done?" asked she with an air of great
+innocence.
+
+"You have made me happy, me who adore you," was the evasive reply.
+
+Josephine came in from her walk with a high color and beaming eyes,
+and screamed, "Run, Rose!"
+
+On this concise, and to us not very clear instruction, Rose slipped
+up the secret stair.  She saw Camille come in and gravely unpack his
+little portmanteau, and dispose his things in the drawers with
+soldier-like neatness, and hum an agreeable march.  She came and
+told Josephine.
+
+"Ah!" said Josephine with a little sigh of pleasure, and a gentle
+triumph in her eyes.
+
+She had not only got her desire, but had arrived at it her way,--
+woman's way, round about.
+
+This adroit benevolence led to more than she bargained for.  She and
+Camille were now together every day: and their hearts, being under
+restraint in public, melted together all the more in their stolen
+interviews.
+
+At the third delicious interview the modest Camille begged Josephine
+to be his wife directly.
+
+Have you noticed those half tame deer that come up to you in a park
+so lovingly, with great tender eyes, and, being now almost within
+reach, stop short, and with bodies fixed like statues on pedestals,
+crane out their graceful necks for sugar, or bread, or a chestnut,
+or a pocket-handkerchief?  Do but offer to put your hand upon them,
+away they bound that moment twenty yards, and then stand quite
+still, and look at your hand and you, with great inquiring,
+suspicious, tender eyes.
+
+So Josephine started at Camille's audacious proposal.  "Never
+mention such a thing to me again: or--or, I will not walk with you
+any more:" then she thrilled with pleasure at the obnoxious idea,
+"she Camille's wife!" and colored all over--with rage, Camille
+thought.  He promised submissively not to renew the topic: no more
+he did till next day.  Josephine had spent nearly the whole interval
+in thinking of it; so she was prepared to put him down by calm
+reasons.  She proceeded to do so, gently, but firmly.
+
+Lo and behold! what does he do, but meets her with just as many
+reasons, and just as calm ones: and urges them gently, but firmly.
+
+Heaven had been very kind to them: why should they be unkind to
+themselves?  They had had a great escape: why not accept the
+happiness, as, being persons of honor, they had accepted the misery?
+with many other arguments, differing in other things, but agreeing
+in this, that they were all sober, grave, and full of common-sense.
+
+Finding him not defenceless on the score of reason, she shifted her
+ground and appealed to his delicacy.  On this he appealed to her
+love, and then calm reason was jostled off the field, and passion
+and sentiment battled in her place.
+
+In these contests day by day renewed, Camille had many advantages.
+
+Rose, though she did not like him, had now declared on his side.
+She refused to show him the least attention.  This threw him on
+Josephine: and when Josephine begged her to help reduce Camille to
+reason, her answer would be,--
+
+"Hypocrite!" with a kiss: or else she would say, with a half comic
+petulance, "No! no!  I am on his side.  Give him his own way, or he
+will make us all four miserable."
+
+Thus Josephine's ally went over to the enemy.
+
+And then this coy young lady's very power of resistance began to
+give way.  She had now battled for months against her own heart:
+first for her mother; then, in a far more terrible conflict for
+Raynal, for honor and purity; and of late she had been battling,
+still against her own heart, for delicacy, for etiquette, things
+very dear to her, but not so great, holy, and sustaining as honor
+and charity that were her very household gods: and so, just when the
+motives of resistance were lowered, the length of the resistance
+began to wear her out.
+
+For nothing is so hard to her sex as a long steady struggle.  In
+matters physical, this is the thing the muscles of the fair cannot
+stand; in matters intellectual and moral, the long strain it is that
+beats them dead.
+
+Do not look for a Bacona, a Newtona, a Handella, a Victoria Huga.
+
+Some American ladies tell us education has stopped the growth of
+these.
+
+No! mesdames.  These are not in nature.
+
+They can bubble letters in ten minutes that you could no more
+deliver to order in ten days than a river can play like a fountain.
+They can sparkle gems of stories: they can flash little diamonds of
+poems.  The entire sex has never produced one opera nor one epic
+that mankind could tolerate: and why? these come by long, high-
+strung labor.  But, weak as they are in the long run of everything
+but the affections (and there giants), they are all overpowering
+while their gallop lasts.  Fragilla shall dance any two of you flat
+on the floor before four o'clock, and then dance on till the peep of
+day.
+
+Only you trundle off to your business as usual, and could dance
+again the next night, and so on through countless ages.
+
+She who danced you into nothing is in bed, a human jelly tipped with
+headache.
+
+What did Josephine say to Rose one day?  "I am tired of saying 'No!
+no! no! no! no!' forever and ever to him I love."
+
+But this was not all.  She was not free from self-reproach.
+Camille's faith in her had stood firm.  Hers in him had not.  She
+had wronged him, first by believing him false, then by marrying
+another.  One day she asked his pardon for this.  He replied that he
+had forgiven that; but would she be good enough to make him forget
+it?
+
+"I wish I could."
+
+"You can.  Marry me: then your relation to that man will seem but a
+hideous dream.  I shall be able to say, looking at you, my wife, 'I
+was faithful: I suffered something for her; I came home: she loved
+me still; the proof is, she was my wife within three months of my
+return.'"
+
+When he said that to her in the Pleasaunce, if there had been a
+priest at hand--.  In a word, Josephine longed to show him her love,
+yet wished not to shock her mother, nor offend her own sense of
+delicacy; but Camille cared for nothing but his love.  To sacrifice
+love and happiness, even for a time, to etiquette, seemed to him to
+be trifling with the substance of great things for the shadow of
+petty things; and he said so: sometimes sadly, sometimes almost
+bitterly.
+
+So Josephine was a beleagured fortress, attacked with one will, and
+defended by troops, one-third of which were hot on the side of the
+besiegers.
+
+When singleness attacks division, you know the result beforehand.
+Why then should I spin words?  I will not trace so ill-matched a
+contest step by step, sentence by sentence: let me rather hasten to
+relate the one peculiarity that arose out of this trite contest,
+where, under the names of Camille and Josephine, the two great sexes
+may be seen acting the whole world-wide distich,--
+
+
+     "It's a man's part to try,
+      And a woman's to deny [for a while?]."
+
+
+Finding her own resolutions oozing away, Josephine caught at another
+person.
+
+She said to Camille before Rose,--
+
+"Even if I could bring myself to snatch at happiness in this
+indelicate way--scarce a month after, oh!"  And there ended the
+lady's sentence.  In the absence of a legitimate full stop, she put
+one hand before her lovely face to hide it, and so no more.  But
+some two minutes after she delivered the rest in the form and with
+the tone of a distinct remark, "No: my mother would never consent."
+
+"Yes, she would if you could be brought to implore her as earnestly
+as I implore you."
+
+"Now would she?" asked Josephine, turning quickly to her sister.
+
+"No, never.  Our mother would look with horror on such a proposal.
+A daughter of hers to marry within a twelvemonth of her widowhood!"
+
+"There, you see, Camille."
+
+"And, besides, she loved Raynal so; she has not forgotten him as we
+have, almost."
+
+"Ungrateful creature that I am!" sighed Josephine!
+
+"She mourns for him every day.  Often I see her eyes suddenly fill;
+that is for him.  Josephine's influence with mamma is very great: it
+is double mine: but if we all went on our knees to her, the doctor
+and all, she would never consent."
+
+"There you see, Camille: and I could not defy my mother, even for
+you."
+
+Camille sighed.
+
+"I see everything is against me, even my love: for that love is too
+much akin to veneration to propose to you a clandestine marriage."
+
+"Oh, thank you! bless you for respecting as well as loving me, dear
+Camille," said Josephine.
+
+These words, uttered with gentle warmth, were some consolation to
+Camille, and confirmed him, as they were intended to do, in the
+above good resolution.  He smiled.
+
+"Maladroit!" muttered Rose.
+
+"Why maladroit?" asked Camille, opening his eyes.
+
+"Let us talk of something else," replied Rose, coolly.
+
+Camille turned red.  He understood that he had done something very
+stupid, but he could not conceive what.  He looked from one sister
+to the other alternately.  Rose was smiling ironically, Josephine
+had her eyes bent demurely on a handkerchief she was embroidering.
+
+That evening Camille drew Rose aside, and asked for an explanation
+of her "maladroit."
+
+"So it was," replied Rose, sharply.
+
+But as this did not make the matter quite clear, Camille begged a
+little further explanation.
+
+"Was it your part to make difficulties?"
+
+"No, indeed."
+
+"Was it for you to tell her a secret marriage would not be delicate?
+Do you think she will be behind you in delicacy? or that a love
+without respect will satisfy her? yet you must go and tell her you
+respected her too much to ask her to marry you secretly.  In other
+words, situated as she is, you asked her not to marry you at all:
+she consented to that directly; what else could you expect?"
+
+"Maladroit! indeed," said Camille, "but I would not have said it,
+only I thought"--
+
+"You thought nothing would induce her to marry secretly, so you said
+to yourself, 'I will assume a virtue: I will do a bit of cheap self-
+denial: decline to the sound of trumpets what another will be sure
+to deny me if I don't--ha! ha!'--well, for your comfort, I am by no
+means so sure she might not have been brought to do ANYTHING for
+you, except openly defy mamma: but now of course"--
+
+And here this young lady's sentence ended: for the sisters, unlike
+in most things, were one in grammar.
+
+Camille was so disconcerted and sad at what he had done, that Rose
+began to pity him: so she rallied him a little longer in spite of
+her pity: and then all of a sudden gave him her hand, and said she
+would try and repair the mischief.
+
+He began to smother her hand with kisses.
+
+"Oh!" said she, "I don't deserve all that: I have a motive of my
+own; let me alone, child, do.  Your unlucky speech will be quoted to
+me a dozen times.  Never mind."
+
+Rose went and bribed Josephine to consent.
+
+"Come, mamma shall not know, and as for you, you shall scarcely move
+in the matter; only do not oppose me very violently, and all will be
+well."
+
+"Ah, Rose!" said Josephine; "it is delightful--terrible, I mean--to
+have a little creature about one that reads one like this.  What
+shall I do?  What shall I do?"
+
+"Why, do the best you can under all the circumstances.  His wound is
+healed, you know; he must go back to the army; you have both
+suffered to the limits of mortal endurance.  Is he to go away
+unhappy, in any doubt of your affection? and you to remain behind
+with the misery of self-reproach added to the desolation of
+absence?--think."
+
+"It is cruel.  But to deceive my mother!"
+
+"Do not say deceive our mother; that is such a shocking phrase."
+
+Rose then reminded Josephine that their confessor had told them a
+wise reticence was not the same thing as a moral deceit.  She
+reminded her, too, how often they had acted on his advice and always
+with good effect; how many anxieties and worries they had saved
+their mother by reticence.  Josephine assented warmly to this.
+
+Was there not some reason to think they had saved their mother's
+very life by these reticences?  Josephine assented.  "And,
+Josephine, you are of age; you are your own mistress; you have a
+right to marry whom you please: and, sooner or later, you will
+certainly marry Camille.  I doubt whether even our mother could
+prevail on you to refuse him altogether.  So it is but a question of
+time, and of giving our mother pain, or sparing her pain.  Dear
+mamma is old; she is prejudiced.  Why shock her prejudices?  She
+could not be brought to understand the case: these things never
+happened in her day.  Everything seems to have gone by rule then.
+Let us do nothing to worry her for the short time she has to live.
+Let us take a course between pain to her and cruelty to you and
+Camille."
+
+These arguments went far to convince Josephine: for her own heart
+supported them.  She went from her solid objections to untenable
+ones--a great point gained.  She urged the difficulty, the
+impossibility of a secret marriage.
+
+Camille burst in here: he undertook at once to overcome these
+imaginary difficulties.  "They could be married at a distance."
+
+"You will find no priest who will consent to do such a wicked thing
+as marry us without my mother's knowledge," objected Josephine.
+
+"Oh! as to that," said Rose, "you know the mayor marries people
+nowadays."
+
+"I will not be married again without a priest," said Josephine,
+sharply.
+
+"Nor I," said Camille.  "I know a mayor who will do the civil forms
+for me, and a priest who will marry me in the sight of Heaven, and
+both will keep it secret for love of me till it shall please
+Josephine to throw off this disguise."
+
+"Who is the priest?" inquired Josephine, keenly.
+
+"An old cure: he lives near Frejus: he was my tutor, and the mayor
+is the mayor of Frejus, also an old friend of mine."
+
+"But what on earth will you say to them?"
+
+"That is my affair: I must give them some reasons which compel me to
+keep my marriage secret.  Oh! I shall have to tell them some fibs,
+of course."
+
+"There, I thought so!  I will not have you telling fibs; it lowers
+you."
+
+"Of course it does; but you can't have secrecy without a fib or
+two."
+
+"Fibs that will injure no one," said Rose, majestically.
+
+From this day Camille began to act as well as to talk.  He bought a
+light caleche and a powerful horse, and elected factotum Dard his
+groom.  Camille rode over to Frejus and told a made-up story to the
+old cure and the mayor, and these his old friends believed every
+word he said, and readily promised their services and strict
+secrecy.
+
+He told the young ladies what he had done.
+
+Rose approved.  Josephine shook her head, and seeing matters going
+as her heart desired and her conscience did not quite approve, she
+suddenly affected to be next to nobody in the business--to be
+resigned, passive, and disposed of to her surprise by Queen Rose and
+King Camille, without herself taking any actual part in their
+proceedings.
+
+At last the great day arrived on which Camille and Josephine were to
+be married at Frejus.
+
+The mayor awaited them at eleven o'clock.  The cure at twelve.  The
+family had been duly prepared for this excursion by several smaller
+ones.
+
+Rose announced their intention over night; a part of it.
+
+"Mamma," said she, blushing a little, "Colonel Dujardin is good
+enough to take us to Frejus tomorrow.  It is a long way, and we must
+breakfast early or we shall not be back to dinner."
+
+"Do so, my child.  I hope you will have a fine day: and mind you
+take plenty of wraps with you in case of a shower."
+
+At seven o'clock the next morning Camille and the two ladies took a
+hasty cup of coffee together instead of breakfast, and then Dard
+brought the caleche round.
+
+The ladies got in, and Camille had just taken the reins in his hand,
+when Jacintha screamed to him from the hall, "Wait a moment,
+colonel, wait a moment!  The doctor! don't go without the doctor!"
+And the next moment Dr. Aubertin appeared with his cloak on his arm,
+and, saluting the ladies politely, seated himself quietly in the
+vehicle before the party had recovered their surprise.
+
+The ladies managed to keep their countenances, but Dujardin's
+discomfiture was evident.
+
+He looked piteously at Josephine, and then asked Aubertin if they
+were to set him down anywhere in particular.
+
+"Oh, no; I am going with you to Frejus," was the quiet reply.
+
+Josephine quaked.  Camille was devoured with secret rage: he lashed
+the horse and away they went.
+
+It was a silent party.  The doctor seemed in a reverie.  The others
+did not know what to think, much less to say.  Aubertin sat by
+Camille's side; so the latter could hold no secret communication
+with either lady.
+
+Now it was not the doctor's habit to rise at this time of the
+morning: yet there he was, going with them to Frejus uninvited.
+
+Josephine was in agony; had their intention transpired through some
+imprudence of Camille?
+
+Camille was terribly uneasy.  He concluded the secret had transpired
+through female indiscretion.  Then they all tortured themselves as
+to the old man's intention.  But what seemed most likely was, that
+he was with them to prevent a clandestine marriage by his bare
+presence, without making a scene and shocking Josephine's pride: and
+if so, was he there by his own impulse?  No, it was rather to be
+feared that all this was done by order of the baroness.  There was a
+finesse about it that smacked of a feminine origin, and the baroness
+was very capable of adopting such a means as this, to spare her own
+pride and her favorite daughter's.  "The clandestine" is not all
+sugar.  A more miserable party never went along, even to a wedding.
+
+After waiting a long time for the doctor to declare himself, they
+turned desperate, and began to chatter all manner of trifles.  This
+had a good effect: it roused Aubertin from his reverie, and
+presently he gave them the following piece of information: "I told
+you the other day that a nephew of mine was just dead; a nephew I
+had not seen for many years.  Well, my friends, I received last
+night a hasty summons to his funeral."
+
+"At Frejus?"
+
+"No, at Paris.  The invitation was so pressing, that I was obliged
+to go.  The letter informed me, however, that a diligence passes
+through Frejus, at eleven o'clock, for Paris.  I heard you say you
+were going to Frejus; so I packed up a few changes of linen, and my
+MS., my work on entomology, which at my last visit to the capital
+all the publishers were mad enough to refuse: here it is.  Apropos,
+has Jacintha put my bag into the carriage?"
+
+On this a fierce foot-search, and the bag was found.  Meantime,
+Josephine leaned back in her seat with a sigh of thankfulness.  She
+was more intent on not being found out than on being married.  But
+Camille, who was more intent on being married than on not being
+found out, was asking himself, with fury, how on earth they should
+get rid of Aubertin in time.
+
+Well, of course, under such circumstances as these the diligence did
+not come to its time, nor till long after; and all the while, they
+were waiting for it they were failing their rendezvous with the
+mayor, and making their rendezvous with the curate impossible.  But,
+above all, there was the risk of one or other of those friends
+coming up and blurting all out, taking for granted that the doctor
+must be in their confidence, or why bring him.
+
+At last, at half-past eleven o'clock, to their great relief, up came
+the diligence.  The doctor prepared to take his place in the
+interior, when the conductor politely informed him that the vehicle
+stopped there a quarter of an hour.
+
+"In that case I will not abandon my friends," said the doctor,
+affectionately.
+
+One of his friends gnashed his teeth at this mark of affection.  But
+Josephine smiled sweetly.
+
+At last he was gone; but it wanted ten minutes only to twelve.
+
+Josephine inquired amiably, whether it would not be as well to
+postpone matters to another day--meaning forever.  "My ARDOR is
+chilled," said she, and showed symptoms of crying at what she had
+gone through.
+
+Camille replied by half dragging them to the mayor.  That worthy
+received them with profound, though somewhat demure respect, and
+invited them to a table sumptuously served.  The ladies, out of
+politeness, were about to assent, but Camille begged permission to
+postpone that part until after the ceremony.
+
+At last, to their astonishment, they were married.  Then, with a
+promise to return and dine with the mayor, they went to the cure.
+Lo and behold! he was gone to visit a sick person.  "He had waited a
+long time for them," said the servant.
+
+Josephine was much disconcerted, and showed a disposition to cry
+again.  The servant, a good-natured girl, nosed a wedding, and
+offered to run and bring his reverence in a minute.
+
+Presently there came an old silvery-haired man, who addressed them
+all as his children.  He took them to the church, and blessed their
+union; and for the first time Josephine felt as if Heaven consented.
+They took a gentle farewell of him, and went back to the mayor's to
+dine; and at this stage of the business Rose and Josephine at last
+effected a downright simultaneous cry, apropos of nothing that was
+then occurring.
+
+This refreshed them mightily, and they glowed at the mayor's table
+like roses washed with dew.
+
+But oh! how glad at heart they all were to find themselves in the
+carriage once more going home to Beaurepaire.
+
+Rose and Josephine sat intertwined on the back seat; Camille, the
+reins in his right hand, nearly turned his back on the horse, and
+leaned back over to them and purred to Rose and his wife with
+ineffable triumph and tenderness.
+
+The lovers were in Elysium, and Rose was not a little proud of her
+good management in ending all their troubles.  Their mother received
+them back with great, and as they fancied, with singular, affection.
+She was beginning to be anxious about them, she said.  Then her
+kindness gave these happy souls a pang it never gave them before.
+
+Since the above events scarce a fortnight had elapsed; but such a
+change!  Camille sunburnt and healthy, and full of animation and
+confidence; Josephine beaming with suppressed happiness, and more
+beautiful than Rose could ever remember to have seen her.  For a
+soft halo of love and happiness shone around her head; a new and
+indefinable attraction bloomed on her face.  She was a wife.  Her
+eye, that used to glance furtively on Camille, now dwelt demurely on
+him; dwelt with a sort of gentle wonder and admiration as well as
+affection, and, when he came or passed very near her, a keen
+observer might have seen her thrill.
+
+She kept a good deal out of her mother's way; for she felt within
+that her face must be too happy.  She feared to shock her mother's
+grief with her radiance.  She was ashamed of feeling unmixed heaven.
+But the flood of secret bliss she floated in bore all misgivings
+away.  The pair were forever stealing away together for hours, and
+on these occasions Rose used to keep out of her mother's sight,
+until they should return.  So then the new-married couple could
+wander hand in hand through the thick woods of Beaurepaire, whose
+fresh green leaves were now just out, and hear the distant cuckoo,
+and sit on mossy banks, and pour love into one another's eyes, and
+plan ages of happiness, and murmur their deep passion and their
+bliss almost more than mortal; could do all this and more, without
+shocking propriety.  These sweet duets passed for trios: for on
+their return Rose would be out looking for them, or would go and
+meet them at some distance, and all three would go up together to
+the baroness, as from a joint excursion.  And when they went up to
+their bedrooms, Josephine would throw her arms round her sister's
+neck, and sigh, "It is not happiness, it is beatitude!"
+
+Meantime, the baroness mourned for Raynal.  Her grief showed no
+decrease.  Rose even fancied at times she wore a gloomy and
+discontented look as well; but on reflection she attributed that to
+her own fancy, or to the contrast that had now sprung up in her
+sister's beaming complacency.
+
+Rose, when she found herself left day after day alone for hours, was
+sad and thought of Edouard.  And this feeling gained on her day by
+day.
+
+At last, one afternoon, she locked herself in her own room, and,
+after a long contest with her pride, which, if not indomitable, was
+next door to it, she sat down to write him a little letter.  Now, in
+this letter, in the place devoted by men to their after-thoughts, by
+women to their pretended after-thoughts; i. e., to what they have
+been thinking of all through the letter, she dropped a careless hint
+that all the party missed him very much, "even the obnoxious
+colonel, who, by-the-by, has transferred his services elsewhere.  I
+have forgiven him that, because he has said civil things about you."
+
+Rose was reading her letter over again, to make sure that all the
+principal expressions were indistinct, and that the composition
+generally, except the postscript, resembled a Delphic oracle, when
+there was a hasty footstep, and a tap at her door, and in came
+Jacintha, excited.
+
+"He is come, mademoiselle," cried she, and nodded her head like a
+mandarin, only more knowingly; then she added, "So you may burn
+that."  For her quick eye had glanced at the table.
+
+"Who is come?" inquired Rose, eagerly.
+
+"Why, your one?"
+
+"My one?" asked the young lady, reddening, "my what?"
+
+"The little one--Edouard--Monsieur Riviere."
+
+"Oh, Monsieur Riviere," said Rose, acting nonchalance.  "Why could
+you not say so? you use such phrases, who can conjecture what you
+mean?  I will come to Monsieur Riviere directly; mamma will be so
+glad."
+
+Jacintha gone, Rose tore up the letter and locked up the pieces,
+then ran to the glass.  Etc.
+
+Edouard had been so profoundly miserable he could stand it no
+longer; in spite of his determination not to visit Beaurepaire while
+it contained a rival, he rode over to see whether he had not
+tormented himself idly: above all, to see the beloved face.
+
+Jacintha put him into the salle a manger.  "By that you will see her
+alone," said the knowing Jacintha.  He sat down, hat and whip in
+hand, and wondered how he should be received--if at all.
+
+In glides Rose all sprightliness and good-humor, and puts out her
+hand to him; the which he kisses.
+
+"How could I keep away so long?" asked he vaguely, and self-
+astonished.
+
+"How indeed, and we missing you so all the time!"
+
+"Have YOU missed me?" was the eager inquiry.
+
+"Oh, no!" was the cheerful reply; "but all the rest have."
+
+Presently the malicious thing gave a sudden start.
+
+"Oh! such a piece of news; you remember Colonel Dujardin, the
+obnoxious colonel?"
+
+No answer.
+
+"Transferred his attentions.  Fancy!"
+
+"Who to?"
+
+"To Josephine and mamma.  But such are the military.  He only wanted
+to get rid of you: this done (through your want of spirit), he
+scorns the rich prize; so now I scorn HIM.  Will you come for a
+walk?"
+
+"Oh, yes!"
+
+"We will go and look for my deserter.  I say, tell me now; cannot I
+write to the commander-in-chief about this? a soldier has no right
+to be a deserter, has he? tell me, you are a public man, and know
+everything except my heart."
+
+"Is it not too bad to tease me to-day?"
+
+"Yes! but please! I have had few amusements of late.  I find it so
+dull without you to tease."
+
+Formal permission to tease being conceded, she went that instant on
+the opposite tack, and began to tell him how she had missed him, and
+how sorry she had been anything should have occurred to vex their
+kind good friend.  In short, Edouard spent a delightful day, for
+Rose took him one way to meet Josephine, who, she knew, was coming
+another.  At night the last embers of jealousy got quenched, for
+Josephine was a wife now, and had already begun to tell Camille all
+her little innocent secrets; and she told him all about Edouard and
+Rose, and gave him his orders; so he treated Rose with great respect
+before Edouard; but paid her no marked attention; also he was
+affable to Riviere, who, having ceased to suspect, began to like
+him.
+
+In the course of the evening, the colonel also informed the baroness
+that he expected every day an order to join the army of the Rhine.
+
+Edouard pricked his ears.
+
+The baroness said no more than politeness dictated.  She did not
+press him to stay, but treated his departure as a matter of course.
+Riviere rode home late in the evening in high spirits.
+
+The next day Rose varied her late deportment; she sang snatches of
+melody, going about the house; it was for all the world like a bird
+chirping.  In the middle of one chirp Jacintha interfered.  "Hush,
+mademoiselle, your mamma! she is at the bottom of the corridor."
+
+"What was I thinking of?" said Rose.
+
+"Oh! I dare say you know, mademoiselle," replied the privileged
+domestic.
+
+A letter of good news came from Aubertin.  That summons to his
+nephew's funeral was an era in his harmless life.
+
+The said nephew was a rich man and an oddity; one of those who love
+to surprise folk.  Moreover, he had no children, and detected his
+nephews and nieces being unnaturally civil to him.  "Waiting to cut
+me up," was his generous reading of them.  So with this he made a
+will, and there defied, as far as in him lay, the laws of nature;
+for he set his wealth a-flowing backwards instead of forwards; he
+handed his property up to an ancestor, instead of down to posterity.
+
+All this the doctor's pen set down with some humor, and in the calm
+spirit with which a genuine philosopher receives prosperity as well
+as adversity.  Yet one natural regret escaped him; that all this
+wealth, since it was to come, had not come a year or two sooner.
+
+All at Beaurepaire knew what their dear old friend meant.
+
+His other news to them was that they might expect him any moment.
+
+So here was another cause of rejoicing.
+
+"I am so glad," said Josephine.  "Now, perhaps, he will be able to
+publish his poor dear entomology, that the booksellers were all so
+unkind, so unfeeling about."
+
+I linger on the brink of painful scenes to observe that a sweet and
+loving friendship, such as this was between the good doctor and
+three persons of another sex, is one of the best treasures of the
+human heart.  Poverty had strengthened it; yet now wealth could not
+weaken it.  With no tie of blood it yet was filial, sisterly,
+brotherly, national, chivalrous; happy, unalloyed sentiment, free
+from ups and downs, from heats and chills, from rivalry, from
+caprice; and, indeed, from all mortal accidents but one--and why say
+one? methinks death itself does but suspend these gentle, rare,
+unselfish amities a moment, then waft them upward to their abiding
+home.
+
+
+CHAPTER XV.
+
+
+It was a fair morning in June: the sky was a bright, deep, lovely,
+speckless blue: the flowers and bushes poured perfume, and sprinkled
+song upon the balmy air.  On such a day, so calm, so warm, so
+bright, so scented, so tuneful, to live and to be young is to be
+happy.  With gentle hand it wipes all other days out of the memory;
+it smiles, it smells, it sings, and clouds and rain and biting wind
+seem as far off and impossible as grief and trouble.
+
+Camille and Josephine had stolen out, and strolled lazily up and
+down close under the house, drinking the sweet air, fragrant with
+perfume and melody; the blue sky, and love.
+
+Rose was in the house.  She had missed them; but she thought they
+must be near; for they seldom took long walks early in the day.
+Meeting Jacintha on the landing of the great staircase, she asked
+her where her sister was.
+
+"Madame Raynal is gone for a walk.  She has taken the colonel with
+her.  You know she always takes the colonel out with her now."
+
+"That will do.  You can finish your work."
+
+Jacintha went into Camille's room.
+
+Rose, who had looked as grave as a judge while Jacintha was present,
+bubbled into laughter.  She even repeated Jacintha's words aloud,
+and chuckled over them.  "You know she always takes the colonel out
+with her now--ha, ha, ha!"
+
+"Rose!" sighed a distant voice.
+
+She looked round, and saw the baroness at some distance in the
+corridor, coming slowly towards her, with eyes bent gloomily on the
+ground.  Rose composed her features into a settled gravity, and went
+to meet her.
+
+"I wish to speak with you," said the baroness; "let us sit down; it
+is cool here."
+
+Rose ran and brought a seat without a back, but well stuffed, and
+set it against the wall.  The old lady sat down and leaned back, and
+looked at Rose in silence a good while; then she said,--
+
+"There is room for you; sit down, for I want to speak seriously to
+you."
+
+"Yes, mamma; what is it?"
+
+"Turn a little round, and let me see your face."
+
+Rose complied; and began to feel a little uneasy.
+
+"Perhaps you can guess what I am going to say to you?"
+
+"I have no idea."
+
+"Well, I am going to put a question to you."
+
+"With all my heart, dear mamma."
+
+"I invite you to explain to me the most singular, the most
+unaccountable thing that ever fell under my notice.  Will you do
+this for your mother?"
+
+"O mamma! of course I will do anything to please you that I can;
+but, indeed, I don't know what you mean."
+
+"I am going to tell you."
+
+The old lady paused.  The young one, naturally enough, felt a chill
+of vague anxiety strike across her frame.
+
+"Rose," said the old lady, speaking very gently but firmly, and
+leaning in a peculiar way on her words, while her eye worked like an
+ice gimlet on her daughter's face, "a little while ago, when my poor
+Raynal--our benefactor--was alive--and I was happy--you all chilled
+my happiness by your gloom: the whole house seemed a house of
+mourning--tell me now why was this."
+
+"Mamma!" said Rose, after a moment's hesitation, "we could hardly be
+gay.  Sickness in the house!  And if Colonel Raynal was alive, still
+he was absent, and in danger."
+
+"Oh! then it was out of regard for him we were all dispirited?"
+
+"Why, I suppose so," said Rose, stoutly; but then colored high at
+her own want of candor.  However, she congratulated herself that her
+mother's suspicion was confined to past events.
+
+Her self-congratulation on that score was short; for the baroness,
+after eying her grimly for a second or two in silence, put her this
+awkward question plump.
+
+"If so, tell me why is it that ever since that black day when the
+news of his DEATH reached us, the whole house has gone into black,
+and has gone out of mourning?"
+
+"Mamma," stammered Rose, "what DO you mean?"
+
+"Even poor Camille, who was so pale and wan, has recovered like
+magic."
+
+"O mamma! is not that fancy?" said Rose, piteously.  "Of what do you
+suspect me?  Can you think I am unfeeling--ungrateful?  I should not
+be YOUR daughter."
+
+"No, no," said the baroness, "to do you justice, you attempt sorrow;
+as you put on black.  But, my poor child, you do it with so little
+skill that one sees a horrible gayety breaking through that thin
+disguise: you are no true mourners: you are like the mutes or the
+undertakers at a funeral, forced grief on the surface of your faces,
+and frightful complacency below."
+
+"Tra la! lal! la! la!  Tra la! la!  Tra la! la!" carolled Jacintha,
+in the colonel's room hard by.
+
+The ladies looked at one another: Rose in great confusion.
+
+"Tra la! la! la!  Tra lal! lal! la! la! la!"
+
+"Jacintha!" screamed Rose angrily.
+
+"Hush! not a word," said the baroness.  "Why remonstrate with HER?
+Servants are but chameleons: they take the color of those they
+serve.  Do not cry.  I wanted your confidence, not your tears, love.
+There, I will not twice in one day ask you for your heart: it would
+be to lower the mother, and give the daughter the pain of refusing
+it, and the regret, sure to come one day, of having refused it.  I
+will discover the meaning of it all by myself."  She went away with
+a gentle sigh; and Rose was cut to the heart by her words; she
+resolved, whatever it might cost her and Josephine, to make a clean
+breast this very day.  As she was one of those who act promptly, she
+went instantly in search of her sister, to gain her consent, if
+possible.
+
+Now, the said Josephine was in the garden walking with Camille, and
+uttering a wife's tender solicitudes.
+
+"And must you leave me? must you risk your life again so soon; the
+life on which mine depends?"
+
+"My dear, that letter I received from headquarters two days ago,
+that inquiry whether my wound was cured.  A hint, Josephine--a hint
+too broad for any soldier not to take."
+
+"Camille, you are very proud," said Josephine, with an accent of
+reproach, and a look of approval.
+
+"I am obliged to be.  I am the husband of the proudest woman in
+France."
+
+"Hush! not so loud: there is Dard on the grass."
+
+"Dard!" muttered the soldier with a word of meaning.  "Josephine,"
+said he after a pause, and a little peevishly, "how much longer are
+we to lower our voices, and turn away our eyes from each other, and
+be ashamed of our happiness?"
+
+"Five months longer, is it not?" answered Josephine quietly.
+
+"Five months longer!"
+
+Josephine was hurt at this, and for once was betrayed into a serious
+and merited remonstrance.
+
+"Is this just?" said she.  "Think of two months ago: yes, but two
+months ago, you were dying.  You doubted my love, because it could
+not overcome my virtue and my gratitude: yet you might have seen it
+was destroying my life.  Poor Raynal, my husband, my benefactor,
+died.  Then I could do more for you, if not with delicacy, at least
+with honor; but no! words, and looks, and tender offices of love
+were not enough, I must give stronger proof.  Dear Camille, I have
+been reared in a strict school: and perhaps none of your sex can
+know what it cost me to go to Frejus that day with him I love."
+
+"My own Josephine!"
+
+"I made but one condition: that you would not rob me of my mother's
+respect: to her our hasty marriage would appear monstrous,
+heartless.  You consented to be secretly happy for six months.  One
+fortnight has passed, and you are discontented again."
+
+"Oh, no! do not think so.  It is every word true.  I am an
+ungrateful villain."
+
+"How dare you say so? and to me!  No! but you are a man."
+
+"So I have been told; but my conduct to you, sweet one, has not been
+that of a man from first to last.  Yet I could die for you, with a
+smile on my lips.  But when I think that once I lifted this
+sacrilegious hand against your life--oh!"
+
+"Do not be silly, Camille.  I love you all the better for loving me
+well enough to kill me.  What woman would not?  I tell you, you
+foolish thing, you are a man: monseigneur is one of the lordly sex,
+that is accustomed to have everything its own way.  My love, in a
+world that is full of misery, here are two that are condemned to be
+secretly happy a few months longer: a hard fate for one of your sex,
+it seems: but it is so much sweeter than the usual lot of mine, that
+really I cannot share your misery," and she smiled joyously.
+
+"Then share my happiness, my dear wife."
+
+"I do; only mine is deep, not loud."
+
+"Why, Dard is gone, and we are out of doors; will the little birds
+betray us?"
+
+"The lower windows are open, and I saw Jacintha in one of the
+rooms."
+
+"Jacintha? we are in awe of the very servants.  Well, if I must not
+say it loud I will say it often," and putting his mouth to her ear,
+he poured a burning whisper of love into it--"My love! my angel! my
+wife! my wife! my wife!"
+
+She turned her swimming eyes on him.
+
+"My husband!" she whispered in return.
+
+Rose came out, and found them billing and cooing.  "You MUST not be
+so happy, you two," said she authoritatively.
+
+"How can we help it?" asked Camille.
+
+"You must and shall help it, somehow," retorted this little tyrant.
+"Mamma suspects.  She has given me such a cross-examination, my
+blood runs cold.  No, on second thoughts, kiss her again, and you
+may both be as happy as you like; for I am going to tell mamma all,
+and no power on earth shall hinder me."
+
+"Rose," said Camille, "you are a sensible girl; and I always said
+so."
+
+But Josephine was horrified.  "What! tell my mother that within a
+month of my husband's death?"--
+
+"Don't say your husband," put in Camille wincing; "the priest never
+confirmed that union; words spoken before a magistrate do not make a
+marriage in the sight of Heaven."
+
+Josephine cut him short.  "Amongst honorable men and women all oaths
+are alike sacred: and Heaven's eye is in a magistrate's room as in a
+church.  A daughter of Beaurepaire gave her hand to him, and called
+herself his wife.  Therefore, she was his wife: and is his widow.
+She owes him everything; the house you are all living in among the
+rest.  She ought to be proud of her brief connection with that pure,
+heroic spirit, and, when she is so little noble as to disown him,
+then say that gratitude and justice have no longer a place among
+mankind."
+
+"Come into the chapel," said Camille, with a voice that showed he
+was hurt.
+
+They entered the chapel, and there they saw something that
+thoroughly surprised them: a marble monument to the memory of
+Raynal.  It leaned at present against the wall below the place
+prepared to receive it.  The inscription, short, but emphatic, and
+full of feeling, told of the battles he had fought in, including the
+last fatal skirmish, and his marriage with the heiress of
+Beaurepaire; and, in a few soldier-like words, the uprightness,
+simplicity, and generosity of his character.
+
+They were so touched by this unexpected trait in Camille that they
+both threw their arms round his neck by one impulse.  "Am I wrong to
+be proud of him?" said Josephine, triumphantly.
+
+"Well, don't say too much to me," said Camille, looking down
+confused.  "One tries to be good; but it is very hard--to some of
+us--not to you, Josephine; and, after all, it is only the truth that
+we have written on that stone.  Poor Raynal! he was my old comrade;
+he saved me from death, and not a soldier's death--drowning; and he
+was a better man than I am, or ever shall be.  Now he is dead, I can
+say these things.  If I had said them when he was alive, it would
+have been more to my credit."
+
+They all three went back towards the house; and on the way Rose told
+them all that had passed between the baroness and her.  When she
+came to the actual details of that conversation, to the words, and
+looks, and tones, Josephine's uneasiness rose to an overpowering
+height; she even admitted that further concealment would be very
+difficult.
+
+"Better tell her than let her find out," said Rose.  "We must tell
+her some day."
+
+At last, after a long and agitated discussion, Josephine consented;
+but Rose must be the one to tell.  "So then, you at least will make
+your peace with mamma," argued Josephine, "and let us go in and do
+this before our courage fails; besides, it is going to rain, and it
+has turned cold.  Where have all these clouds come from?  An hour
+ago there was not one in the sky."
+
+They went, with hesitating steps and guilty looks, to the saloon.
+Their mother was not there.  Here was a reprieve.
+
+Rose had an idea.  She would take her to the chapel, and show her
+the monument, and that would please her with poor Camille.  "After
+that," said Rose, "I will begin by telling her all the misery you
+have both gone through; and, when she pities you, then I will show
+her it was all my fault your misery ended in a secret marriage."
+
+The confederates sat there in a chilly state, waiting for the
+baroness.  At last, as she did not come, Rose got up to go to her.
+"When the mind is made up, it is no use being cowardly, and putting
+off," said she, firmly.  For all that, her cheek had but little
+color left in it, when she left her chair with this resolve.
+
+Now as Rose went down the long saloon to carry out their united
+resolve, Jacintha looked in; and, after a hasty glance to see who
+was present, she waited till Rose came up to her, and then whipped a
+letter from under her apron and gave it her.
+
+"For my mistress," said she, with an air of mystery.
+
+"Why not take it to her, then?" inquired Rose.
+
+"I thought you might like to see it first, mademoiselle," said
+Jacintha, with quiet meaning.
+
+"Is it from the dear doctor?" asked Josephine.
+
+"La, no, mademoiselle, don't you know the doctor is come home?  Why,
+he has been in the house near an hour.  He is with my lady."
+
+The doctor proved Jacintha correct by entering the room in person
+soon after; on this Rose threw down the letter, and she and the
+whole party were instantly occupied in greeting him.
+
+When the ladies had embraced him and Camille shaken hands with him,
+they plied him with a thousand questions.  Indeed, he had not half
+satisfied their curiosity, when Rose happened to catch sight of the
+letter again, and took it up to carry to the baroness.  She now, for
+the first time, eyed it attentively, and the consequence was she
+uttered an exclamation, and took the first opportunity to beckon
+Aubertin.
+
+He came to her; and she put the letter into his hand.
+
+He put up his glasses, and eyed it.  "Yes!" whispered he, "it is
+from HIM."
+
+Josephine and Camille saw something was going on; they joined the
+other two, with curiosity in their faces.
+
+Rose put her hand on a small table near her, and leaned a moment.
+She turned half sick at a letter coming from the dead.  Josephine
+now came towards her with a face of concern, and asked what was the
+matter.
+
+The reply came from Aubertin.  "My poor friends," said he, solemnly,
+"this is one of those fearful things that you have not seen in your
+short lives, but it has been more than once my lot to witness it.
+The ships that carry letters from distant countries vary greatly in
+speed, and are subject to detaining accidents.  Yes, this is the
+third time I have seen a letter come written by a hand known to be
+cold.  The baroness is a little excited to-day, I don't know from
+what cause.  With your approbation, Madame Raynal, I will read this
+letter before I let her see it."
+
+"Read it, if you please."
+
+"Shall I read it out?"
+
+"Certainly.  There may be some wish expressed in it; oh, I hope
+there is!"
+
+Camille, from delicacy, retired to some little distance, and the
+doctor read the letter in a low and solemn voice.
+
+
+"MY DEAR MOTHER,--I hope all are well at Beaurepaire, as I am, or I
+hope soon to be.  I received a wound in our last skirmish; not a
+very severe one; but it put an end to my writing for some time."
+
+
+"Poor fellow! it was his death wound.  Why, when was this written?--
+why," and the doctor paused, and seemed stupefied: "why, my dears,
+has my memory gone, or"--and again he looked eagerly at the letter--
+"what was the date of the battle in which he was killed? for this
+letter is dated the 15th of May.  Is it a dream? no! this was
+written since the date of his death."
+
+"No, doctor," said Rose, "you deceive yourself."
+
+"Why, what was the date of the Moniteur, then?" asked Aubertin, in
+great agitation.
+
+"Considerably later than this," said Camille.
+
+"I don't think so; the journal! where is it?"
+
+"My mother has it locked up.  I'll run."
+
+"No, Rose; no one but me.  Now, Josephine, do not you go and give
+way to hopes that may be delusive.  I must see that journal
+directly.  I will go to the baroness.  I shall excuse her less than
+you would."
+
+He was scarcely gone when a cry of horror filled the room, a cry as
+of madness falling like a thunderbolt on a human mind.  It was
+Josephine, who up to this had not uttered one word.  But now she
+stood, white as a corpse, in the middle of the room, and wrung her
+hands.  "What have I done?  What shall I do?  It was the 3d of May.
+I see it before me in letters of fire; the 3d of May! the 3d of
+May!--and he writes the 15th."
+
+"No! no!" cried Camille wildly.  "It was long, long after time 3d."
+
+"It was the 3d of May," repeated Josephine in a hoarse voice that
+none would have known for hers.
+
+Camille ran to her with words of comfort and hope; he did not share
+her fears.  He remembered about when the Moniteur came, though not
+the very day.  He threw his arm lovingly round her as if to protect
+her against these shadowy terrors.  Her dilating eyes seemed fixed
+on something distant in space or time, at some horrible thing coming
+slowly towards her.  She did not see Camille approach her, but the
+moment she felt him she turned upon him swiftly.
+
+"Do you love me?" still in the hoarse voice that had so little in it
+of Josephine.  "I mean, does one grain of respect or virtue mingle
+in your love for me?"
+
+"What words are these, my wife?"
+
+"Then leave Raynal's house upon the instant.  You wonder I can be so
+cruel?  I wonder too; and that I can see my duty so clear in one
+short moment.  But I have lived twenty years since that letter came.
+Oh! my brain has whirled through a thousand agonies.  And I have
+come back a thousand times to the same thing; you and I must see
+each other's face no more."
+
+"Oh!" cried Rose, "is there no way but this?"
+
+"Take care," she screamed, wildly, to her and Camille, "I am on the
+verge of madness; is it for you two to thrust me over the precipice?
+Come, now, if you are a man of honor, if you have a spark of
+gratitude towards the poor woman who has given you all except her
+fair name--that she will take to the grave in spite of you all--
+promise that you will leave Raynal's house this minute if he is
+alive, and let me die in honor as I have lived."
+
+"No, no!" cried Camille, terror-stricken; "it cannot be.  Heaven is
+merciful, and Heaven sees how happy we are.  Be calm! these are idle
+fears; be calm! I say.  For if it is so I will obey you.  I will
+stay; I will go; I will die; I will live; I will obey you."
+
+"Swear this to me by the thing you hold most sacred," she almost
+shrieked.
+
+"I swear by my love for you," was his touching reply.
+
+Ere they had recovered a miserable composure after this passionate
+outburst, all the more terrible as coming from a creature so tender
+as Josephine, agitated voices were heard at the door, and the
+baroness tottered in, followed by the doctor, who was trying in vain
+to put some bounds to her emotion and her hopes.
+
+"Oh, my children! my children!" cried she, trembling violently.
+"Here, Rose, my hands shake so; take this key, open the cabinet,
+there is the Moniteur.  What is the date?"
+
+The journal was found, and rapidly examined.  The date was the 20th
+of May.
+
+"There!" cried Camille.  "I told you!"
+
+The baroness uttered a feeble moan.  Her hopes died as suddenly as
+they had been born, and she sank drooping into a chair, with a
+bitter sigh.
+
+Camille stole a joyful look at Josephine.  She was in the same
+attitude looking straight before her as at a coming horror.
+Presently Rose uttered a faint cry, "The battle was BEFORE."
+
+"To be sure," cried the doctor.  "You forget, it is not the date of
+the paper we want, but of the battle it records.  For Heaven's sake,
+when was the battle?"
+
+"The 3d of May," said Josephine, in a voice that seemed to come from
+the tomb.
+
+Rose's hands that held the journal fell like a dead weight upon her
+knees, journal and all.  She whispered, "It was the 3d of May."
+
+"Ah!" cried the baroness, starting up, "he may yet be alive.  He
+must be alive.  Heaven is merciful!  Heaven would not take my son
+from me, a poor old woman who has not long to live.  There was a
+letter; where is the letter?"
+
+"Are we mad, not to read the letter?" said the doctor.  "I had it;
+it has dropped from my old fingers when I went for the journal."
+
+A short examination of the room showed the letter lying crumpled up
+near the door.  Camille gave it to the baroness.  She tried to read
+it, but could not.
+
+"I am old," said she; "my hand shakes and my eyes are troubled.
+This young gentleman will read it to us.  His eyes are not dim and
+troubled.  Something tells me that when I hear this letter, I shall
+find out whether my son lives.  Why do you not read it to me,
+Camille?" cried she, almost fiercely.
+
+Camille, thus pressed, obeyed mechanically, and began to read
+Raynal's letter aloud, scarce knowing what he did, but urged and
+driven by the baroness.
+
+
+"MY DEAR MOTHER,--I hope all are well at Beaurepaire, as I am, or I
+hope soon to be.  I received a wound in our last skirmish; not a
+very severe one, but it put an end to my writing for some time."
+
+
+"Go on, dear Camille! go on."
+
+"The page ends there, madame,"
+
+The paper was thin, and Camille, whose hand trembled, had some
+difficulty in detaching the leaves from one another.  He succeeded,
+however, at last, and went on reading and writhing.
+
+
+"By the way, you must address your next letter to me as Colonel
+Raynal.  I was promoted just before this last affair, but had not
+time to tell you; and my wound stopped my writing till now."
+
+
+"There, there!" cried the baroness.  "He was Colonel Raynal, and
+Colonel Raynal was not killed."
+
+The doctor implored her not to interrupt.
+
+"Go on, Camille.  Why do you hesitate? what is the matter?  Do for
+pity's sake go on, sir."
+
+Camille cast a look of agony around, and put his hand to his brow,
+on which large drops of cold perspiration, like a death dew, were
+gathering; but driven to the stake on all sides, he gasped on rather
+than read, for his eye had gone down the page.
+
+
+"A namesake of mine, Commandant Raynal,"--
+
+
+"Ah!"
+
+
+"has not been--so fortunate.  He"--
+
+
+"Go on! go on!"
+
+The wretched man could now scarcely utter Raynal's words; they came
+from him in a choking groan.
+
+
+"he was killed, poor fellow! while heading a gallant charge upon the
+enemy's flank."
+
+
+He ground the letter convulsively in his hand, then it fell all
+crumpled on the floor.
+
+"Bless you, Camille!" cried the baroness, "bless you! bless you!  I
+have a son still."
+
+She stooped with difficulty, took up the letter, and, kissing it
+again and again, fell on her knees, and thanked Heaven aloud before
+them all.  Then she rose and went hastily out, and her voice was
+heard crying very loud, "Jacintha! Jacintha!"
+
+The doctor followed in considerable anxiety for the effects of this
+violent joy on so aged a person.  Three remained behind, panting and
+pale like those to whom dead Lazarus burst the tomb, and came forth
+in a moment, at a word.  Then Camille half kneeled, half fell, at
+Josephine's feet, and, in a voice choked with sobs, bade her dispose
+of him.
+
+She turned her head away.  "Do not speak to me; do not look at me;
+if we look at one another, we are lost.  Go! die at your post, and I
+at mine."
+
+He bowed his head, and kissed her dress, then rose calm as despair,
+and white as death, and, with his knees knocking under him, tottered
+away like a corpse set moving.
+
+He disappeared from the house.
+
+The baroness soon came back, triumphant and gay.
+
+"I have sent her to bid them ring the bells in the village.  The
+poor shall be feasted; all shall share our joy: my son was dead, and
+lives.  Oh, joy! joy! joy!"
+
+"Mother!" shrieked Josephine.
+
+"Mad woman that I am, I am too boisterous.  Help me, Rose! she is
+going to faint; her lips are white."
+
+Dr. Aubertin and Rose brought a chair.  They forced Josephine into
+it.  She was not the least faint; yet her body obeyed their hands
+just like a dead body.  The baroness melted into tears; tears
+streamed from Rose's eyes.  Josephine's were dry and stony, and
+fixed on coming horror.  The baroness looked at her with anxiety.
+"Thoughtless old woman!  It was too sudden; it is too much for my
+dear child; too much for me," and she kneeled, and laid her aged
+head on her daughter's bosom, saying feebly through her tears, "too
+much joy, too much joy!"
+
+Josephine took no notice of her.  She sat like one turned to stone
+looking far away over her mother's head with rigid eyes fixed on the
+air and on coming horrors.
+
+Rose felt her arm seized.  It was Aubertin.  He too was pale now,
+though not before.  He spoke in a terrible whisper to Rose, his eye
+fixed on the woman of stone that sat there.
+
+"IS THIS JOY?"
+
+Rose, by a mighty effort, raised her eyes and confronted his full.
+"What else should it be?" said she.
+
+And with these words this Spartan girl was her sister's champion
+once more against all comers, friend or foe.
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI.
+
+
+Dr. Aubertin received one day a note from a publishing bookseller,
+to inquire whether he still thought of giving the world his valuable
+work on insects.  The doctor was amazed.  "My valuable work!  Why,
+Rose, they all refused it, and this person in particular recoiled
+from it as if my insects could sting on paper."
+
+The above led to a correspondence, in which the convert to insects
+explained that the work must be published at the author's expense,
+the publisher contenting himself with the profits.  The author,
+thirsting for the public, consented.  Then the publisher wrote again
+to say that the immortal treatise must be spiced; a little politics
+flung in: "Nothing goes down, else."  The author answered in some
+heat that he would not dilute things everlasting with the fleeting
+topics of the day, nor defile science with politics.  On this his
+Mentor smoothed him down, despising him secretly for not seeing that
+a book is a matter of trade and nothing else.  It ended in Aubertin
+going to Paris to hatch his Phoenix.  He had not been there a week,
+when a small deputation called on him, and informed him he had been
+elected honorary member of a certain scientific society.  The
+compliment was followed by others, till at last certain ladies, with
+the pliancy of their sex, find out they had always secretly cared
+for butterflies.  Then the naturalist smelt a rat, or, in other
+words, began to scent that entomology, a form of idiocy in a poor
+man, is a graceful decoration of the intellect in a rich one.
+
+Philosopher without bile, he saw through this, and let it amuse, not
+shock him.  His own species, a singularly interesting one in my
+opinion, had another trait in reserve for him.
+
+He took a world of trouble to find out the circumstances of his
+nephew's nephews and nieces: then he made arrangements for
+distributing a large part of his legacy among them.  His intentions
+and the proportions of his generosity transpired.
+
+Hitherto they had been silent, but now they all fell-to and abused
+him: each looking only to the amount of his individual share, not at
+the sum total the doctor was giving way to an ungrateful lot.
+
+The donor was greatly amused, and noted down the incident and some
+of the remarks in his commonplace book, under the general head of
+"Bestiarium;" and the particular head of "Homo."
+
+Paris with its seductions netted the good doctor, and held him two
+or three months; would have detained him longer, but for alarming
+accounts the baroness sent of Josephine's health.  These determined
+him to return to Beaurepaire; and, must I own it, the announcement
+was no longer hailed at Beaurepaire with universal joy as
+heretofore.
+
+
+Josephine Raynal, late Dujardin, is by this time no stranger to my
+intelligent reader.  I wish him to bring his knowledge of her
+character and her sensibility to my aid.  Imagine, as the weary
+hours and days and weeks roll over her head, what this loving woman
+feels for her lover whom she has dismissed; what this grateful wife
+feels for the benefactor she has unwittingly wronged; but will never
+wrong with her eyes open; what this lady pure as snow, and proud as
+fire, feels at the seeming frailty into which a cruel combination of
+circumstances has entrapped her.
+
+Put down the book a moment: shut your eyes: and imagine this strange
+and complicated form of human suffering.
+
+Her mental sufferings were terrible; and for some time Rose feared
+for her reason.  At last her agonies subsided into a listlessness
+and apathy little less alarming.  She seemed a creature descending
+inch by inch into the tomb.  Indeed, I fully believe she would have
+died of despair: but one of nature's greatest forces stepped into
+the arena and fought on the side of life.  She was affected with
+certain bilious symptoms that added to Rose's uneasiness, but
+Jacintha assured her it was nothing, and would retire and leave the
+sufferer better.  Jacintha, indeed, seemed now to take a particular
+interest in Josephine, and was always about her with looks of pity
+and interest.
+
+"Good creature!" thought Rose, "she sees my sister is unhappy: and
+that makes her more attentive and devoted to her than ever."
+
+One day these three were together in Josephine's room.  Josephine
+was mechanically combing her long hair, when all of a sudden she
+stretched out her hand and cried, "Rose!"
+
+Rose ran to her, and coming behind her saw in the glass that her
+lips were colorless.  She screamed to Jacintha, and between them
+they supported Josephine to the bed.  She had hardly touched it when
+she fainted dead away.  "Mamma! mamma!" cried Rose in her terror.
+
+"Hush!" cried Jacintha roughly, "hold your tongue: it is only a
+faint.  Help me loosen her: don't make any noise, whatever."  They
+loosened her stays, and applied the usual remedies, but it was some
+time before she came-to.  At last the color came back to her lips,
+then to her cheek, and the light to her eye.  She smiled feebly on
+Jacintha and Rose, and asked if she had not been insensible.
+
+"Yes, love, and frightened us--a little--not much--oh, dear! oh,
+dear!"
+
+"Don't be alarmed, sweet one, I am better.  And I will never do it
+again, since it frightens you."  Then Josephine said to her sister
+in a low voice, and in the Italian language, "I hoped it was death,
+my sister; but he comes not to the wretched."
+
+"If you hoped that," replied Rose in the same language, "you do not
+love your poor sister who so loves you."
+
+While the Italian was going on, Jacintha's dark eyes glanced
+suspiciously on each speaker in turn.  But her suspicions were all
+wide of the mark.
+
+"Now may I go and tell mamma?" asked Rose.
+
+"No, mademoiselle, you shall not," said Jacintha.  "Madame Raynal,
+do take my side, and forbid her."
+
+"Why, what is it to you?" said Rose, haughtily.
+
+"If it was not something to me, should I thwart my dear young lady?"
+
+"No.  And you shall have your own way, if you will but condescend to
+give me a reason."
+
+This to some of us might appear reasonable, but not to Jacintha: it
+even hurt her feelings.
+
+"Mademoiselle Rose," she said, "when you were little and used to ask
+me for anything, did I ever say to you, 'Give me a REASON first'?"
+
+"There! she is right," said Josephine.  "We should not make terms
+with tried friends.  Come, we will pay her devotion this compliment.
+It is such a small favor.  For my part I feel obliged to her for
+asking it."
+
+Josephine's health improved steadily from that day.  Her hollow
+cheeks recovered their plump smoothness, and her beauty its bloom,
+and her person grew more noble and statue-like than ever, and within
+she felt a sense of indomitable vitality.  Her appetite had for some
+time been excessively feeble and uncertain, and her food tasteless;
+but of late, by what she conceived to be a reaction such as is
+common after youth has shaken off a long sickness, her appetite had
+been not only healthy but eager.  The baroness observed this, and it
+relieved her of a large portion of her anxiety.  One day at dinner
+her maternal heart was so pleased with Josephine's performance that
+she took it as a personal favor, "Well done, Josephine," said she;
+"that gives your mother pleasure to see you eat again.  Soup and
+bouillon: and now twice you have been to Rose for some of that pate,
+which does you so much credit, Jacintha."
+
+Josephine colored high at this compliment.
+
+"It is true," said she, "I eat like a pig;" and, with a furtive
+glance at the said pate, she laid down her knife and fork, and ate
+no more of anything.  The baroness had now a droll misgiving.
+
+"The doctor will be angry with me," said she: "he will find her as
+well as ever."
+
+"Madame," said Jacintha hastily, "when does the doctor come, if I
+may make so bold, that I may get his room ready, you know?"
+
+"Well thought of, Jacintha.  He comes the day after to-morrow, in
+the afternoon."
+
+At night when the young ladies went up to bed, what did they find
+but a little cloth laid on a little table in Josephine's room, and
+the remains of the pate she had liked.  Rose burst out laughing.
+"Look at that dear duck of a goose, Jacintha!  Our mother's flattery
+sank deep: she thinks we can eat her pates at all hours of the day
+and night.  Shall I send it away?"
+
+"No," said Josephine, "that would hurt her culinary pride, and
+perhaps her affection: only cover it up, dear, for just now I am not
+in the humor: it rather turns me."
+
+It was covered up.  The sisters retired to rest.  In the morning
+Rose lifted the cover and found the plate cleared, polished.  She
+was astounded.
+
+The large tapestried chamber, once occupied by Camille Dujardin, was
+now turned into a sitting-room, and it was a favorite on account of
+the beautiful view from the windows.
+
+One day Josephine sat there alone with some work in her hand; but
+the needle often stopped, and the fair head drooped.  She heaved a
+deep sigh.  To her surprise it was echoed by a sigh that, like her
+own, seemed to come from a heart full of sighs.
+
+She turned hastily round and saw Jacintha.
+
+Now Josephine had all a woman's eye for reading faces, and she was
+instantly struck by a certain gravity in Jacintha's gaze, and a
+flutter which the young woman was suppressing with tolerable but not
+complete success.
+
+Disguising the uneasiness this discovery gave her, she looked her
+visitor full in the face, and said mildly, but a little coldly,
+"Well, Jacintha?"
+
+Jacintha lowered her eyes and muttered slowly,--
+
+"The doctor--comes--to-day," then raised her eyes all in a moment to
+take Josephine off her guard; but the calm face was impenetrable.
+So then Jacintha added, "to our misfortune," throwing in still more
+meaning.
+
+"To our misfortune?  A dear old friend--like him?"
+
+Jacintha explained.  "That old man makes me shake.  You are never
+safe with him.  So long as his head is in the clouds, you might take
+his shoes off, and on he'd walk and never know it; but every now and
+then he comes out of the clouds all in one moment, without a word of
+warning, and when he does his eye is on everything, like a bird's.
+Then he is so old: he has seen a heap.  Take my word for it, the old
+are more knowing than the young, let them be as sharp as you like:
+the old have seen everything.  WE have only heard talk of the most
+part, with here and there a glimpse.  To know life to the bottom you
+must live it out, from the soup to the dessert; and that is what the
+doctor has done, and now he is coming here.  And Mademoiselle Rose
+will go telling him everything; and if she tells him half what she
+has seen, your secret will be no secret to that old man."
+
+"My secret!" gasped Josephine, turning pale.
+
+"Don't look so, madame: don't be frightened at poor Jacintha.
+Sooner or later you MUST trust somebody besides Mademoiselle Rose."
+
+Josephine looked at her with inquiring, frightened eyes.
+
+Jacintha drew nearer to her.
+
+"Mademoiselle,--I beg pardon, madame,--I carried you in my arms when
+I was a child.  When I was a girl you toddled at my side, and held
+my gown, and lisped my name, and used to put your little arms round
+my neck, and kissed me, you would; and if ever I had the least pain
+or sickness your dear little face would turn as sorrowful, and all
+the pretty color leave it for Jacintha; and now you are in trouble,
+in sore trouble, yet you turn away from me, you dare not trust me,
+that would be cut in pieces ere  I would betray you.  Ah,
+mademoiselle, you are wrong.  The poor can feel: they have all seen
+trouble, and a servant is the best of friends where she has the
+heart to love her mistress; and do not I love you?  Pray do not turn
+from her who has carried you in her arms, and laid you to sleep upon
+her bosom, many's and many's the time."
+
+Josephine panted audibly.  She held out her hand eloquently to
+Jacintha, but she turned her head away and trembled.
+
+Jacintha cast a hasty glance round the room.  Then she trembled too
+at what she was going to say, and the effect it might have on the
+young lady.  As for Josephine, terrible as the conversation had
+become, she made no attempt to evade it: she remained perfectly
+passive.  It was the best way to learn how far Jacintha had
+penetrated her secret, if at all.
+
+Jacintha looked fearfully round and whispered in Josephine's ear,
+"When the news of Colonel Raynal's death came, you wept, but the
+color came back to your cheek.  When the news of his life came, you
+turned to stone.  Ah! my poor young lady, there has been more
+between you and THAT MAN than should be.  Ever since one day you all
+went to Frejus together, you were a changed woman.  I have seen you
+look at him as--as a wife looks at her man.  I have seen HIM"--
+
+"Hush, Jacintha!  Do not tell me what you have seen: oh! do not
+remind me of joys I pray God to help me forget.  He was my husband,
+then!--oh, cruel Jacintha, to remind me of what I have been, of what
+I am!  Ah me! ah me! ah me!"
+
+"Your husband!" cried Jacintha in utter amazement.
+
+Then Josephine drooped her head on this faithful creature's
+shoulder, and told her with many sobs the story I have told you.
+She told it very briefly, for it was to a woman who, though little
+educated, was full of feeling and shrewdness, and needed but the
+bare facts: she could add the rest from her own heart and
+experience: could tell the storm of feelings through which these two
+unhappy lovers must have passed.  Her frequent sighs of pity and
+sympathy drew Josephine on to pour out all her griefs.  When the
+tale was ended she gave a sigh of relief.
+
+"It might have been worse: I thought it was worse the more fool I.
+I deserve to have my head cut off."  This was Jacintha's only
+comment at that time.
+
+It was Josephine's turn to be amazed.  "It could have been worse?"
+said she.  "How? tell me," added she bitterly.  "It would be a
+consolation to me, could I see that."
+
+Jacintha colored and evaded this question, and begged her to go on,
+to keep nothing back from her.  Josephine assured her she had
+revealed all.  Jacintha looked at her a moment in silence.
+
+"It is then as I half suspected.  You do not know all that is before
+you.  You do not see why I am afraid of that old man."
+
+"No, not of him in particular."
+
+"Nor why I want to keep Mademoiselle Rose from prattling to him?"
+
+"No.  I assure you Rose is to be trusted; she is wise--wiser than I
+am."
+
+"You are neither of you wise.  You neither of you know anything.  My
+poor young mistress, you are but a child still.  You have a deep
+water to wade through," said Jacintha, so solemnly that Josephine
+trembled.  "A deep water, and do not see it even.  You have told me
+what is past, now I must tell you what is coming.  Heaven help me!
+But is it possible you have no misgiving?  Tell the truth, now."
+
+"Alas! I am full of them; at your words, at your manner, they fly
+around me in crowds."
+
+"Have you no ONE?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Then turn your head from me a bit, my sweet young lady; I am an
+honest woman, though I am not so innocent as you, and I am forced
+against my will to speak my mind plainer than I am used to."
+
+Then followed a conversation, to detail which might anticipate our
+story; suffice it to say, that Rose, coming into the room rather
+suddenly, found her sister weeping on Jacintha's bosom, and Jacintha
+crying and sobbing over her.
+
+She stood and stared in utter amazement.
+
+
+Dr. Aubertin, on his arrival, was agreeably surprised at Madame
+Raynal's appearance.  He inquired after her appetite.
+
+"Oh, as to her appetite," cried the baroness, "that is immense."
+
+"Indeed!"
+
+"It was," explained Josephine, "just when I began to get better, but
+now it is as much as usual."  This answer had been arranged
+beforehand by Jacintha.  She added, "The fact is, we wanted to see
+you, doctor, and my ridiculous ailments were a good excuse for
+tearing you from Paris."--"And now we have succeeded," said Rose,
+"let us throw off the mask, and talk of other things; above all, of
+Paris, and your eclat."
+
+"For all that," persisted the baroness, "she was ill, when I first
+wrote, and very ill too."
+
+"Madame Raynal," said the doctor solemnly, "your conduct has been
+irregular; once ill, and your illness announced to your medical
+adviser, etiquette forbade you to get well but by his prescriptions.
+Since, then, you have shown yourself unfit to conduct a malady, it
+becomes my painful duty to forbid you henceforth ever to be ill at
+all, without my permission first obtained in writing."
+
+This badinage was greatly relished by Rose, but not at all by the
+baroness, who was as humorless as a swan.
+
+He stayed a month at Beaurepaire, then off to Paris again: and being
+now a rich man, and not too old to enjoy innocent pleasures, he got
+a habit of running backwards and forwards between the two places,
+spending a month or so at each alternately.  So the days rolled on.
+Josephine fell into a state that almost defies description; her
+heart was full of deadly wounds, yet it seemed, by some mysterious,
+half-healing balm, to throb and ache, but bleed no more.  Beams of
+strange, unreasonable complacency would shoot across her; the next
+moment reflection would come, she would droop her head, and sigh
+piteously.  Then all would merge in a wild terror of detection.  She
+seemed on the borders of a river of bliss, new, divine, and
+inexhaustible: and on the other bank mocking malignant fiends dared
+her to enter that heavenly stream.  The past to her was full of
+regrets; the future full of terrors, and empty of hope.  Yet she did
+not, could not succumb.  Instead of the listlessness and languor of
+a few months back, she had now more energy than ever; at times it
+mounted to irritation.  An activity possessed her: it broke out in
+many feminine ways.  Among the rest she was seized with what we men
+call a cacoethes of the needle: "a raging desire" for work.  Her
+fingers itched for work.  She was at it all day.  As devotees retire
+to pray, so she to stitch.  On a wet day she would often slip into
+the kitchen, and ply the needle beside Jacintha: on a dry day she
+would hide in the old oak-tree, and sit like a mouse, and ply the
+tools of her craft, and make things of no mortal use to man or
+woman; and she tried little fringes of muslin upon her white hand,
+and held it up in front of her, and smiled, and then moaned.  It was
+winter, and Rose used sometimes to bring her out a thick shawl, as
+she sat in the old oak-tree stitching, but Josephine nearly always
+declined it.  SHE WAS NEARLY IMPERVIOUS TO COLD.
+
+Then, her purse being better filled than formerly, she visited the
+poor more than ever, and above all the young couples; and took a
+warm interest in their household matters, and gave them muslin
+articles of her own making, and sometimes sniffed the soup in a
+young housewife's pot, and took a fancy to it, and, if invited to
+taste it, paid her the compliment of eating a good plateful of it,
+and said it was much better soup than the chateau produced, and,
+what is stranger, thought so: and, whenever some peevish little brat
+set up a yell in its cradle and the father naturally enough shook
+his fist at the destroyer of his peace, Madame Raynal's lovely face
+filled with concern not for the sufferer but the pest, and she flew
+to it and rocked it and coaxed it and consoled it, till the young
+housewife smiled and stopped its mouth by other means.  And, besides
+the five-franc pieces she gave the infants to hold, these visits of
+Madame Raynal were always followed by one from Jacintha with a
+basket of provisions on her stalwart arm, and honest Sir John
+Burgoyne peeping out at the corner.  Kind and beneficent as she was,
+her temper deteriorated considerably, for it came down from angelic
+to human.  Rose and Jacintha were struck with the change, assented
+to everything she said, and encouraged her in everything it pleased
+her caprice to do.  Meantime the baroness lived on her son Raynal's
+letters (they came regularly twice a month).  Rose too had a
+correspondence, a constant source of delight to her.  Edouard
+Riviere was posted at a distance, and could not visit her; but their
+love advanced rapidly.  Every day he wrote down for his Rose the
+acts of the day, and twice a week sent the budget to his sweetheart,
+and told her at the same time every feeling of his heart.  She was
+less fortunate than he; she had to carry a heavy secret; but still
+she found plenty to tell him, and tender feelings too to vent on him
+in her own arch, shy, fitful way.  Letters can enchain hearts; it
+was by letters that these two found themselves imperceptibly
+betrothed.  Their union was looked forward to as certain, and not
+very distant.  Rose was fairly in love.
+
+One day, Dr. Aubertin, coming back from Paris to Beaurepaire rather
+suddenly, found nobody at home but the baroness.  Josephine and Rose
+were gone to Frejus; had been there more than a week.  She was
+ailing again; so as Frejus had agreed with her once, Rose thought it
+might again.  "She would send for them back directly."
+
+"No," said the doctor, "why do that?  I will go over there and see
+them."  Accordingly, a day or two after this, he hired a carriage,
+and went off early in the morning to Frejus.  In so small a place he
+expected to find the young ladies at once; but, to his surprise, no
+one knew them nor had heard of them.  He was at a nonplus, and just
+about to return home and laugh at himself and the baroness for this
+wild-goose chase, when he fell in with a face he knew, one Mivart, a
+surgeon, a young man of some talent, who had made his acquaintance
+in Paris.  Mivart accosted him with great respect; and, after the
+first compliments, informed him that he had been settled some months
+in this little town, and was doing a fair stroke of business.
+
+"Killing some, and letting nature cure others, eh?" said the doctor;
+then, having had his joke, he told Mivart what had brought him to
+Frejus.
+
+"Are they pretty women, your friends?  I think I know all the pretty
+women about," said Mivart with levity.  "They are not pretty,"
+replied Aubertin.  Mivart's interest in them faded visibly out of
+his countenance.  "But they are beautiful.  The elder might pass for
+Venus, and the younger for Hebe."
+
+"I know them then!" cried he; "they are patients of mine."
+
+The doctor colored.  "Ah, indeed!"
+
+"In the absence of your greater skill," said Mivart, politely; "it
+is Madame Aubertin and her sister you are looking for, is it not?"
+
+Aubertin groaned.  "I am rather too old to be looking for a Madame
+Aubertin," said he; "no; it is Madame Raynal, and Mademoiselle de
+Beaurepaire."
+
+Mivart became confidential.  "Madame Aubertin and her sister," said
+he, "are so lovely they make me ill to look at them: the deepest
+blue eyes you ever saw, both of them; high foreheads; teeth like
+ivory mixed with pearl; such aristocratic feet and hands; and their
+arms--oh!" and by way of general summary the young surgeon kissed
+the tips of his fingers, and was silent; language succumbed under
+the theme.  The doctor smiled coldly.
+
+Mivart added, "If you had come an hour sooner, you might have seen
+Mademoiselle Rose; she was in the town."
+
+"Mademoiselle Rose? who is that?"
+
+"Why, Madame Aubertin's sister."
+
+At this Dr. Aubertin looked first very puzzled, then very grave.
+
+"Hum!" said he, after a little reflection, "where do these paragons
+live?"
+
+"They lodge at a small farm; it belongs to a widow; her name is
+Roth."  They parted.  Dr. Aubertin walked slowly towards his
+carriage, his hands behind him, his eyes on the ground.  He bade the
+driver inquire where the Widow Roth lived, and learned it was about
+half a league out of the town.  He drove to the farmhouse; when the
+carriage drove up, a young lady looked out of the window on the
+first floor.  It was Rose de Beaurepaire.  She caught the doctor's
+eye, and he hers.  She came down and welcomed him with a great
+appearance of cordiality, and asked him, with a smile, how he found
+them out.
+
+"From your medical attendant," said the doctor, dryly.
+
+Rose looked keenly in his face.
+
+"He said he was in attendance on two paragons of beauty, blue eyes,
+white teeth and arms."
+
+"And you found us out by that?" inquired Rose, looking still more
+keenly at him.
+
+"Hardly; but it was my last chance of finding you, so I came.  Where
+is Madame Raynal?"
+
+"Come into this room, dear friend.  I will go and find her."
+
+Full twenty minutes was the doctor kept waiting, and then in came
+Rose, gayly crying, "I have hunted her high and low, and where do
+you think my lady was? sitting out in the garden--come."
+
+Sure enough, they found Josephine in the garden, seated on a low
+chair.  She smiled when the doctor came up to her, and asked after
+her mother.  There was an air of languor about her; her color was
+clear, delicate, and beautiful.
+
+"You have been unwell, my child."
+
+"A little, dear friend; you know me; always ailing, and tormenting
+those I love."
+
+"Well! but, Josephine, you know this place and this sweet air always
+set you up.  Look at her now, doctor; did you ever see her look
+better?  See what a color.  I never saw her look more lovely."
+
+"I never saw her look SO lovely; but I have seen her look better.
+Your pulse.  A little languid?"
+
+"Yes, I am a little."
+
+"Do you stay at Beaurepaire?" inquired Rose; "if so, we will come
+home."
+
+"On the contrary, you will stay here another fortnight," said the
+doctor, authoritatively.
+
+"Prescribe some of your nice tonics for me, doctor," said Josephine,
+coaxingly.
+
+"No! I can't do that; you are in the hands of another practitioner."
+
+"What does that matter?  You were at Paris."
+
+"It is not the etiquette in our profession to interfere with another
+man's patients."
+
+"Oh, dear! I am so sorry," began Josephine.
+
+"I see nothing here that my good friend Mivart is not competent to
+deal with," said the doctor, coldly.
+
+Then followed some general conversation, at the end of which the
+doctor once more laid his commands on them to stay another fortnight
+where they were, and bade them good-by.
+
+He was no sooner gone than Rose went to the door of the kitchen, and
+called out, "Madame Jouvenel!  Madame Jouvenel! you may come into
+the garden again."
+
+The doctor drove away; but, instead of going straight to Beaurepaire,
+he ordered the driver to return to the town.  He then walked to
+Mivart's house.
+
+In about a quarter of an hour he came out of it, looking singularly
+grave, sad, and stern.
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII.
+
+
+Edouard Riviere contrived one Saturday to work off all arrears of
+business, and start for Beaurepaire.  He had received a very kind
+letter from Rose, and his longing to see her overpowered him.  On
+the road his eyes often glittered, and his cheek flushed with
+expectation.  At last he got there.  His heart beat: for four months
+he had not seen her.  He ran up into the drawing-room, and there
+found the baroness alone; she welcomed him cordially, but soon let
+him know Rose and her sister were at Frejus.  His heart sank.
+Frejus was a long way off.  But this was not all.  Rose's last
+letter was dated from Beaurepaire, yet it must have been written at
+Frejus.  He went to Jacintha, and demanded an explanation of this.
+The ready Jacintha said it looked as if she meant to be home
+directly; and added, with cool cunning, "That is a hint for me to
+get their rooms ready."
+
+"This letter must have come here enclosed in another," said Edouard,
+sternly.
+
+"Like enough," replied Jacintha, with an appearance of sovereign
+indifference.
+
+Edouard looked at her, and said, grimly, "I will go to Frejus."
+
+"So I would," said Jacintha, faltering a little, but not
+perceptibly; "you might meet them on the road, if so be they come
+the same road; there are two roads, you know."
+
+Edouard hesitated; but he ended by sending Dard to the town on his
+own horse, with orders to leave him at the inn, and borrow a fresh
+horse.  "I shall just have time," said he.  He rode to Frejus, and
+inquired at the inns and post-office for Mademoiselle de
+Beaurepaire.  They did not know her; then he inquired for Madame
+Raynal.  No such name known.  He rode by the seaside upon the chance
+of their seeing him.  He paraded on horseback throughout the place,
+in hopes every moment that a window would open, and a fair face
+shine at it, and call him.  At last his time was up, and he was
+obliged to ride back, sick at heart, to Beaurepaire.  He told the
+baroness, with some natural irritation, what had happened.  She was
+as much surprised as he was.
+
+"I write to Madame Raynal at the post-office, Frejus," said she.
+
+"And Madame Raynal gets your letters?"
+
+"Of course she does, since she answers them; you cannot have
+inquired at the post."
+
+"Why, it was the first place I inquired at, and neither Mademoiselle
+de Beaurepaire nor Madame Raynal were known there."
+
+Jacintha, who could have given the clew, seemed so puzzled herself,
+that they did not even apply to her.  Edouard took a sorrowful leave
+of the baroness, and set out on his journey home.
+
+Oh! how sad and weary that ride seemed now by what it had been
+coming.  His disappointment was deep and irritating; and ere he had
+ridden half way a torturer fastened on his heart.  That torture is
+suspicion; a vague and shadowy, but gigantic phantom that oppresses
+and rends the mind more terribly than certainty.  In this state of
+vague, sickening suspicion, he remained some days: then came an
+affectionate letter from Rose, who had actually returned home.  In
+this she expressed her regret and disappointment at having missed
+him; blamed herself for misleading him, but explained that their
+stay at Frejus had been prolonged from day to day far beyond her
+expectation.  "The stupidity of the post-office was more than she
+could account for," said she.  But, what went farthest to console
+Edouard, was, that after this contretemps she never ceased to invite
+him to come to Beaurepaire.  Now, before this, though she said many
+kind and pretty things in her letters, she had never invited him to
+visit the chateau; he had noticed this.  "Sweet soul," thought he,
+"she really is vexed.  I must be a brute to think any more about it.
+Still"--
+
+So this wound was skinned over.
+
+At last, what he called his lucky star ordained that he should be
+transferred to the very post his Commandant Raynal had once
+occupied.  He sought and obtained permission to fix his quarters in
+the little village near Beaurepaire, and though this plan could not
+be carried out for three months, yet the prospect of it was joyful
+all that time--joyful to both lovers.  Rose needed this consolation,
+for she was very unhappy: her beloved sister, since their return
+from Frejus, had gone back.  The flush of health was faded, and so
+was her late energy.  She fell into deep depression and languor,
+broken occasionally by fits of nervous irritation.
+
+She would sit for hours together at one window languishing and
+fretting.  Can the female reader guess which way that window looked?
+
+Now, Edouard was a favorite of Josephine's; so Rose hoped he would
+help to distract her attention from those sorrows which a lapse of
+years alone could cure.
+
+On every account, then, his visit was looked forward to with hope
+and joy.
+
+He came.  He was received with open arms.  He took up his quarters
+at his old lodgings, but spent his evenings and every leisure hour
+at the chateau.
+
+He was very much in love, and showed it.  He adhered to Rose like a
+leech, and followed her about like a little dog.
+
+This would have made her very happy if there had been nothing great
+to distract her attention and her heart; but she had Josephine,
+whose deep depression and fits of irritation and terror filled her
+with anxiety; and so Edouard was in the way now and then.  On these
+occasions he was too vain to see what she was too polite to show him
+offensively.
+
+But on this she became vexed at his obtuseness.
+
+"Does he think I can be always at his beck and call?" thought she.
+
+"She is always after her sister," said he.
+
+He was just beginning to be jealous of Josephine when the following
+incident occurred:--
+
+Rose and the doctor were discussing Josephine.  Edouard pretended to
+be reading a book, but he listened to every word.
+
+Dr. Aubertin gave it as his opinion that Madame Raynal did not make
+enough blood.
+
+"Oh! if I thought that!" cried Rose.
+
+"Well, then, it is so, I assure you."
+
+"Doctor," said Rose, "do you remember, one day you said healthy
+blood could be drawn from robust veins and poured into a sick
+person's?"
+
+"It is a well-known fact," said Aubertin.
+
+"I don't believe it," said Rose, dryly.
+
+"Then you place a very narrow limit to science," said the doctor,
+coldly.
+
+"Did you ever see it done?" asked Rose, slyly.
+
+"I have not only seen it done, but have done it myself."
+
+"Then do it for us.  There's my arm; take blood from that for dear
+Josephine!" and she thrust a white arm out under his eye with such a
+bold movement and such a look of fire and love as never beamed from
+common eyes.
+
+A keen, cold pang shot through the human heart of Edouard Riviere.
+
+The doctor started and gazed at her with admiration: then he hung
+his head.  "I could not do it.  I love you both too well to drain
+either of life's current."
+
+Rose veiled her fire, and began to coax.  "Once a week; just once a
+week, dear, dear doctor; you know I should never miss it.  I am so
+full of that health, which Heaven denies to her I love."
+
+"Let us try milder measures first," said the doctor.  "I have most
+faith in time."
+
+"What if I were to take her to Frejus? hitherto, the sea has always
+done wonders for her."
+
+"Frejus, by all means," said Edouard, mingling suddenly in the
+conversation; "and this time I will go with you, and then I shall
+find out where you lodged before, and how the boobies came to say
+they did not know you."
+
+Rose bit her lip.  She could not help seeing then how much dear
+Edouard was in her way and Josephine's.  Their best friends are in
+the way of all who have secrets.  Presently the doctor went to his
+study.  Then Edouard let fall a mock soliloquy.  "I wonder," said
+he, dropping out his words one by one, "whether any one will ever
+love me well enough to give a drop of their blood for me."
+
+"If you were in sickness and sorrow, who knows?" said Rose, coloring
+up.
+
+"I would soon be in sickness and sorrow if I thought that."
+
+"Don't jest with such matters, monsieur."
+
+"I am serious.  I wish I was as ill as Madame Raynal is, to be loved
+as she is."
+
+"You must resemble her in some other things to be loved as she is.
+
+"You have often made me feel that of late, dear Rose."
+
+This touched her.  But she fought down the kindly feeling.  "I am
+glad of it," said she, out of perverseness.  She added after a
+while, "Edouard, you are naturally jealous."
+
+"Not the least in the world, Rose, I assure you.  I have many
+faults, but jealous I am not."
+
+"Oh, yes, you are, and suspicious, too; there is something in your
+character that alarms me for our happiness."
+
+"Well, if you come to that, there are things in YOUR conduct I could
+wish explained."
+
+"There! I said so.  You have not confidence in me."
+
+"Pray don't say that, dear Rose.  I have every confidence in you;
+only please don't ask me to divest myself of my senses and my
+reason."
+
+"I don't ask you to do that or anything else for me; good-by, for
+the present."
+
+"Where are you going now? tic! tic! I never can get a word in peace
+with you."
+
+"I am not going to commit murder.  I'm only going up-stairs to my
+sister."
+
+"Poor Madame Raynal, she makes it very hard for me not to dislike
+her."
+
+"Dislike my Josephine?" and Rose bristled visibly.
+
+"She is an angel, but I should hate an angel if it came forever
+between you and me."
+
+"Excuse me, she was here long before you.  It is you that came
+between her and me."
+
+"I came because I was told I should be welcome," said Edouard
+bitterly, and equivocating a little; he added, "and I dare say I
+shall go when I am told I am one too many."
+
+"Bad heart! who says you are one too many in the house?  But you are
+too exigent, monsieur; you assume the husband, and you tease me.  It
+is selfish; can you not see I am anxious and worried? you ought to
+be kind to me, and soothe me; that is what I look for from you, and,
+instead of that, I declare you are getting to be quite a worry."
+
+"I should not be if you loved me as I love you.  I give YOU no
+rival.  Shall I tell you the cause of all this? you have secrets."
+
+"What secrets?"
+
+"Is it me you ask? am I trusted with them?  Secrets are a bond that
+not even love can overcome.  It is to talk secrets you run away from
+me to Madame Raynal.  Where did you lodge at Frejus, Mademoiselle
+the Reticent?"
+
+"In a grotto, dry at low water, Monsieur the Inquisitive."
+
+"That is enough: since you will not tell me, I will find it out
+before I am a week older."
+
+This alarmed Rose terribly, and drove her to extremities.  She
+decided to quarrel.
+
+"Sir," said she, "I thank you for playing the tyrant a little
+prematurely; it has put me on my guard.  Let us part; you and I are
+not suited to each other, Edouard Riviere."
+
+He took this more humbly than she expected.  "Part!" said he, in
+consternation; "that is a terrible word to pass between you and me.
+Forgive me! I suppose I am jealous."
+
+"You are; you are actually jealous of my sister.  Well, I tell you
+plainly I love you, but I love my sister better.  I never could love
+any man as I do her; it is ridiculous to expect such a thing."
+
+"And do you think I could bear to play second fiddle to her all my
+life?"
+
+"I don't ask you.  Go and play first trumpet to some other lady."
+
+"You speak your wishes so plainly now, I have nothing to do but to
+obey."
+
+He kissed her hand and went away disconsolately.
+
+Rose, instead of going to Josephine, her determination to do which
+had mainly caused the quarrel, sat sadly down, and leaned her head
+on her hand.  "I am cruel.  I am ungrateful.  He has gone away
+broken-hearted.  And what shall I do without him?--little fool!  I
+love him better than he loves me.  He will never forgive me.  I have
+wounded his vanity; and they are vainer than we are.  If we meet at
+dinner I will be so kind to him, he will forget it all.  No! Edouard
+will not come to dinner.  He is not a spaniel that you can beat, and
+then whistle back again.  Something tells me I have lost him, and if
+I have, what shall I do?  I will write him a note.  I will ask him
+to forgive me."
+
+She sat down at the table, and took a sheet of notepaper and began
+to write a few conciliatory words.  She was so occupied in making
+these kind enough, and not too kind, that a light step approached
+her unobserved.  She looked up and there was Edouard.  She whipped
+the paper off the table.
+
+A look of suspicion and misery crossed Edouard's face.
+
+Rose caught it, and said, "Well, am I to be affronted any more?"
+
+"No, Rose.  I came back to beg you to forget what passed just now,"
+said he.
+
+Rose's eye flashed; his return showed her her power.  She abused it
+directly.
+
+"How can I forget it if you come reminding me?"
+
+"Dear Rose, now don't be so unkind, so cruel--I have not come back
+to tease you, sweet one.  I come to know what I can do to please
+you; to make you love me again?" and he was about to kneel
+graciously on one knee.
+
+"I'll tell you.  Don't come near me for a month."
+
+Edouard started up, white as ashes with mortification and wounded
+love.
+
+"This is how you treat me for humbling myself, when it is you that
+ought to ask forgiveness."
+
+"Why should I ask what I don't care about?"
+
+"What DO you care about?--except that sister of yours?  You have no
+heart.  And on this cold-blooded creature I have wasted a love an
+empress might have been proud of inspiring.  I pray Heaven some man
+may sport with your affections, you heartless creature, as you have
+played with mine, and make you suffer what I suffer now!"
+
+And with a burst of inarticulate grief and rage he flung out of the
+room.
+
+Rose sank trembling on the sofa a little while: then with a mighty
+effort rose and went to comfort her sister.
+
+Edouard came no more to Beaurepaire.
+
+
+There is an old French proverb, and a wise one, "Rien n'est certain
+que l'imprevu;" it means you can make sure of nothing but this, that
+matters will not turn as you feel sure they will.  And, even for
+this reason, you, who are thinking of suicide because trade is
+declining, speculation failing, bankruptcy impending, or your life
+going to be blighted forever by unrequited love--DON'T DO IT.
+Whether you are English, American, French, or German, listen to a
+man that knows what is what, and DON'T DO IT.  I tell you none of
+those horrors, when they really come, will affect you as you fancy
+they will.  The joys we expect are not a quarter so bright, nor the
+troubles half so dark as we think they will be.  Bankruptcy coming
+is one thing, come is quite another: and no heart or life was ever
+really blighted at twenty years of age.  The love-sick girls that
+are picked out of the canal alive, all, without exception, marry
+another man, have brats, and get to screech with laughter when they
+think of sweetheart No. 1, generally a blockhead, or else a
+blackguard, whom they were fools enough to wet their clothes for,
+let alone kill their souls.  This happens INVARIABLY.  The love-sick
+girls that are picked out of the canal dead have fled from a year's
+misery to eternal pain, from grief that time never failed to cure,
+to anguish incurable.  In this world "Rien n'est certain que
+l'imprevu."
+
+Edouard and Rose were tender lovers, at a distance.  How much
+happier and more loving they thought they should be beneath the same
+roof.  They came together: their prominent faults of character
+rubbed: the secret that was in the house did its work: and
+altogether, they quarrelled.  L'imprevu.
+
+Dard had been saying to Jacintha for ever so long, "When granny
+dies, I will marry you."
+
+Granny died.  Dard took possession of her little property.  Up came
+a glittering official, and turned him out; he was not her heir.
+Perrin, the notary, was.  He had bought the inheritance of her two
+sons, long since dead.
+
+Dard had not only looked on the cottage and cow, as his, but had
+spoken of them as such for years.  The disappointment and the irony
+of comrades ate into him.
+
+"I will leave this cursed place," said he.
+
+Josephine instantly sent for him to Beaurepaire.  He came, and was
+factotum with the novelty of a fixed salary.  Jacintha accommodated
+him with a new little odd job or two.  She set him to dance on the
+oak floors with a brush fastened to his right foot; and, after a
+rehearsal or two, she made him wait at table.  Didn't he bang the
+things about: and when he brought a lady a dish, and she did not
+instantly attend, he gave her elbow a poke to attract attention:
+then she squeaked; and he grinned at her double absurdity in minding
+a touch, and not minding the real business of the table.
+
+But his wrongs rankled in him.  He vented antique phrases such as,
+"I want a change;"  "This village is the last place the Almighty
+made," etc.
+
+Then he was attacked with a moral disease: affected the company of
+soldiers.  He spent his weekly salary carousing with the military, a
+class of men so brilliant that they are not expected to pay for
+their share of the drink; they contribute the anecdotes and the
+familiar appeals to Heaven: and is not that enough?
+
+Present at many recitals, the heroes of which lost nothing by being
+their own historians, Dard imbibed a taste for military adventure.
+His very talk, which used to be so homely, began now to be tinselled
+with big swelling words of vanity imported from the army.  I need
+hardly say these bombastical phrases did not elevate his general
+dialect: they lay fearfully distinct upon the surface, "like lumps
+of marl upon a barren soil, encumbering the ground they could not
+fertilize."
+
+Jacintha took leave to remind him of an incident connected with
+warfare--wounds.
+
+"Do you remember how you were down upon your luck when you did but
+cut your foot?  Why, that is nothing in the army.  They never go out
+to fight but some come back with arms off, and some with legs off
+and some with heads; and the rest don't come back at all: and how
+would you like that?"
+
+This intrusion of statistics into warfare at first cooled Dard's
+impatience for the field.  But presently the fighting half of his
+heart received an ally in one Sergeant La Croix (not a bad name for
+a military aspirant).  This sergeant was at the village waiting to
+march with the new recruits to the Rhine.  Sergeant La Croix was a
+man who, by force of eloquence, could make soldiering appear the
+most delightful as well as glorious of human pursuits.  His tongue
+fired the inexperienced soul with a love of arms, as do the drums
+and trumpets and tramp of soldiers, and their bayonets glittering in
+the sun.  He would have been worth his weight in fustian here, where
+we recruit by that and jargon; he was superfluous in France, where
+they recruited by force: but he was ornamental: and he set Dard and
+one or two more on fire.  Indeed, so absorbing was his sense of
+military glory, that there was no room left in him for that mere
+verbal honor civilians call veracity.
+
+To speak plainly, the sergeant was a fluent, fertile, interesting,
+sonorous, prompt, audacious liar: and such was his success, that
+Dard and one or two more became mere human fiction pipes--of
+comparatively small diameter--irrigating a rural district with false
+views of military life, derived from that inexhaustible reservoir,
+La Croix.
+
+At last the long-threatened conscription was levied: every person
+fit to bear arms, and not coming under the allowed exceptions, drew
+a number: and at a certain hour the numbers corresponding to these
+were deposited in an urn, and one-third of them were drawn in
+presence of the authorities.  Those men whose numbers were drawn had
+to go for soldiers.  Jacintha awaited the result in great anxiety.
+She could not sit at home for it; so she went down the road to meet
+Dard, who had promised to come and tell her the result as soon as
+known.  At last she saw him approaching in a disconsolate way.  "O
+Dard! speak! are we undone? are you a dead man?" cried she.  "Have
+they made a soldier of you?"
+
+"No such luck: I shall die a man of all work," grunted Dard.
+
+"And you are sorry? you unnatural little monster! you have no
+feeling for me, then."
+
+"Oh, yes, I have; but glory is No. 1 with me now."
+
+"How loud the bantams crow!  You leave glory to fools that be six
+feet high."
+
+"General Bonaparte isn't much higher than I am, and glory sits upon
+his brow.  Why shouldn't glory sit upon my brow?"
+
+"Because it would weigh you down, and smother you, you little fool."
+She added, "And think of me, that couldn't bear you to be killed at
+any price, glory or no glory."
+
+Then, to appease her fears, Dard showed her his number, 99; and
+assured her he had seen the last number in the functionary's hand
+before he came away, and it was sixty something.
+
+This ocular demonstration satisfied Jacintha; and she ordered Dard
+to help her draw the water.
+
+"All right," said he, "there is no immortal glory to be picked up
+to-day, so I'll go in for odd jobs."
+
+While they were at this job a voice was heard hallooing.  Dard
+looked up, and there was a rigid military figure, with a tremendous
+mustache, peering about.  Dard was overjoyed.  It was his friend,
+his boon-companion.  "Come here, old fellow," cried he, "ain't I
+glad to see you, that is all?"  La Croix marched towards the pair.
+"What are you skulking here for, recruit ninety-nine?" said he,
+sternly, dropping the boon-companion in the sergeant; "the rest are
+on the road."
+
+"The rest, old fellow! what do you mean? why, I was not drawn."
+
+"Yes, you were."
+
+"No, I wasn't."
+
+"Thunder of war, but I say you were.  Yours was the last number."
+
+"That is an unlucky guess of yours, for I saw the last number.  Look
+here," and he fumbled in his pocket, and produced his number.
+
+La Croix instantly fished out a corresponding number.
+
+"Well, and here you are; this was the last number drawn."
+
+Dard burst out laughing.
+
+"You goose!" said he, "that is sixty-six--look at it."
+
+"Sixty-six!" roared the sergeant; "no more than yours is--they are
+both sixty-sixes when you play tricks with them, and turn them up
+like that; but they are both ninety-nines when you look at them
+fair."
+
+Dard scratched his head.
+
+"Come," said the corporal, briskly, "make up his bundle, girl, and
+let us be off; we have got our marching orders; going to the Rhine."
+
+"And do you think that I will let him go?" screamed Jacintha.  "No!
+I will say one word to Madame Raynal, and she will buy him a
+substitute directly."
+
+Dard stopped her sullenly.  "No! I have told all in the village that
+I would go the first chance: it is come, and I'll go.  I won't stay
+to be laughed at about this too.  If I was sure to be cut in pieces,
+I'd go.  Give over blubbering, girl, and get us a bottle of the best
+wine, and while we are drinking it, the sergeant and I, you make up
+my bundle.  I shall never do any good here."
+
+Jacintha knew the obstinate toad.  She did as she was bid, and soon
+the little bundle was ready, and the two men faced the wine; La
+Croix, radiant and bellicose; Dard, crestfallen but dogged (for
+there was a little bit of good stuff at the bottom of the creature);
+and Jacintha rocking herself, with her apron over her head.
+
+"I'll give you a toast," said La Croix.  "Here's gunpowder."
+
+Jacintha promptly honored the toast with a flood of tears.
+
+"Drop that, Jacintha," said Dard, angrily; "do you think that is
+encouraging?  Sergeant, I told this poor girl all about glory before
+you came, but she was not ripe for it: say something to cheer her
+up, for I can't."
+
+"I can," cried this trumpet of battle, emptying its glass.
+"Attention, young woman."
+
+"Oh, dear! oh, dear! yes, sir."
+
+"A French soldier is a man who carries France in his heart"--
+
+"But if the cruel foreign soldiers kill him?  Oh!"
+
+"Why, in that case, he does not care a straw.  Every man must die;
+horses likewise, and dogs, and donkeys, when they come to the end of
+their troubles; but dogs and donkeys and chaps in blouses can't die
+gloriously; as Dard may, if he has any luck at all: so, from this
+hour, if there was twice as little of him, be proud of him, for from
+this time he is a part of France and her renown.  Come, recruit
+ninety-nine, shoulder your traps at duty's call, and let us go forth
+in form.  Attention!  Quick--march!  Halt! is that the way I showed
+you to march?  Didn't I tell you to start from the left?  Now try
+again.  QUICK--march! left--right--left--right--left--right--NOW
+you've--GOT it--DRAT ye,--KEEP it--left--right--left--right--left--
+right."  And with no more ado the sergeant marched the little odd-
+job man to the wars.
+
+VIVE LA FRANCE!
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII.
+
+
+Edouard, the moment his temper cooled, became very sad.  He longed
+to be friends again with Rose, but did not know how.  His own pride
+held him back, and so did his fear that he had gone too far, and
+that his offended mistress would not listen to an offer of
+reconciliation from him.  He sat down alone now to all his little
+meals.  No sweet, mellow voices in his ear after the fatigues of the
+day.  It was a dismal change in his life.
+
+At last, one day, he received three lines from Josephine, requesting
+him to come and speak to her.  He went over directly, full of vague
+hopes.  He found her seated pale and languid in a small room on the
+ground floor.
+
+"What has she been doing to you, dear?" began she kindly.
+
+"Has she not told you, Madame Raynal?"
+
+"No; she is refractory.  She will tell me nothing, and that makes me
+fear she is the one in fault."
+
+"Oh! if she does not accuse me, I am sure I will not accuse her.  I
+dare say I am to blame; it is not her fault that I cannot make her
+love me."
+
+"But you can.  She does."
+
+"Yes; but she loves others better, and she holds me out no hope it
+will ever be otherwise.  On this one point how can I hope for your
+sympathy; unfortunately for me you are one of my rivals.  She told
+me plainly she never could love me as she loves you."
+
+"And you believed her?"
+
+"I had good reason to believe her."
+
+Josephine smiled sadly.  "Dear Edouard," said she, "you must not
+attach so much importance to every word we say.  Does Rose at her
+age know everything?  Is she a prophet?  Perhaps she really fancies
+she will always love her sister as she does now; but you are a man
+of sense; you ought to smile and let her talk.  When you marry her
+you will take her to your own house; she will only see me now and
+then; she will have you and your affection always present.  Each day
+some new tie between you and her.  You two will share every joy,
+every sorrow.  Your children playing at your feet, and reflecting
+the features of both parents, will make you one.  Your hearts will
+melt together in that blessed union which raises earth so near to
+heaven; and then you will wonder you could ever be jealous of poor
+Josephine, who must never hope--ah, me!"
+
+Edouard, wrapped up in himself, mistook Josephine's emotion at the
+picture she had drawn of conjugal love.  He soothed her, and vowed
+upon his honor he never would separate Rose from her.
+
+"Madame Raynal," said he, "you are an angel, and I am a fiend.
+Jealousy must be the meanest of all sentiments.  I never will be
+jealous again, above all, of you, sweet angel.  Why, you are my
+sister as well as hers, and she has a right to love you, for I love
+you myself."
+
+"You make me very happy when you talk so," sighed Josephine.  "Peace
+is made?"
+
+"Never again to be broken.  I will go and ask her pardon.  What is
+the matter now?"
+
+For Jacintha was cackling very loud, and dismissing with ignominy
+two beggars, male and female.
+
+She was industry personified, and had no sympathy with mendicity.
+In vain the couple protested, Heaven knows with what truth, that
+they were not beggars, but mechanics out of work.  "March! tramp!"
+was Jacintha's least word.  She added, giving the rein to her
+imagination, "I'll loose the dog."  The man moved away, the woman
+turned appealingly to Edouard.  He and Josephine came towards the
+group.  She had got a sort of large hood, and in that hood she
+carried an infant on her shoulders.  Josephine inspected it.  "It
+looks sickly, poor little thing," said she.
+
+"What can you expect, young lady?" said the woman.  "Its mother had
+to rise and go about when she ought to have been in her bed, and now
+she has not enough to give it."
+
+"Oh, dear!" cried Josephine.  "Jacintha, give them some food and a
+nice bottle of wine."
+
+"That I will," cried Jacintha, changing her tone with courtier-like
+alacrity.  "I did not see she was nursing."
+
+Josephine put a franc into the infant's hand; the little fingers
+closed on it with that instinct of appropriation, which is our first
+and often our last sentiment.  Josephine smiled lovingly on the
+child, and the child seeing that gave a small crow.
+
+"Bless it," said Josephine, and thereupon her lovely head reared
+itself like a snake's, and then darted down on the child; and the
+young noble kissed the beggar's brat as if she would eat it.
+
+This won the mother's heart more than even the gifts.
+
+"Blessings on you, my lady!" she cried.  "I pray the Lord not to
+forget this when a woman's trouble comes on you in your turn!  It is
+a small child, mademoiselle, but it is not an unhealthy one.  See."
+Inspection was offered, and eagerly accepted.
+
+Edouard stood looking on at some distance in amazement, mingled with
+disgust.
+
+"Ugh!" said he, when she rejoined him, "how could you kiss that
+nasty little brat?"
+
+"Dear Edouard, don't speak so of a poor little innocent.  Who would
+pity them if we women did not?  It had lovely eyes."
+
+"Like saucers."
+
+"Yes."
+
+"It is no compliment when you are affectionate to anybody; you
+overflow with benevolence on all creation, like the rose which sheds
+its perfume on the first-comer."
+
+"If he is not going to be jealous of me next," whined Josephine.
+
+She took him to Rose, and she said, "There, whenever good friends
+quarrel, it is understood they were both in the wrong.  Bygones are
+to be bygones; and when your time comes round to quarrel again,
+please consult me first, since it is me you will afflict."  She left
+them together, and went and tapped timidly at the doctor's study.
+
+Aubertin received her with none of that reserve she had seen in him.
+He appeared both surprised and pleased at her visit to his little
+sanctum.  He even showed an emotion Josephine was at a loss to
+account for.  But that wore off during the conversation, and,
+indeed, gave place to a sort of coldness.
+
+"Dear friend," said she, "I come to consult you about Rose and
+Edouard."  She then told him what had happened, and hinted at
+Edouard's one fault.  The doctor smiled.  "It is curious.  You have
+come to draw my attention to a point on which it has been fixed for
+some days past.  I am preparing a cure for the two young fools; a
+severe remedy, but in their case a sure one."
+
+He then showed her a deed, wherein he had settled sixty thousand
+francs on Rose and her children.  "Edouard," said he, "has a good
+place.  He is active and rising, and with my sixty thousand francs,
+and a little purse of ten thousand more for furniture and nonsense,
+they can marry next week, if they like.  Yes, marriage is a
+sovereign medicine for both of these patients.  She does not love
+him quite enough.  Cure: marriage.  He loves her a little too much.
+Cure: marriage."
+
+"O doctor!"
+
+"Can't help it.  I did not make men and women.  We must take human
+nature as we find it, and thank God for it on the whole.  Have you
+nothing else to confide to me?"
+
+"No, doctor."
+
+"Are you sure?"
+
+"No, dear friend.  But this is very near my heart," faltered
+Josephine.
+
+The doctor sighed; then said gently, "They shall be happy: as happy
+as you wish them."
+
+Meantime, in another room, a reconciliation scene was taking place,
+and the mutual concessions of two impetuous but generous spirits.
+
+
+The baroness noticed the change in Josephine's appearance.
+
+She asked Rose what could be the matter.
+
+"Some passing ailment," was the reply.
+
+"Passing?  She has been so, on and off, a long time.  She makes me
+very anxious."
+
+Rose made light of it to her mother, but in her own heart she grew
+more and more anxious day by day.  She held secret conferences with
+Jacintha; that sagacious personage had a plan to wake Josephine from
+her deathly languor, and even soothe her nerves, and check those
+pitiable fits of nervous irritation to which she had become subject.
+Unfortunately, Jacintha's plan was so difficult and so dangerous,
+that at first even the courageous Rose recoiled from it; but there
+are dangers that seem to diminish when you look them long in the
+face.
+
+The whole party was seated in the tapestried room: Jacintha was
+there, sewing a pair of sheets, at a respectful distance from the
+gentlefolks, absorbed in her work; but with both ears on full cock.
+
+The doctor, holding his glasses to his eye, had just begun to read
+out the Moniteur.
+
+The baroness sat close to him, Edouard opposite; and the young
+ladies each in her corner of a large luxurious sofa, at some little
+distance.
+
+
+"'The Austrians left seventy cannon, eight thousand men, and three
+colors upon the field.  Army of the North: General Menard defeated
+the enemy after a severe engagement, taking thirteen field-pieces
+and a quantity of ammunition.'"
+
+
+The baroness made a narrow-minded renmark.  "That is always the way
+with these journals," said she.  "Austrians!  Prussians! when it's
+Egypt one wants to hear about."--"No, not a word about Egypt," said
+the doctor; "but there is a whole column about the Rhine, where
+Colonel Dujardin is--and Dard.  If I was dictator, the first
+nuisance I would put down is small type."  He then spelled out a
+sanguinary engagement: "eight thousand of the enemy killed.  We have
+some losses to lament.  Colonel Dujardin"--
+
+"Only wounded, I hope," said the baroness.
+
+The doctor went coolly on.  "At the head of the 24th brigade made a
+brilliant charge on the enemy's flank, that is described in the
+general order as having decided the fate of the battle."
+
+"How badly you do read," said the old lady, sharply.  "I thought he
+was gone; instead of that he has covered himself with glory; but it
+is all our doing, is it not, young ladies?  We saved his life."
+
+"We saved it amongst us, madame."
+
+"What is the matter, Rose?" said Edouard.
+
+"Nothing: give me the salts, quick."
+
+She only passed them, as it were, under her own nostrils; then held
+them to Josephine, who was now observed to be trembling all over.
+Rose contrived to make it appear that this was mere sympathy on
+Josephine's part.
+
+"Don't be silly, girls," cried the baroness, cheerfully; "there is
+nobody killed that we care about."
+
+Dr. Aubertin read the rest to himself.
+
+Edouard fell into a gloomy silence and tortured himself about
+Camille, and Rose's anxiety and agitation.
+
+By and by the new servant brought in a letter.  It was the long-
+expected one from Egypt.
+
+"Here is something better than salts for you.  A long letter,
+Josephine, and all in his own hand; so he is safe, thank Heaven! I
+was beginning to be uneasy again.  You frightened me for that poor
+Camille: but this is worth a dozen Camilles; this is my son; I would
+give my old life for him."--"My dear Mother--('Bless him!'), my dear
+wife, and my dear sister--('Well! you sit there like two rocks!')--
+We have just gained a battle--fifty colors.  ('What do you think of
+that?')  All the enemy's baggage and ammunition are in our hands.
+('This is something like a battle, this one.')  Also the Pasha of
+Natolie.  ('Ah! the Pasha of Natolie; an important personage, no
+doubt, though I never had the honor of hearing of him.  Do you
+hear?--you on the sofa.  My son has captured the Pasha of Natolie.
+He is as brave as Caesar.')  But this success is not one of those
+that lead to important results ('Never mind, a victory is a
+victory'), and I should not wonder if Bonaparte was to dash home any
+day.  If so, I shall go with him, and perhaps spend a whole day with
+you, on my way to the Rhine."
+
+At this prospect a ghastly look passed quick as lightning between
+Rose and Josephine.
+
+The baroness beckoned Josephine to come close to her, and read her
+what followed in a lower tone of voice.
+
+"Tell my wife I love her more and more every day.  I don't expect as
+much from her, but she will make me very happy if she can make shift
+to like me as well as her family do."--"No danger!  What husband
+deserves to be loved as he does?  I long for his return, that his
+wife, his mother, and his sister may all combine to teach this poor
+soldier what happiness means.  We owe him everything, Josephine, and
+if we did not love him, and make him happy, we should be monsters;
+now should we not?"
+
+Josephine stammered an assent.
+
+"NOW you may read his letter: Jacintha and all," said the baroness
+graciously.
+
+The letter circulated.  Meantime, the baroness conversed with
+Aubertin in quite an undertone.
+
+"My friend, look at Josephine.  That girl is ill, or else she is
+going to be ill."
+
+"Neither the one nor the other, madame," said Aubertin, looking her
+coolly in the face.
+
+"But I say she is.  Is a doctor's eye keener than a mother's?"
+
+"Considerably," replied the doctor with cool and enviable effrontery.
+
+The baroness rose.  "Now, children, for our evening walk.  We shall
+enjoy it now."
+
+"I trust you may: but for all that I must forbid the evening air to
+one of the party--to Madame Raynal."
+
+The baroness came to him and whispered, "That is right.  Thank you.
+See what is the matter with her, and tell me."  And she carried off
+the rest of the party.
+
+At the same time Jacintha asked permission to pass the rest of the
+evening with her relations in the village.  But why that swift,
+quivering glance of intelligence between Jacintha and Rose de
+Beaurepaire when the baroness said, "Yes, certainly"?
+
+Time will show.
+
+Josephine and the doctor were left alone.  Now Josephine had noticed
+the old people whisper and her mother glance her way, and the whole
+woman was on her guard.  She assumed a languid complacency, and by
+way of shield, if necessary, took some work, and bent her eyes and
+apparently her attention on it.
+
+The doctor was silent and ill at ease.
+
+She saw he had something weighty on his mind.  "The air would have
+done me no harm," said she.
+
+"Neither will a few words with me."
+
+"Oh, no, dear friend.  Only I think I should have liked a little
+walk this evening."
+
+"Josephine," said the doctor quietly, "when you were a child I saved
+your life."
+
+"I have often heard my mother speak of it.  I was choked by the
+croup, and you had the courage to lance my windpipe."
+
+"Had I?" said the doctor, with a smile.  He added gravely, "It seems
+then that to be cruel is sometimes kindness.  It is the nature of
+men to love those whose life they save."
+
+"And they love you."
+
+"Well, our affection is not perfect.  I don't know which is most to
+blame, but after all these years I have failed to inspire you with
+confidence."  The doctor's voice was sad, and Josephine's bosom
+panted.
+
+"Pray do not say so," she cried.  "I would trust you with my life."
+
+"But not with your secret."
+
+"My secret!  What secret?  I have no secrets."
+
+"Josephine, you have now for full twelve months suffered in body and
+mind, yet you have never come to me for counsel, for comfort, for an
+old man's experience and advice, nor even for medical aid."
+
+"But, dear friend, I assure you"--
+
+"We DO NOT deceive our friend.  We CANNOT deceive our doctor."
+
+Josephine trembled, but defended herself after the manner of her
+sex.  "Dear doctor," said she, "I love you all the better for this.
+Your regard for me has for once blinded your science.  I am not so
+robust as you have known me, but there is nothing serious the matter
+with me.  Let us talk of something else.  Besides, it is not
+interesting to talk about one's self."
+
+"Very well; since there is nothing serious or interesting in your
+case, we will talk about something that is both serious and
+interesting."
+
+"With all my heart;" and she smiled with a sense of relief.
+
+But the doctor leaned over the table to her, and said in a cautious
+and most emphatic whisper, "We will talk about YOUR CHILD."
+
+The work dropped from Josephine's hands: she turned her face wildly
+on Aubertin, and faltered out, "M--my child?"
+
+"My words are plain," replied he gravely.  "YOUR CHILD."
+
+When the doctor repeated these words, when Josephine looking in his
+face saw he spoke from knowledge, however acquired, and not from
+guess, she glided down slowly off the sofa and clasped his knees as
+he stood before her, and hid her face in an agony of shame and
+terror on his knees.
+
+"Forgive me," she sobbed.  "Pray do not expose me!  Do not destroy
+me."
+
+"Unhappy young lady," said he, "did you think you had deceived me,
+or that you are fit to deceive any but the blind?  Your face, your
+anguish after Colonel Dujardin's departure, your languor, and then
+your sudden robustness, your appetite, your caprices, your strange
+sojourn at Frejus, your changed looks and loss of health on your
+return!  Josephine, your old friend has passed many an hour thinking
+of you, divining your folly, following your trouble step by step.
+Yet you never invited him to aid you."
+
+Josephine faltered out a lame excuse.  If she had revered him less
+she could have borne to confess to him.  She added it would be a
+relief to her to confide in him.
+
+"Then tell me all," said he.
+
+She consented almost eagerly, and told him--nearly all.  The old man
+was deeply affected.  He murmured in a broken voice, "Your story is
+the story of your sex, self-sacrifice, first to your mother, then to
+Camille, now to your husband."
+
+"And he is well worthy of any sacrifice I can make," said Josephine.
+"But oh, how hard it is to live!"
+
+"I hope to make it less hard to you ere long," said the doctor
+quietly.  He then congratulated himself on having forced Josephine
+to confide in him.  "For," said he, "you never needed an experienced
+friend more than at this moment.  Your mother will not always be so
+blind as of late.  Edouard is suspicious.  Jacintha is a shrewd
+young woman, and very inquisitive."
+
+Josephine was not at the end of her concealments: she was ashamed to
+let him know she had made a confidant of Jacintha and not of him.
+She held her peace.
+
+"Then," continued Aubertin, "there is the terrible chance of
+Raynal's return.  But ere I take on me to advise you, what are your
+own plans?"
+
+"I don't know," said Josephine helplessly.
+
+"You--don't--know!" cried the doctor, looking at her in utter
+amazement.
+
+"It is the answer of a mad woman, is it not?  Doctor, I am little
+better.  My foot has slipped on the edge of a precipice.  I close my
+eyes, and let myself glide down it.  What will become of me?"
+
+"All shall be well," said Aubertin, "provided you do not still love
+that man."
+
+Josephine did not immediately reply: her thoughts turned inwards.
+The good doctor was proceeding to congratulate her on being cured of
+a fatal passion, when she stopped him with wonder in her face.  "Not
+love him!  How can I help loving him?  I was his betrothed.  I
+wronged him in my thoughts.  War, prison, anguish, could not kill
+him; he loved me so.  He struggled bleeding to my feet; and could I
+let him die, after all?  Could I be crueller than prison, and
+torture, and despair?"
+
+The doctor sighed deeply; but, arming himself with the necessary
+resolution, he sternly replied, "A woman of your name cannot
+vacillate between love and honor; such vacillations have but one
+end.  I will not let you drift a moral wreck between passion and
+virtue; and that is what it will come to if you hesitate now."
+
+"Hesitate!  Who can say I have hesitated where my honor was
+concerned?  You can read our bodies then, but not our hearts.  What!
+you see me so pale, forlorn, and dead, and that does not tell you I
+have bid Camille farewell forever?  That we might be safer still I
+have not even told him he is a father: was ever woman so cruel as I
+am?  I have written him but one letter, and in that I must deceive
+him.  I told him I thought I might one day be happy, if I could hear
+that he did not give way to despair.  I told him we must never meet
+again in this world.  So now come what will: show me my duty and I
+will do it.  This endless deceit burns my heart.  Shall I tell my
+husband?  It will be but one pang more, one blush more for me.  But
+my mother!" and, thus appealed to, Dr. Aubertin felt, for the first
+time, all the difficulty of the situation he had undertaken to cure.
+He hesitated, he was embarrassed.
+
+"Ah," said Josephine, "you see."  Then, after a short silence, she
+said despairingly, "This is my only hope: that poor Raynal will be
+long absent, and that ere he returns mamma will lie safe from sorrow
+and shame in the little chapel.  Doctor, when a woman of my age
+forms such wishes as these, I think you might pity her, and forgive
+her ill-treatment of you, for she cannot be very happy.  Ah me! ah
+me! ah me!"
+
+"Courage, poor soul!  All is now in my hands, and I will save you,"
+said the doctor, his voice trembling in spite of him.  "Guilt lies
+in the intention.  A more innocent woman than you does not breathe.
+Two courses lay open to you: to leave this house with Camille
+Dujardin, or to dismiss him, and live for your hard duty till it
+shall please Heaven to make that duty easy (no middle course was
+tenable for a day); of these two paths you chose the right one, and,
+having chosen, I really think you are not called on to reveal your
+misfortune, and make those unhappy to whose happiness you have
+sacrificed your own for years to come."
+
+"Forever," said Josephine quietly.
+
+"The young use that word lightly.  The old have almost ceased to use
+it.  They have seen how few earthly things can conquer time."
+
+He resumed, "You think only of others, Josephine, but I shall think
+of you as well.  I shall not allow your life to be wasted in a
+needless struggle against nature."  Then turning to Rose, who had
+glided into the room, and stood amazed, "Her griefs were as many
+before her child was born, yet her health stood firm.  Why? because
+nature was on her side.  Now she is sinking into the grave.  Why?
+because she is defying nature.  Nature intended her to be pressing
+her child to her bosom day and night; instead of that, a peasant
+woman at Frejus nurses the child, and the mother pines at
+Beaurepaire."
+
+At this, Josephine leaned her face on her hands on the doctor's
+shoulder.  In this attitude she murmured to him, "I have never seen
+him since I left Frejus."  Dr. Aubertin sighed for her.  Emboldened
+by this, she announced her intention of going to Frejus the very
+next day to see her little Henri.  But to this Dr. Aubertin
+demurred.  "What, another journey to Frejus?" said he, "when the
+first has already roused Edouard's suspicions; I can never consent
+to that."
+
+Then Josephine surprised them both.  She dropped her coaxing voice
+and pecked the doctor like an irritated pigeon.  "Take care," said
+she, "don't be too cruel to me.  You see I am obedient, resigned.  I
+have given up all I lived for: but if I am never to have my little
+boy's arms round me to console me, then--why torment me any longer?
+Why not say to me, 'Josephine, you have offended Heaven; pray for
+pardon, and die'?"
+
+Then the doctor was angry in his turn.  "Oh, go then," said he, "go
+to Frejus; you will have Edouard Riviere for a companion this time.
+Your first visit roused his suspicions.  So before you go tell your
+mother all; for since she is sure to find it out, she had better
+hear it from you than from another."
+
+"Doctor, have pity on me," said Josephine.
+
+"You have no heart," said Rose.  "She shall see him though, in spite
+of you."
+
+"Oh, yes! he has a heart," said Josephine: "he is my best friend.
+He will let me see my boy."
+
+All this, and the tearful eyes and coaxing yet trembling voice, was
+hard to resist.  But Aubertin saw clearly, and stood firm.  He put
+his handkerchief to his eyes a moment: then took the pining young
+mother's hand.  "And, do you think," said he, "I do not pity you and
+love your boy?  Ah! he will never want a father whilst I live; and
+from this moment he is under my care.  I will go to see him; I will
+bring you news, and all in good time; I will place him where you
+shall visit him without imprudence; but, for the present, trust a
+wiser head than yours or Rose's; and give me your sacred promise not
+to go to Frejus."
+
+Weighed down by his good-sense and kindness, Josephine resisted no
+longer in words.  She just lifted her hands in despair and began to
+cry.  It was so piteous, Aubertin was ready to yield in turn, and
+consent to any imprudence, when he met with an unexpected ally.
+
+"Promise," said Rose, doggedly.
+
+Josephine looked at her calmly through her tears.
+
+"Promise, dear," repeated Rose, and this time with an intonation so
+fine that it attracted Josephine's notice, but not the doctor's.  It
+was followed by a glance equally subtle.
+
+"I promise," said Josephine, with her eye fixed inquiringly on her
+sister.
+
+For once she could not make the telegraph out: but she could see it
+was playing, and that was enough.  She did what Rose bid her; she
+promised not to go to Frejus without leave.
+
+Finding her so submissive all of a sudden, he went on to suggest
+that she must not go kissing every child she saw.  "Edouard tells me
+he saw you kissing a beggar's brat.  The young rogue was going to
+quiz you about it at the dinner-table; luckily, he told me his
+intention, and I would not let him.  I said the baroness would be
+annoyed with you for descending from your dignity--and exposing a
+noble family to fleas--hush! here he is."
+
+"Tiresome!" muttered Rose, "just when"--
+
+Edouard came forward with a half-vexed face.
+
+However, he turned it off into play.  "What have you been saying to
+her, monsieur, to interest her so?  Give me a leaf out of your book.
+I need it."
+
+The doctor was taken aback for a moment, but at last he said slyly,
+"I have been proposing to her to name the day.  She says she must
+consult you before she decides that."
+
+"Oh, you wicked doctor!--and consult HIM of all people!"
+
+"So be off, both of you, and don't reappear before me till it is
+settled."
+
+Edouard's eyes sparkled.  Rose went out with a face as red as fire.
+
+It was a balmy evening.  Edouard was to leave them for a week the
+next day.  They were alone: Rose was determined he should go away
+quite happy.  Everything was in Edouard's favor: he pleaded his
+cause warmly: she listened tenderly: this happy evening her piquancy
+and archness seemed to dissolve into tenderness as she and Edouard
+walked hand in hand under the moon: a tenderness all the more
+heavenly to her devoted lover, that she was not one of those angels
+who cloy a man by invariable sweetness.
+
+For a little while she forgot everything but her companion.  In that
+soft hour he won her to name the day, after her fashion.
+
+"Josephine goes to Paris with the doctor in about three weeks,"
+murmured she.
+
+"And you will stay behind, all alone?"
+
+"Alone? that shall depend on you, monsieur."
+
+On this Edouard caught her for the first time in his arms.
+
+She made a faint resistance.
+
+"Seal me that promise, sweet one!"
+
+"No! no!--there!"
+
+He pressed a delicious first kiss upon two velvet lips that in their
+innocence scarcely shunned the sweet attack.
+
+For all that, the bond was no sooner sealed after this fashion, than
+the lady's cheek began to burn.
+
+"Suppose we go in NOW?" said she, dryly.
+
+"Ah, not yet."
+
+"It is late, dear Edouard."
+
+And with these words something returned to her mind with its full
+force: something that Edouard had actually made her forget.  She
+wanted to get rid of him now.
+
+"Edouard," said she, "can you get up early in the morning?  If you
+can, meet me here to-morrow before any of them are up; then we can
+talk without interruption."
+
+Edouard was delighted.
+
+"Eight o'clock?"
+
+"Sooner if you like.  Mamma bade me come and read to her in her room
+to-night.  She will be waiting for me.  Is it not tiresome?"
+
+"Yes, it is."
+
+"Well, we must not mind that, dear; in three weeks' time we are to
+have too much of one another, you know, instead of too little."
+
+"Too much! I shall never have enough of you.  I shall hate the night
+which will rob me of the sight of you for so many hours in the
+twenty-four."
+
+"If you can't see me, perhaps you may hear me; my tongue runs by
+night as well as by day."
+
+"Well, that is a comfort," said Edouard, gravely.  "Yes, little
+quizzer, I would rather hear you scold than an angel sing.  Judge,
+then, what music it is when you say you love me!"
+
+"I love you, Edouard."
+
+Edouard kissed her hand warmly, and then looked irresolutely at her
+face.
+
+"No, no!" said she, laughing and blushing.  "How rude you are.  Next
+time we meet."
+
+"That is a bargain.  But I won't go till you say you love me again.
+
+"Edouard, don't be silly.  I am ashamed of saying the same thing so
+often--I won't say it any more.  What is the use?  You know I love
+you.  There, I HAVE said it: how stupid!"
+
+"Adieu, then, my wife that is to be."
+
+"Adieu! dear Edouard."
+
+"My hus--go on--my hus--"
+
+"My huswife that shall be."
+
+Then they walked very slowly towards the house, and once more Rose
+left quizzing, and was all tenderness.
+
+"Will you not come in, and bid them 'good-night'?"
+
+"No, my own; I am in heaven.  Common faces--common voices would
+bring me down to earth.  Let me be alone;--your sweet words ringing
+in my ear.  I will dilute you with nothing meaner than the stars.
+See how bright they shine in heaven; but not so bright as you shine
+in my heart."
+
+"Dear Edouard, you flatter me, you spoil me.  Alas! why am I not
+more worthy of your love?"
+
+"More worthy!  How can that be?"
+
+Rose sighed.
+
+"But I will atone for all.  I will make you a better--(here she
+substituted a full stop for a substantive)--than you expect.  You
+will see else."
+
+She lingered at the door: a proof that if Edouard, at that
+particular moment, had seized another kiss, there would have been no
+very violent opposition or offence.
+
+But he was not so impudent as some.  He had been told to wait till
+the next meeting for that.  He prayed Heaven to bless her, and so
+the affianced lovers parted for the night.
+
+It was about nine o'clock.  Edouard, instead of returning to his
+lodgings, started down towards the town, to conclude a bargain with
+the innkeeper for an English mare he was in treaty for.  He wanted
+her for to-morrow's work; so that decided him to make the purchase.
+In purchases, as in other matters, a feather turns the balanced
+scale.  He sauntered leisurely down.  It was a very clear night; the
+full moon and the stars shining silvery and vivid.  Edouard's heart
+swelled with joy.  He was loved after all, deeply loved; and in
+three short weeks he was actually to be Rose's husband: her lord and
+master.  How like a heavenly dream it all seemed--the first hopeless
+courtship, and now the wedding fixed!  But it was no dream; he felt
+her soft words still murmur music at his heart, and the shadow of
+her velvet lips slept upon his own.
+
+He had strolled about a league when he heard the ring of a horse's
+hoofs coming towards him, accompanied by a clanking noise; it came
+nearer and nearer, till it reached a hill that lay a little ahead of
+Edouard; then the sounds ceased; the cavalier was walking his horse
+up the hill.
+
+Presently, as if they had started from the earth, up popped between
+Edouard and the sky, first a cocked hat that seemed in that light to
+be cut with a razor out of flint; then the wearer, phosphorescent
+here and there; so brightly the keen moonlight played on his
+epaulets and steel scabbard.  A step or two nearer, and Edouard gave
+a great shout; it was Colonel Raynal.
+
+After the first warm greeting, and questions and answers, Raynal
+told him he was on his way to the Rhine with despatches.
+
+"To the Rhine?"
+
+I am allowed six days to get there.  I made a calculation, and found
+I could give Beaurepaire half a day.  I shall have to make up for it
+by hard riding.  You know me; always in a hurry.  It is Bonaparte's
+fault this time.  He is always in a hurry too."
+
+"Why, colonel," said Edouard, "let us make haste then.  Mind they go
+early to rest at the chateau."
+
+"But you are not coming my way, youngster?"
+
+"Not coming your way?  Yes, but I am.  Yours is a face I don't see
+every day, colonel; besides I would not miss THEIR faces, especially
+the baroness's and Madame Raynal's, at sight of you; and, besides,"--
+and the young gentleman chuckled to himself, and thought of Rose's
+words, "the next time we meet;" well, this will be the next time.
+"May I jump up behind?"
+
+Colonel Raynal nodded assent.  Edouard took a run, and lighted like
+a monkey on the horse's crupper.  He pranced and kicked at this
+unexpected addition; but the spur being promptly applied to his
+flanks, he bounded off with a snort that betrayed more astonishment
+than satisfaction, and away they cantered to Beaurepaire, without
+drawing rein.
+
+"There," said Edouard, "I was afraid they would be gone to bed; and
+they are.  The very house seems asleep--fancy--at half-past ten."
+
+"That is a pity," said Raynal, "for this chateau is the stronghold
+of etiquette.  They will be two hours dressing before they will come
+out and shake hands.  I must put my horse into the stable.  Go you
+and give the alarm."
+
+"I will, colonel.  Stop, first let me see whether none of them are
+up, after all."
+
+And Edouard walked round the chateau, and soon discovered a light at
+one window, the window of the tapestried room.  Running round the
+other way he came slap upon another light: this one was nearer the
+ground.  A narrow but massive door, which he had always seen not
+only locked but screwed up, was wide open; and through the aperture
+the light of a candle streamed out and met the moonlight streaming
+in.
+
+"Hallo!" cried Edouard.
+
+He stopped, turned, and looked in.
+
+"Hallo!" he cried again much louder.
+
+A young woman was sleeping with her feet in the silvery moonlight,
+and her head in the orange-colored blaze of a flat candle, which
+rested on the next step above of a fine stone staircase, whose
+existence was now first revealed to the inquisitive Edouard.
+
+Coming plump upon all this so unexpectedly, he quite started.
+
+"Why, Jacintha!"
+
+He touched her on the shoulder to wake her.  No.  Jacintha was
+sleeping as only tired domestics can sleep.  He might have taken the
+candle and burnt her gown off her back.  She had found a step that
+fitted into the small of her back, and another that supported her
+head, and there she was fast as a door.
+
+At this moment Raynal's voice was heard calling him.
+
+"There is a light in that bedroom."
+
+"It is not a bedroom, colonel; it is our sitting-room now.  We shall
+find them all there, or at least the young ladies; and perhaps the
+doctor.  The baroness goes to bed early.  Meantime I can show you
+one of our dramatis personae, and an important one too.  She rules
+the roost."
+
+He took him mysteriously and showed him Jacintha.
+
+Moonlight by itself seems white, and candlelight by itself seems
+yellow; but when the two come into close contrast at night, candle
+turns a reddish flame, and moonlight a bluish gleam.
+
+So Jacintha, with her shoes in this celestial sheen, and her face in
+that demoniacal glare, was enough to knock the gazer's eye out.
+
+"Make a good sentinel--this one," said Raynal--"an outlying picket
+for instance, on rough ground, in front of the enemy's riflemen."
+
+"Ha! ha! colonel!  Let us see where this staircase leads.  I have an
+idea it will prove a short cut."
+
+"Where to?"
+
+"To the saloon, or somewhere, or else to some of Jacintha's haunts.
+Serve her right for going to sleep at the mouth of her den."
+
+"Forward then--no, halt!  Suppose it leads to the bedrooms?  Mind
+this is a thundering place for ceremony.  We shall get drummed out
+of the barracks if we don't mind our etiquette."
+
+At this they hesitated; and Edouard himself thought, on the whole,
+it would be better to go and hammer at the front door.
+
+Now while they hesitated, a soft delicious harmony of female voices
+suddenly rose, and seemed to come and run round the walls.  The men
+looked at one another in astonishment; for the effect was magical.
+The staircase being enclosed on all sides with stone walls and
+floored with stone, they were like flies inside a violoncello; the
+voices rang above, below, and on every side of the vibrating walls.
+In some epochs spirits as hardy as Raynal's, and wits as quick as
+Riviere's, would have fled then and there to the nearest public, and
+told over cups how they had heard the dames of Beaurepaire, long
+since dead, holding their revel, and the conscious old devil's nest
+of a chateau quivering to the ghostly strains.
+
+But this was an incredulous age.  They listened, and listened, and
+decided the sounds came from up-stairs.
+
+"Let us mount, and surprise these singing witches," said Edouard.
+
+"Surprise them! what for?  It is not the enemy--for once.  What is
+the good of surprising our friends?"
+
+Storming parties and surprises were no novelty and therefore no
+treat to Raynal.
+
+"It will be so delightful to see their faces at first sight of you.
+O colonel, for my sake!  Don't spoil it by going tamely in at the
+front door, after coming at night from Egypt for half an hour."
+
+Raynal grumbled something about its being a childish trick; but to
+please Edouard consented at last; only stipulated for a light: "or
+else," said he, "we shall surprise ourselves instead with a broken
+neck, going over ground we don't know to surprise the natives--our
+skirmishers got nicked that way now and then in Egypt."
+
+"Yes, colonel, I will go first with Jacintha's candle."  Edouard
+mounted the stairs on tiptoe.  Raynal followed.  The solid stone
+steps did not prate.  The men had mounted a considerable way, when
+puff a blast of wind came through a hole, and out went Edouard's
+candle.  He turned sharply round to Raynal.  "Peste!" said he in a
+vicious whisper.  But the other laid his hand on his shoulder and
+whispered, "Look to the front."  He looked, and, his own candle
+being out, saw a glimmer on ahead.  He crept towards it.  It was a
+taper shooting a feeble light across a small aperture.  They caught
+a glimpse of what seemed to be a small apartment.  Yet Edouard
+recognized the carpet of the tapestried room--which was a very large
+room.  Creeping a yard nearer, he discovered that it was the
+tapestried room, and that what had seemed the further wall was only
+the screen, behind which were lights, and two women singing a duet.
+
+He whispered to Raynal, "It is the tapestried room."
+
+"Is it a sitting-room?" whispered Raynal.
+
+"Yes! yes!  Mind and not knock your foot against the wood."
+
+And Raynal went softly up and put his foot quietly through the
+aperture, which he now saw was made by a panel drawn back close to
+the ground; and stood in the tapestried chamber.  The carpet was
+thick; the voices favored the stealthy advance; the floor of the old
+house was like a rock; and Edouard put his face through the
+aperture, glowing all over with anticipation of the little scream of
+joy that would welcome his friend dropping in so nice and suddenly
+from Egypt.
+
+The feeling was rendered still more piquant by a sharp curiosity
+that had been growing on him for some minutes past.  For why was
+this passage opened to-night?--he had never seen it opened before.
+And why was Jacintha lying sentinel at the foot of the stairs?
+
+But this was not all.  Now that they were in the room both men
+became conscious of another sound besides the ladies' voices--a very
+peculiar sound.  It also came from behind the screen.  They both
+heard it, and showed, by the puzzled looks they cast at one another,
+that neither could make out what on earth it was.  It consisted of a
+succession of little rustles, followed by little thumps on the
+floor.
+
+But what was curious, too, this rustle, thump--rustle, thump--fell
+exactly into the time of the music; so that, clearly, either the
+rustle thump was being played to the tune, or the tune sung to the
+rustle thump.
+
+This last touch of mystery inflamed Edouard's impatience beyond
+bearing: he pointed eagerly and merrily to the corner of the screen.
+Raynal obeyed, and stepped very slowly and cautiously towards it.
+
+Rustle, thump! rustle, thump! rustle, thump! with the rhythm of
+harmonious voices.
+
+Edouard got his head and foot into the room without taking his eye
+off Raynal.
+
+Rustle, thump! rustle, thump! rustle, thump!
+
+Raynal was now at the screen, and quietly put his head round it, and
+his hand upon it.
+
+Edouard was bursting with expectation.
+
+No result.  What is this?  Don't they see him?  Why does he not
+speak to them?  He seems transfixed.
+
+Rustle, thump! rustle, thump; accompanied now for a few notes by one
+voice only, Rose's.
+
+Suddenly there burst a shriek from Josephine, so loud, so fearful,
+that it made even Raynal stagger back a step, the screen in his
+hand.
+
+Then another scream of terror and anguish from Rose.  Then a fainter
+cry, and the heavy helpless fall of a human body.
+
+Raynal sprang forward whirling the screen to the earth in terrible
+agitation, and Edouard bounded over it as it fell at his feet.  He
+did not take a second step.  The scene that caught his eye stupefied
+and paralyzed him in full career, and froze him to the spot with
+amazement and strange misgivings.
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX.
+
+
+To return for a moment to Rose.  She parted from Edouard, and went
+in at the front door: but the next moment she opened it softly and
+watched her lover unseen.  "Dear Edouard!" she murmured: and then
+she thought, "how sad it is that I must deceive him, even to-night:
+must make up an excuse to get him from me, when we were so happy
+together.  Ah! he little knows how I shall welcome our wedding-day.
+When once I can see my poor martyr on the road to peace and content
+under the good doctor's care.  And oh! the happiness of having no
+more secrets from him I love!  Dear Edouard! when once we are
+married, I never, never, will have a secret from you again--I swear
+it."
+
+As a comment on these words she now stepped cautiously out, and
+peered in every direction.
+
+"St--st!" she whispered.  No answer came to this signal.
+
+Rose returned into the house and bolted the door inside.  She went
+up to the tapestried room, and found the doctor in the act of
+wishing Josephine good-night.  The baroness, fatigued a little by
+her walk, had mounted no higher than her own bedroom, which was on
+the first floor just under the tapestried room.  Rose followed the
+doctor out.  "Dear friend, one word.  Josephine talked of telling
+Raynal.  You have not encouraged her to do that?"
+
+"Certainly not, while he is in Egypt."
+
+"Still less on his return.  Doctor, you don't know that man.
+Josephine does not know him.  But I do.  He would kill her if he
+knew.  He would kill her that minute.  He would not wait: he would
+not listen to excuses: he is a man of iron.  Or if he spared her he
+would kill Camille: and that would destroy her by the cruellest of
+all deaths!  My friend, I am a wicked, miserable girl.  I am the
+cause of all this misery!"
+
+She then told Aubertin all about the anonymous letter, and what
+Raynal had said to her in consequence.
+
+"He never would have married her had he known she loved another.  He
+asked me was it so.  I told him a falsehood.  At least I
+equivocated, and to equivocate with one so loyal and simple was to
+deceive him.  I am the only sinner: that sweet angel is the only
+sufferer.  Is this the justice of Heaven?  Doctor, my remorse is
+great.  No one knows what I feel when I look at my work.  Edouard
+thinks I love her so much better than I do him.  He is wrong: it is
+not love only, it is pity: it is remorse for the sorrow I have
+brought on her, and the wrong I have done poor Raynal."
+
+The high-spirited girl was greatly agitated: and Aubertin, though he
+did not acquit her of all blame, soothed her, and made excuses for
+her.
+
+"We must not always judge by results," said he.  "Things turned
+unfortunately.  You did for the best.  I forgive you for one.  That
+is, I will forgive you if you promise not to act again without my
+advice."
+
+"Oh, never! never!"
+
+"And, above all, no imprudence about that child.  In three little
+weeks they will be together without risk of discovery.  Well, you
+don't answer me."
+
+Rose's blood turned cold.  "Dear friend," she stammered, "I quite
+agree with you."
+
+"Promise, then."
+
+"Not to let Josephine go to Frejus?" said Rose hastily.  "Oh, yes! I
+promise."
+
+"You are a good girl," said Aubertin.  "You have a will of your own.
+But you can submit to age and experience."  The doctor then kissed
+her, and bade her farewell.
+
+"I leave for Paris at six in the morning," he said.  "I will not try
+your patience or hers unnecessarily.  Perhaps it will not be three
+weeks ere she sees her child under her friend's roof."
+
+The moment Rose was alone, she sat down and sighed bitterly.  "There
+is no end to it," she sobbed despairingly.  "It is like a spider's
+web: every struggle to be free but multiplies the fine yet
+irresistible thread that seems to bind me.  And to-night I thought
+to be so happy; instead of that, he has left me scarce the heart to
+do what I have to do."
+
+She went back to the room, opened a window, and put out a white
+handkerchief, then closed the window down on it.
+
+Then she went to Josephine's bedroom-door: it opened on the
+tapestried room.
+
+"Josephine," she cried, "don't go to bed just yet."
+
+"No, love.  What are you doing?  I want to talk to you.  Why did you
+say promise? and what did you mean by looking at me so?  Shall I
+come out to you?"
+
+"Not just yet," said Rose; she then glided into the corridor, and
+passed her mother's room and the doctor's, and listened to see if
+all was quiet.  While she was gone Josephine opened her door; but
+not seeing Rose in the sitting-room, retired again.
+
+Rose returned softly, and sat down with her head in her hand, in a
+calm attitude belied by her glancing eye, and the quick tapping of
+her other hand upon the table.
+
+Presently she raised her head quickly; a sound had reached her ear,--
+a sound so slight that none but a high-strung ear could have caught
+it.  It was like a mouse giving a single scratch against a stone
+wall.
+
+Rose coughed slightly.
+
+On this a clearer sound was heard, as of a person scratching wood
+with the finger-nail.  Rose darted to the side of the room, pressed
+against the wall, and at the same time put her other hand against
+the rim of one of the panels and pushed it laterally; it yielded,
+and at the opening stood Jacintha in her cloak and bonnet.
+
+"Yes," said Jacintha, "under my cloak--look!"
+
+"Ah! you found the things on the steps?"
+
+"Yes! I nearly tumbled over them.  Have you locked that door?"
+
+"No, but I will."  And Rose glided to the door and locked it.  Then
+she put the screen up between Josephine's room and the open panel:
+then she and Jacintha were wonderfully busy on the other side the
+screen, but presently Rose said, "This is imprudent; you must go
+down to the foot of the stairs and wait till I call you."
+
+Jacintha pleaded hard against this arrangement, and represented that
+there was no earthly chance of any one coming to that part of the
+chateau.
+
+"No matter; I will be guarded on every side."
+
+"Mustn't I stop and just see her happy for once?"
+
+"No, my poor Jacintha, you must hear it from my lips."
+
+Jacintha retired to keep watch as she was bid.  Rose went to
+Josephine's room, and threw her arms round her neck and kissed her
+vehemently.  Josephine returned her embrace, then held her out at
+arm's length and looked at her.
+
+"Your eyes are red, yet your little face is full of joy.  There, you
+smile."
+
+"I can't help that; I am so happy."
+
+"I am glad of it.  Are you coming to bed?"
+
+"Not yet.  I invite you to take a little walk with me first.  Come!"
+and she led the way slowly, looking back with infinite archness and
+tenderness.
+
+"You almost frighten me," said Josephine; "it is not like you to be
+all joy when I am sad.  Three whole weeks more!"
+
+"That is it.  Why are you sad? because the doctor would not let you
+go to Frejus.  And why am I not sad? because I had already thought
+of a way to let you see Edouard without going so far."
+
+"Rose! O Rose! O Rose!"
+
+"This way--come!" and she smiled and beckoned with her finger, while
+Josephine followed like one under a spell, her bosom heaving, her
+eye glancing on every side, hoping some strange joy, yet scarce
+daring to hope.
+
+Rose drew back the screen, and there was a sweet little berceau that
+had once been Josephine's own, and in it, sunk deep in snow-white
+lawn, was a sleeping child, that lay there looking as a rose might
+look could it fall upon new-fallen snow.
+
+At sight of it Josephine uttered a little cry, not loud but deep--
+ay, a cry to bring tears into the eye of the hearer, and she stood
+trembling from head to foot, her hands clasped, and her eye
+fascinated and fixed on the cradle.
+
+"My child under this roof!  What have you done?" but her eye,
+fascinated and fixed, never left the cradle.
+
+"I saw you languishing, dying, for want of him."
+
+"Oh, if anybody should come?"  But her eye never stirred an inch
+from the cradle.
+
+"No, no, no! the door is locked.  Jacintha watches below; there is
+no dan--  Ah, oh, poor sister!"
+
+For, as Rose was speaking, the young mother sprang silently upon her
+child.  You would have thought she was going to kill him; her head
+reared itself again and again like a crested snake's, and again and
+again and again and again plunged down upon the child, and she
+kissed his little body from head to foot with soft violence, and
+murmured, through her streaming tears, "My child! my darling! my
+angel! oh, my poor boy! my child! my child!"
+
+I will ask my female readers of every degree to tell their brothers
+and husbands all the young noble did: how she sat on the floor, and
+had her child on her bosom; how she smiled over it through her
+tears; how she purred over it; how she, the stately one, lisped and
+prattled over it; and how life came pouring into her heart from it.
+
+Before she had had it in her arms five minutes, her pale cheek was
+as red as a rose, and her eyes brighter than diamonds.
+
+"Bless you, Rose! bless you! bless you! in one moment you have made
+me forget all I ever suffered in my life."
+
+"There is a cold draught," cried she presently, with maternal
+anxiety; "close the panel, Rose."
+
+"No, dear; or I could not call to Jacintha, or she to me; but I will
+shift the screen round between him and the draught.  There, now,
+come to his aunt--a darling!"
+
+Then Rose sat on the floor too, and Josephine put her boy on aunt's
+lap, and took a distant view of him.  But she could not bear so vast
+a separation long.  She must have him to her bosom again.
+
+Presently my lord, finding himself hugged, opened his eyes, and, as
+a natural consequence, his mouth.
+
+"Oh, that will never do," cried Rose, and they put him back in the
+cradle with all expedition, and began to rock it.  Young master was
+not to be altogether appeased even by that.  So Rose began singing
+an old-fashioned Breton chant or lullaby.
+
+Josephine sang with her, and, singing, watched with a smile her boy
+drop off by degrees to sleep under the gentle motion and the lulling
+song.  They sang and rocked till the lids came creeping down, and
+hid the great blue eyes; but still they sang and rocked, lulling the
+boy, and gladdening their own hearts; for the quaint old Breton
+ditty was tunable as the lark that carols over the green wheat in
+April; and the words so simple and motherly, that a nation had taken
+them to heart.  Such songs bind ages together and make the lofty and
+the low akin by the great ties of music and the heart.  Many a
+Breton peasant's bosom in the olden time had gushed over her
+sleeping boy as the young dame's of Beaurepaire gushed now--in this
+quaint, tuneful lullaby.
+
+Now, as they kneeled over the cradle, one on each side, and rocked
+it, and sang that ancient chant, Josephine, who was opposite the
+screen, happening to raise her eyes, saw a strange thing.
+
+There was the face of a man set close against the side of the
+screen, and peeping and peering out of the gloom.  The light of her
+candle fell full on this face; it glared at her, set pale, wonder-
+struck, and vivid in the surrounding gloom.
+
+Horror!  It was her husband's face.
+
+At first she was quite stupefied, and looked at it with soul and
+senses benumbed.  Then she trembled, and put her hand to her eyes;
+for she thought it a phantom or a delusion of the mind.  No: there
+it glared still.  Then she trembled violently, and held out her left
+hand, the fingers working convulsively, to Rose, who was still
+singing.
+
+But, at the same moment, the mouth of this face suddenly opened in a
+long-drawn breath.  At this, Josephine uttered a violent shriek, and
+sprang to her feet, with her right hand quivering and pointing at
+that pale face set in the dark.
+
+Rose started up, and, wheeling her head round, saw Raynal's gloomy
+face looking over her shoulder.  She fell screaming upon her knees,
+and, almost out of her senses, began to pray wildly and piteously
+for mercy.
+
+Josephine uttered one more cry, but this was the faint cry of
+nature, sinking under the shock of terror.  She swooned dead away,
+and fell senseless on the floor ere Raynal could debarrass himself
+of the screen, and get to her.
+
+This, then, was the scene that met Edouard's eyes.  His affianced
+bride on her knees, white as a ghost, trembling, and screaming,
+rather than crying, for mercy.  And Raynal standing over his wife,
+showing by the working of his iron features that he doubted whether
+she was worthy he should raise her.
+
+One would have thought nothing could add to the terror of this
+scene.  Yet it was added to.  The baroness rang her bell violently
+in the room below.  She had heard Josephine's scream and fall.
+
+At the ringing of this shrill bell Rose shuddered like a maniac, and
+grovelled on her knees to Raynal, and seized his very knees and
+implored him to show some pity.
+
+"O sir! kill us! we are culpable"--
+
+Dring! dring! dring! dring! dring! pealed the baroness's bell again.
+
+"But do not tell our mother.  Oh, if you are a man! do not! do not!
+Show us some pity.  We are but women.  Mercy! mercy! mercy!"
+
+"Speak out then," groaned Raynal.  "What does this mean?  Why has my
+wife swooned at sight of me?--whose is this child?"
+
+"Whose?" stammered Rose.  Till he said that, she never thought there
+COULD be a doubt whose child.
+
+Dring! dring! dring! dring! dring!
+
+"Oh, my God!" cried the poor girl, and her scared eyes glanced every
+way like some wild creature looking for a hole, however small, to
+escape by.
+
+Edouard, seeing her hesitation, came down on her other side.  "Whose
+is the child, Rose?" said he sternly.
+
+"You, too?  Why were we born? mercy! oh! pray let me go to my
+sister."
+
+Dring! dring! dring! dring! dring! went the terrible bell.
+
+The men were excited to fury by Rose's hesitation; they each seized
+an arm, and tore her screaming with fear at their violence, from her
+knees up to her feet between them with a single gesture.
+
+"Whose is the child?"
+
+"You hurt me!" said she bitterly to Edouard, and she left crying and
+was terribly calm and sullen all in a moment.
+
+"Whose is the child?" roared Edouard and Raynal, in one raging
+breath.  "Whose is the child?"
+
+"It is mine."
+
+
+CHAPTER XX.
+
+
+These were not words; they were electric shocks.
+
+The two arms that gripped Rose's arms were paralyzed, and dropped
+off them; and there was silence.
+
+Then first the thought of all she had done with those three words
+began to rise and grow and surge over her.  She stood, her eyes
+turned downwards, yet inwards, and dilating with horror.
+
+Silence.
+
+Now a mist began to spread over her eyes, and in it she saw
+indistinctly the figure of Raynal darting to her sister's side, and
+raising her head.
+
+She dared not look round on the other side.  She heard feet stagger
+on the floor.  She heard a groan, too; but not a word.
+
+Horrible silence.
+
+With nerves strung to frenzy, and quivering ears, that magnified
+every sound, she waited for a reproach, a curse; either would have
+been some little relief.  But no! a silence far more terrible.
+
+Then a step wavered across the room.  Her soul was in her ear.  She
+could hear and feel the step totter, and it shook her as it went.
+All sounds were trebled to her.  Then it struck on the stone step of
+the staircase, not like a step, but a knell; another step, another
+and another; down to the very bottom.  Each slow step made her head
+ring and her heart freeze.
+
+At last she heard no more.  Then a scream of anguish and recall rose
+to her lips.  She fought it down, for Josephine and Raynal.  Edouard
+was gone.  She had but her sister now, the sister she loved better
+than herself; the sister to save whose life and honor she had this
+moment sacrificed her own, and all a woman lives for.
+
+She turned, with a wild cry of love and pity, to that sister's side
+to help her; and when she kneeled down beside her, an iron arm was
+promptly thrust out between the beloved one and her.
+
+"This is my care, madame," said Raynal, coldly.
+
+There was no mistaking his manner.  The stained one was not to touch
+his wife.
+
+She looked at him in piteous amazement at his ingratitude.  "It is
+well," said she.  "It is just.  I deserve this from you."
+
+She said no more, but drooped gently down beside the cradle, and hid
+her forehead in the clothes beside the child that had brought all
+this woe, and sobbed bitterly.
+
+Then honest Raynal began to be sorry for her, in spite of himself.
+But there was no time for this.  Josephine stirred; and, at the same
+moment, a violent knocking came at the door of the apartment, and
+the new servant's voice, crying, "Ladies, for Heaven's sake, what is
+the matter?  The baroness heard a fall--she is getting up--she will
+be here.  What shall I tell her is the matter?"
+
+Raynal was going to answer, but Rose, who had started up at the
+knocking, put her hand in a moment right before his mouth, and ran
+to the door.  "There is nothing the matter; tell mamma I am coming
+down to her directly."  She flew back to Raynal in an excitement
+little short of frenzy.  "Help me carry her into her own room,"
+cried she imperiously.  Raynal obeyed by instinct; for the fiery
+girl spoke like a general, giving the word of command, with the
+enemy in front.  He carried the true culprit in his arms, and laid
+her gently on her bed.
+
+"Now put IT out of sight--take this, quick, man! quick!" cried Rose.
+
+Raynal went to the cradle.  "Ah! my poor girl," said he, as he
+lifted it in his arms, "this is a sorry business; to have to hide
+your own child from your own mother!"
+
+"Colonel Raynal," said Rose, "do not insult a poor, despairing girl.
+C'est lache."
+
+"I am silent, young woman," said Raynal, sternly.  "What is to be
+done?"
+
+"Take it down the steps, and give it to Jacintha.  Stay, here is a
+candle; I go to tell mamma you are come; and, Colonel Raynal, I
+never injured YOU: if you tell my mother you will stab her to the
+heart, and me, and may the curse of cowards light on you!--may"--
+
+"Enough!" said Raynal, sternly.  "Do you take me for a babbling
+girl?  I love your mother better than you do, or this brat of yours
+would not be here.  I shall not bring her gray hairs down with
+sorrow to the grave.  I shall speak of this villany to but one
+person; and to him I shall talk with this, and not with the idle
+tongue."  And he tapped his sword-hilt with a sombre look of
+terrible significance.
+
+He carried out the cradle.  The child slept sweetly through it all.
+
+Rose darted into Josephine's room, took the key from the inside to
+the outside, locked the door, put the key in her pocket, and ran
+down to her mother's room; her knees trembled under her as she went.
+
+Meantime, Jacintha, sleeping tranquilly, suddenly felt her throat
+griped, and heard a loud voice ring in her ear; then she was lifted,
+and wrenched, and dropped.  She found herself lying clear of the
+steps in the moonlight; her head was where her feet had been, and
+her candle out.
+
+She uttered shriek upon shriek, and was too frightened to get up.
+She thought it was supernatural; some old De Beaurepaire had served
+her thus for sleeping on her post.  A struggle took place between
+her fidelity and her superstitious fears.  Fidelity conquered.
+Quaking in every limb, she groped up the staircase for her candle.
+
+It was gone.
+
+Then a still more sickening fear came over her.
+
+What if this was no spirit's work, but a human arm--a strong one--
+some man's arm?
+
+Her first impulse was to dart up the stairs, and make sure that no
+calamity had befallen through her mistimed drowsiness.  But, when
+she came to try, her dread of the supernatural revived.  She could
+not venture without a light up those stairs, thronged perhaps with
+angry spirits.  She ran to the kitchen.  She found the tinderbox,
+and with trembling hands struck a light.  She came back shading it
+with her shaky hands; and, committing her soul to the care of
+Heaven, she crept quaking up the stairs.  Then she heard voices
+above, and that restored her more; she mounted more steadily.
+Presently she stopped, for a heavy step was coming down.  It did not
+sound like a woman's step.  It came further down; she turned to fly.
+
+"Jacintha!" said a deep voice, that in this stone cylinder rang like
+thunder from a tomb.
+
+"Oh! saints and angels save me!" yelled Jacintha; and fell on her
+knees, and hid her head for security; and down went her candlestick
+clattering on the stone.
+
+"Don't be a fool!" said the iron voice.  "Get up and take this."
+
+She raised her head by slow degrees, shuddering.  A man was holding
+out a cradle to her; the candle he carried lighted up his face; it
+was Colonel Raynal.
+
+She stared at him stupidly, but never moved from her knees, and the
+candle began to shake violently in her hand, as she herself trembled
+from head to foot.
+
+Then Raynal concluded she was in the plot; but, scorning to reproach
+a servant, he merely said, "Well, what do you kneel there for,
+gaping at me like that?  Take this, I tell you, and carry it out of
+the house."
+
+He shoved the cradle roughly down into her hands, then turned on his
+heel without a word.
+
+Jacintha collapsed on the stairs, and the cradle beside her, for all
+the power was driven out of her body; she could hardly support her
+own weight, much less the cradle.
+
+She rocked herself, and moaned out, "Oh, what's this? oh, what's
+this?"
+
+A cold perspiration came over her whole frame.
+
+"What could this mean?  What on earth had happened?"
+
+She took up the candle, for it was lying burning and guttering on
+the stairs; scraped up the grease with the snuffers, and by force of
+habit tried to polish it clean with a bit of paper that shook
+between her fingers; she did not know what she was doing.  When she
+recovered her wits, she took the child out of the cradle, and
+wrapped it carefully in her shawl; then went slowly down the stairs;
+and holding him close to her bosom, with a furtive eye, and brain
+confused, and a heart like lead, stole away to the tenantless
+cottage, where Madame Jouvenel awaited her.
+
+Meantime, Rose, with quaking heart, had encountered the baroness.
+She found her pale and agitated, and her first question was, "What
+is the matter? what have you been all doing over my head?"
+
+"Darling mother," replied Rose, evasively, "something has happened
+that will rejoice your heart.  Somebody has come home."
+
+"My son? eh, no! impossible!  We cannot be so happy."
+
+"He will be with you directly."
+
+The old lady now trembled with joyful agitation.
+
+"In five minutes I will bring him to you.  Shall you be dressed?  I
+will ring for the girl to help you."
+
+"But, Rose, the scream, and that terrible fall.  Ah! where is
+Josephine?"
+
+"Can't you guess, mamma?  Oh, the fall was only the screen; they
+stumbled over it in the dark."
+
+"They! who?"
+
+"Colonel Raynal, and--and Edouard.  I will tell you, mamma, but
+don't be angry, or even mention it; they wanted to surprise us.
+They saw a light burning, and they crept on tiptoe up to the
+tapestried room, where Josephine and I were, and they did give us a
+great fright."
+
+"What madness!" cried the baroness, angrily; "and in Josephine's
+weak state!  Such a surprise might have driven her into a fit."
+
+"Yes, it was foolish, but let it pass, mamma.  Don't speak of it,
+for he is so sorry about it."
+
+Then Rose slipped out, ordered a fire in the salon, and not in the
+tapestried room, and the next minute was at her sister's door.
+There she found Raynal knocking, and asking Josephine how she was.
+
+"Pray leave her to me a moment," said she.  "I will bring her down to
+you.  Mamma is waiting for you in the salon."
+
+Raynal went down.  Rose unlocked the bedroom-door, went in, and, to
+her horror, found Josephine lying on the floor.  She dashed water in
+her face, and applied every remedy; and at last she came back to
+life, and its terrors.
+
+"Save me, Rose! save me--he is coming to kill me--I heard him at the
+door," and she clung trembling piteously to Rose.
+
+Then Rose, seeing her terror, was almost glad at the suicidal
+falsehood she had told.  She comforted and encouraged Josephine and--
+deceived her.  (This was the climax.)
+
+"All is well, my poor coward," she cried; "your fears are all
+imaginary; another has owned the child, and the story is believed."
+
+"Another! impossible!  He would not believe it."
+
+"He does believe it--he shall believe it."
+
+Rose then, feeling by no means sure that Josephine, terrified as she
+was, would consent to let her sister come to shame to screen her,
+told her boldly that Jacintha had owned herself the mother of the
+child, and that Raynal's only feeling towards HER was pity, and
+regret at having so foolishly frightened her, weakened as she was by
+illness.  "I told him you had been ill, dear.  But how came you on
+the ground?"
+
+"I had come to myself; I was on my knees praying.  He tapped.  I
+heard his voice.  I remember no more.  I must have fainted again
+directly."
+
+Rose had hard work to make her believe that her guilt, as she called
+it, was not known; and even then she could not prevail on her to
+come down-stairs, until she said, "If you don't, he will come to
+you."  On that Josephine consented eagerly, and with trembling
+fingers began to adjust her hair and her dress for the interview.
+
+All this terrible night Rose fought for her sister.  She took her
+down-stairs to the salon; she put her on the sofa; she sat by her
+and pressed her hand constantly to give her courage.  She told the
+story of the surprise her own way, before the whole party, including
+the doctor, to prevent Raynal from being called on to tell it his
+way.  She laughed at Josephine's absurdity, but excused it on
+account of her feeble health.  In short, she threw more and more
+dust in all their eyes.
+
+But by the time when the rising sun came faintly in and lighted the
+haggard party, where the deceived were happy, the deceivers
+wretched, the supernatural strength this young girl had shown was
+almost exhausted.  She felt an hysterical impulse to scream and
+weep: each minute it became more and more ungovernable.  Then came
+an unexpected turn.  Raynal after a long and tiring talk with his
+mother, as he called her, looked at his watch, and in a
+characteristic way coolly announced his immediate departure, this
+being the first hint he had given them that he was not come back for
+good.
+
+The baroness was thunderstruck.
+
+Rose and Josephine pressed one another's hands, and had much ado not
+to utter a loud cry of joy.
+
+Raynal explained that he was the bearer of despatches.  "I must be
+off: not an hour to lose.  Don't fret, mother, I shall soon be back
+again, if I am not knocked on the head."
+
+Raynal took leave of them all.  When it came to Rose's turn, he drew
+her aside and whispered into her ear, "Who is the man?"
+
+She started, and seemed dumfounded.
+
+"Tell me, or I ask my wife."
+
+"She has promised me not to betray me: I made her swear.  Spare me
+now, brother; I will tell you all when you come back."
+
+"That is a bargain: now hear ME swear: he shall marry you, or he
+shall die by my hand."
+
+He confirmed this by a tremendous oath.
+
+Rose shuddered, but said nothing, only she thought to herself, "I am
+forewarned.  Never shall you know who is the father of that child."
+
+He was no sooner gone than the baroness insisted on knowing what
+this private communication between him and Rose was about.
+
+"Oh," said Rose, "he was only telling me to keep up your courage and
+Josephine's till he comes back."
+
+This was the last lie the poor entangled wretch had to tell that
+morning.  The next minute the sisters, exhausted by their terrible
+struggle, went feebly, with downcast eyes, along the corridor and up
+the staircase to Josephine's room.
+
+They went hand in hand.  They sank down, dressed as they were, on
+Josephine's bed, and clung to one another and trembled together,
+till their exhausted natures sank into uneasy slumbers, from which
+each in turn would wake ever and anon with a convulsive start, and
+clasp her sister tighter to her breast.
+
+Theirs was a marvellous love.  Even a course of deceit had not yet
+prevailed to separate or chill their sister bosoms.  But still in
+this deep and wonderful love there were degrees: one went a shade
+deeper than the other now--ay, since last night.  Which? why, she
+who had sacrificed herself for the other, and dared not tell her,
+lest the sacrifice should be refused.
+
+
+It was the gray of the morning, and foggy, when Raynal, after taking
+leave, went to the stable for his horse.  At the stable-door he came
+upon a man sitting doubled up on the very stones of the yard, with
+his head on his knees.  The figure lifted his head, and showed him
+the face of Edouard Riviere, white and ghastly: his hair lank with
+the mist, his teeth chattering with cold and misery.  The poor
+wretch had walked frantically all night round and round the chateau,
+waiting till Raynal should come out.  He told him so.
+
+"But why didn't you?--Ah! I see.  No! you could not go into the
+house after that.  My poor fellow, there is but one thing for you to
+do.  Turn your back on her, and forget she ever lived; she is dead
+to you."
+
+"There is something to be done besides that," said Edouard, gloomily.
+
+"What?"
+
+"Vengeance."
+
+"That is my affair, young man.  When I come back from the Rhine, she
+will tell me who her seducer is.  She has promised."
+
+"And don't you see through that?" said Edouard, gnashing his teeth;
+"that is only to gain time: she will never tell you.  She is young
+in years, but old in treachery."
+
+He groaned and was silent a moment, then laying his hand on Raynal's
+arm said grimly, "Thank Heaven, we don't depend on her for
+information!  I know the villain."
+
+Raynal's eyes flashed: "Ah! then tell me this moment."
+
+"It is that scoundrel Dujardin."
+
+"Dujardin!  What do you mean?"
+
+"I mean that, while you were fighting for France, your house was
+turned into a hospital for wounded soldiers."
+
+"And pray, sir, to what more honorable use could they put it?"
+
+"Well, this Dujardin was housed by you, was nursed by your wife and
+all the family; and in return has seduced your sister, my affianced."
+
+"I can hardly believe that.  Camille Dujardin was always a man of
+honor, and a good soldier."
+
+"Colonel, there has been no man near the place but this Dujardin.  I
+tell you it is he.  Don't make me tear my bleeding heart out: must I
+tell you how often I caught them together, how I suspected, and how
+she gulled me? blind fool that I was, to believe a woman's words
+before my own eyes.  I swear to you he is the villain; the only
+question is, which of us two is to kill him."
+
+"Where is the man?"
+
+"In the army of the Rhine."
+
+"Ah! all the better."
+
+"Covered with glory and honor.  Curse him! oh, curse him! curse
+him!"
+
+"I am in luck.  I am going to the Rhine."
+
+"I know it.  That is why I waited here all through this night of
+misery.  Yes, you are in luck.  But you will send me a line when you
+have killed him; will you not?  Then I shall know joy again.  Should
+he escape you, he shall not escape me."
+
+"Young man," said Raynal, with dignity, "this rage is unmanly.
+Besides, we have not heard his side of the story.  He is a good
+soldier; perhaps he is not all to blame: or perhaps passion has
+betrayed him into a sin that his conscience and honor disapprove: if
+so, he must not die.  You think only of your wrong: it is natural:
+but I am the girl's brother; guardian of her honor and my own.  His
+life is precious as gold.  I shall make him marry her."
+
+"What! reward him for his villany?" cried Edouard, frantically.
+
+"A mighty reward," replied Raynal, with a sneer.
+
+"You leave one thing out of the calculation, monsieur," said
+Edouard, trembling with anger, "that I will kill your brother-in-law
+at the altar, before her eyes."
+
+"YOU leave one thing out of the calculation: that you will first
+have to cross swords, at the altar, with me."
+
+"So be it.  I will not draw on my old commandant.  I could not; but
+be sure I will catch him and her alone some day, and the bride shall
+be a widow in her honeymoon."
+
+"As you please," said Raynal, coolly.  "That is all fair, as you
+have been wronged.  I shall make her an honest wife, and then you
+may make her an honest widow.  (This is what they call LOVE, and
+sneer at me for keeping clear of it.)  But neither he nor you shall
+keep MY SISTER what she is now, a ----," and he used a word out of
+camp.
+
+Edouard winced and groaned.  "Oh! don't call her by such a name.
+There is some mystery.  She loved me once.  There must have been
+some strange seduction."
+
+"Now you deceive yourself," said Raynal.  "I never saw a girl that
+could take her own part better than she can; she is not like her
+sister at all in character.  Not that I excuse him; it was a
+dishonorable act, an ungrateful act to my wife and my mother."
+
+"And to you."
+
+"Now listen to me: in four days I shall stand before him.  I shall
+not go into a pet like you; I am in earnest.  I shall just say to
+him, 'Dujardin, I know all!'  Then if he is guilty his face will
+show it directly.  Then I shall say, 'Comrade, you must marry her
+whom you have dishonored.'"
+
+"He will not.  He is a libertine, a rascal."
+
+"You are speaking of a man you don't know.  He WILL marry her and
+repair the wrong he has done."
+
+"Suppose he refuses?"
+
+"Why should he refuse?  The girl is not ugly nor old, and if she has
+done a folly, he was her partner in it."
+
+"But SUPPOSE he refuses?"
+
+Raynal ground his teeth.  "Refuse?  If he does, I'll run my sword
+through his carcass then and there, and the hussy shall go into a
+convent."
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI.
+
+
+The French army lay before a fortified place near the Rhine, which
+we will call Philipsburg.
+
+This army knew Bonaparte by report only; it was commanded by
+generals of the old school.
+
+Philipsburg was defended on three sides by the nature of the ground;
+but on the side that faced the French line of march there was only a
+zigzag wall, pierced, and a low tower or two at each of the salient
+angles.
+
+There were evidences of a tardy attempt to improve the defences.  In
+particular there was a large round bastion, about three times the
+height of the wall; but the masonry was new, and the very embrasures
+were not yet cut.
+
+Young blood was for assaulting these equivocal fortifications at the
+end of the day's march that brought the French advanced guard in
+sight of the place; but the old generals would not hear of it; the
+soldiers' lives must not be flung away assaulting a place that could
+be reduced in twenty-one days with mathematical certainty.  For at
+this epoch a siege was looked on as a process with a certain result,
+the only problem was in how many days would the place be taken; and
+even this they used to settle to a day or two on paper by
+arithmetic; so many feet of wall, and so many guns on the one side;
+so many guns, so many men, and such and such a soil to cut the
+trenches in on the other: result, two figures varying from fourteen
+to forty.  These two figures represented the duration of the siege.
+
+For all that, siege arithmetic, right in general, has often been
+terribly disturbed by one little incident, that occurs from time to
+time; viz., Genius INside.  And, indeed, this is one of the sins of
+genius; it goes and puts out calculations that have stood the brunt
+of years.  Archimedes and Todleben were, no doubt, clever men in
+their way and good citizens, yet one characteristic of delicate
+men's minds they lacked--veneration; they showed a sad disrespect
+for the wisdom of the ancients, deranged the calculations which so
+much learning and patient thought had hallowed, disturbed the minds
+of white-haired veterans, took sieges out of the grasp of science,
+and plunged them back into the field of wild conjecture.
+
+Our generals then sat down at fourteen hundred yards' distance, and
+planned the trenches artistically, and directed them to be cut at
+artful angles, and so creep nearer and nearer the devoted town.
+Then the Prussians, whose hearts had been in their shoes at first
+sight of the French shakos, plucked up, and turned not the garrison
+only but the population of the town into engineers and masons.
+Their fortifications grew almost as fast as the French trenches.
+
+The first day of the siege, a young but distinguished brigadier in
+the French army rode to the quarters of General Raimbaut, who
+commanded his division, and was his personal friend, and
+respectfully but firmly entreated the general to represent to the
+commander-in-chief the propriety of assaulting that new bastion
+before it should become dangerous.  "My brigade shall carry it in
+fifteen minutes, general," said he.
+
+"What! cross all that open under fire?  One-half your brigade would
+never reach the bastion."
+
+"But the other half would take it."
+
+"That is not so certain."
+
+General Raimbaut refused to forward the young colonel's proposal to
+headquarters.  "I will not subject you to TWO refusals in one
+matter," said he, kindly.
+
+The young colonel lingered.  He said, respectfully, "One question,
+general, when that bastion cuts its teeth will it be any easier to
+take than now?"
+
+"Certainly; it will always be easier to take it from the sap than to
+cross the open under fire to it, and take it.  Come, colonel, to
+your trenches; and if your friend should cut its teeth, you shall
+have a battery in your attack that will set its teeth on edge.  Ha!
+ha!"
+
+The young colonel did not echo his chief's humor; he saluted
+gravely, and returned to the trenches.
+
+The next morning three fresh tiers of embrasures grinned one above
+another at the besiegers.  The besieged had been up all night, and
+not idle.  In half these apertures black muzzles showed themselves.
+
+The bastion had cut its front teeth.
+
+Thirteenth day of the siege.
+
+The trenches were within four hundred yards of the enemy's guns, and
+it was hot work in them.  The enemy had three tiers of guns in the
+round bastion, and on the top they had got a long 48-pounder, which
+they worked with a swivel joint, or the like, and threw a great
+roaring shot into any part of the French lines.
+
+As to the commander-in-chief and his generals, they were dotted
+about a long way in the rear, and no shot came as far as them; but
+in the trenches the men began now to fall fast, especially on the
+left attack, which faced the round bastion.  Our young colonel had
+got his heavy battery, and every now and then he would divert the
+general efforts of the bastion, and compel it to concentrate its
+attention on him, by pounding away at it till it was all in sore
+places.  But he meant it worse mischief than that.  Still, as
+heretofore, regarding it as the key to Philipsburg, he had got a
+large force of engineers at work driving a mine towards it, and to
+this he trusted more than to breaching it; for the bigger holes he
+made in it by day were all stopped at night by the townspeople.
+
+This colonel was not a favorite in the division to which his brigade
+belonged.  He was a good soldier, but a dull companion.  He was also
+accused of hauteur and of an unsoldierly reserve with his brother
+officers.
+
+Some loose-tongued ones even called him a milk-sop, because he was
+constantly seen conversing with the priest--he who had nothing to
+say to an honest soldier.
+
+Others said, "No, hang it, he is not a milk-sop: he is a tried
+soldier: he is a sulky beggar all the same."  Those under his
+immediate command were divided in opinion about him.  There was
+something about him they could not understand.  Why was his sallow
+face so stern, so sad? and why with all that was his voice so
+gentle? somehow the few words that did fall from his mouth were
+prized.  One old soldier used to say, "I would rather have a word
+from our brigadier than from the commander-in-chief."  Others
+thought he must at some part of his career have pillaged a church,
+taken the altar-piece, and sold it to a picture-dealer in Paris, or
+whipped the earrings out of the Madonna's ears, or admitted the
+female enemy to quarter upon ungenerous conditions: this, or some
+such crime to which we poor soldiers are liable: and now was
+committing the mistake of remording himself about it.  "Always
+alongside the chaplain, you see!"
+
+This cold and silent man had won the heart of the most talkative
+sergeant in the French army.  Sergeant La Croix protested with many
+oaths that all the best generals of the day had commanded him in
+turn, and that his present colonel was the first that had succeeded
+in inspiring him with unlimited confidence.  "He knows every point
+of war--this one," said La Croix, "I heard him beg and pray for
+leave to storm this thundering bastion before it was armed: but no,
+the old muffs would be wiser than our colonel.  So now here we are
+kept at bay by a place that Julius Caesar and Cannibal wouldn't have
+made two bites at apiece; no more would I if I was the old boy out
+there behind the hill."  In such terms do sergeants denote
+commanders-in-chief--at a distance.  A voluble sergeant has more
+influence with the men than the minister of war is perhaps aware: on
+the whole, the 24th brigade would have followed its gloomy colonel
+to grim death and a foot farther.  One thing gave these men a touch
+of superstitious reverence for their commander.  He seemed to them
+free from physical weakness.  He never SAT DOWN to dinner, and
+seemed never to sleep.  At no hour of the day or night were the
+sentries safe from his visits.
+
+Very annoying.  But, after awhile, it led to keen watchfulness: the
+more so that the sad and gloomy colonel showed by his manner he
+appreciated it.  Indeed, one night he even opened his marble jaws,
+and told Sergeant La Croix that a watchful sentry was an important
+soldier, not to his brigade only, but to the whole army.  Judge
+whether the maxim and the implied encomium did not circulate next
+morning, with additions.
+
+Sixteenth day of the siege.  The round bastion opened fire at eight
+o'clock, not on the opposing battery, but on the right of the French
+attack.  Its advanced position enabled a portion of its guns to rake
+these trenches slant-wise: and depressing its guns it made the round
+shot strike the ground first and ricochet over.
+
+On this our colonel opened on them with all his guns: one of these
+he served himself.  Among his other warlike accomplishments, he was
+a wonderful shot with a cannon.  He showed them capital practice
+this morning: drove two embrasures into one, and knocked about a ton
+of masonry off the parapet.  Then taking advantage of this, he
+served two of his guns with grape, and swept the enemy off the top
+of the bastion, and kept it clear.  He made it so hot they could not
+work the upper guns.  Then they turned the other two tiers all upon
+him, and at it both sides went ding, dong, till the guns were too
+hot to be worked.  So then Sergeant La Croix popped his head up from
+the battery, and showed the enemy a great white plate.  This was
+meant to convey to them an invitation to dine with the French army:
+the other side of the table of course.
+
+To the credit of Prussian intelligence be it recorded, that this
+pantomimic hint was at once taken and both sides went to dinner.
+
+The fighting colonel, however, remained in the battery, and kept a
+detachment of his gunners employed cooling the guns and repairing
+the touch-holes.  He ordered his two cutlets and his glass of water
+into the battery.
+
+Meantime, the enemy fired a single gun at long intervals, as much as
+to say, "We had the last word."
+
+Let trenches be cut ever so artfully, there will be a little space
+exposed here and there at the angles.  These spaces the men are
+ordered to avoid, or whip quickly across them into cover.
+
+Now the enemy had just got the range of one of these places with
+their solitary gun, and had already dropped a couple of shot right
+on to it.  A camp follower with a tray, two cutlets, and a glass of
+water, came to this open space just as a puff of white smoke burst
+from the bastion.  Instead of instantly seeking shelter till the
+shot had struck, he, in his inexperience, thought the shot must have
+struck, and all danger be over.  He stayed there mooning instead of
+pelting under cover: the shot (eighteen-pound) struck him right on
+the breast, knocked him into spilikins, and sent the mutton cutlets
+flying.
+
+The human fragments lay quiet, ten yards off.  But a soldier that
+was eating his dinner kicked it over, and jumped up at the side of
+"Death's Alley" (as it was christened next minute), and danced and
+yelled with pain.
+
+"Haw! haw! haw!" roared a soldier from the other side of the alley.
+
+"What is that?" cried Sergeant La Croix.  "What do you laugh at,
+Private Cadel?" said he sternly, for, though he was too far in the
+trench to see, he had heard that horrible sound a soldier knows from
+every other, the "thud" of a round shot striking man or horse.
+
+"Sergeant," said Cadel, respectfully, "I laugh to see Private Dard,
+that got the wind of the shot, dance and sing, when the man that got
+the shot itself does not say a word."
+
+"The wind of the shot, you rascal!" roared Private Dard: "look
+here!" and he showed the blood running down his face.
+
+The shot had actually driven a splinter of bone out of the sutler
+into Dard's temple.
+
+"I am the unluckiest fellow in the army," remonstrated Dard: and he
+stamped in a circle.
+
+"Seems to me you are only the second unluckiest this time," said a
+young soldier with his mouth full; and, with a certain dry humor, he
+pointed vaguely over his shoulder with the fork towards the corpse.
+
+The trenches laughed and assented.
+
+This want of sympathy and justice irritated Dard.  "You cursed
+fools!" cried he.  "He is gone where we must all go--without any
+trouble.  But look at me.  I am always getting barked.  Dogs of
+Prussians! they pick me out among a thousand.  I shall have a
+headache all the afternoon, you see else."
+
+Some of our heads would never have ached again: but Dard had a good
+thick skull.
+
+Dard pulled out his spilikin savagely.
+
+"I'll wrap it up in paper for Jacintha," said he.  "Then that will
+learn her what a poor soldier has to go through."
+
+Even this consolation was denied Private Dard.
+
+Corporal Coriolanus Gand, a bit of an infidel from Lyons, who
+sometimes amused himself with the Breton's superstition, told him
+with a grave face, that the splinter belonged not to him, but to the
+sutler, and, though so small, was doubtless a necessary part of his
+frame.
+
+"If you keep that, it will be a bone of contention between you two,"
+said he; "especially at midnight.  HE WILL BE ALWAYS COMING BACK TO
+YOU FOR IT."
+
+"There, take it away!" said the Breton hastily, "and bury it with
+the poor fellow."
+
+Sergeant La Croix presented himself before the colonel with a rueful
+face and saluted him and said, "Colonel, I beg a thousand pardons;
+your dinner has been spilt--a shot from the bastion."
+
+"No matter," said the colonel.  "Give me a piece of bread instead."
+
+La Croix went for it himself, and on his return found Cadel sitting
+on one side of Death's Alley, and Dard with his head bound up on the
+other.  They had got a bottle which each put up in turn wherever he
+fancied the next round shot would strike, and they were betting
+their afternoon rations which would get the Prussians to hit the
+bottle first.
+
+La Croix pulled both their ears playfully.
+
+"Time is up for playing marbles," said he.  "Be off, and play at
+duty," and he bundled them into the battery.
+
+
+It was an hour past midnight: a cloudy night.  The moon was up, but
+seen only by fitful gleams.  A calm, peaceful silence reigned.
+
+Dard was sentinel in the battery.
+
+An officer going his rounds found the said sentinel flat instead of
+vertical.  He stirred him with his scabbard, and up jumped Dard.
+
+"It's all right, sergeant.  O Lord! it's the colonel.  I wasn't
+asleep, colonel."
+
+"I have not accused you.  But you will explain what you were doing."
+
+"Colonel," said Dard, all in a flutter, "I was taking a squint at
+them, because I saw something.  The beggars are building a wall,
+now."
+
+"Where?"
+
+"Between us and the bastion."
+
+"Show me."
+
+"I can't, colonel; the moon has gone in; but I did see it."
+
+"How long was it?"
+
+"About a hundred yards."
+
+"How high?"
+
+"Colonel, it was ten feet high if it was an inch."
+
+"Have you good sight?"
+
+"La! colonel, wasn't I a bit of a poacher before I took to the
+bayonet?"
+
+"Good!  Now reflect.  If you persist in this statement, I turn out
+the brigade on your information."
+
+"I'll stand the fire of a corporal's guard at break of day if I make
+a mistake now," said Dard.
+
+The colonel glided away, called his captain and first lieutenants,
+and said two words in each ear, that made them spring off their
+backs.
+
+Dard, marching to an fro, musket on shoulder, found himself suddenly
+surrounded by grim, silent, but deadly eager soldiers, that came
+pouring like bees into the open space behind the battery.  The
+officers came round the colonel.
+
+"Attend to two things," said he to the captains.  "Don't fire till
+they are within ten yards: and don't follow them unless I lead you."
+
+The men were then told off by companies, some to the battery, some
+to the trenches, some were kept on each side Death's Alley, ready
+for a rush.
+
+They were not all of them in position, when those behind the parapet
+saw, as it were, something deepen the gloom of night, some fourscore
+yards to the front: it was like a line of black ink suddenly drawn
+upon a sheet covered with Indian ink.
+
+It seems quite stationary.  The novices wondered what it was.  The
+veterans muttered--"Three deep."
+
+Though it looked stationary, it got blacker and blacker.  The
+soldiers of the 24th brigade griped their muskets hard, and set
+their teeth, and the sergeants had much ado to keep them quiet.
+
+All of a sudden, a loud yell on the right of the brigade, two or
+three single shots from the trenches in that direction, followed by
+a volley, the cries of wounded men, and the fierce hurrahs of an
+attacking party.
+
+Our colonel knew too well those sounds: the next parallel had been
+surprised, and the Prussian bayonet was now silently at work.
+
+Disguise was now impossible.  At the first shot, a guttural voice in
+front of Dujardin's men was heard to give a word of command.  There
+was a sharp rattle and in a moment the thick black line was tipped
+with glittering steel.
+
+A roar and a rush, and the Prussian line three deep came furiously
+like a huge steel-pointed wave, at the French lines.  A tremendous
+wave of fire rushed out to meet that wave of steel: a crash of two
+hundred muskets, and all was still.  Then you could see through the
+black steel-tipped line in a hundred frightful gaps, and the ground
+sparkled with bayonets and the air rang with the cries of the
+wounded.
+
+A tremendous cheer from the brigade, and the colonel charged at the
+head of his column, out by Death's Alley.
+
+The broken wall was melting away into the night.  The colonel
+wheeled his men to the right: one company, led by the impetuous
+young Captain Jullien, followed the flying enemy.
+
+The other attack had been only too successful.  They shot the
+sentries, and bayoneted many of the soldiers in their tents: others
+escaped by running to the rear, and some into the next parallel.
+
+Several, half dressed, snatched up their muskets, killed one
+Prussian, and fell riddled like sieves.
+
+A gallant officer got a company together into the place of arms and
+formed in line.
+
+Half the Prussian force went at them, the rest swept the trenches:
+the French company delivered a deadly volley, and the next moment
+clash the two forces crossed bayonets, and a silent deadly stabbing
+match was played: the final result of which was inevitable.  The
+Prussians were five to one.  The gallant officer and the poor
+fellows who did their duty so stoutly, had no thought left but to
+die hard, when suddenly a roaring cheer seemed to come from the rear
+rank of the enemy.  "France! France!"  Half the 24th brigade came
+leaping and swarming over the trenches in the Prussian rear.  The
+Prussians wavered.  "France!" cried the little party that were being
+overpowered, and charged in their turn with such fury that in two
+seconds the two French corps went through the enemy's centre like
+paper, and their very bayonets clashed together in more than one
+Prussian body.
+
+Broken thus in two fragments the Prussian corps ceased to exist as a
+military force.  The men fled each his own way back to the fort, and
+many flung away their muskets, for French soldiers were swarming in
+from all quarters.  At this moment, bang! bang! bang! from the
+bastion.
+
+"They are firing on my brigade," said our colonel.  "Who has led his
+company there against my orders?  Captain Neville, into the battery,
+and fire twenty rounds at the bastion!  Aim at the flashes from
+their middle tier."
+
+"Yes, colonel."
+
+The battery opened with all its guns on the bastion.  The right
+attack followed suit.  The town answered, and a furious cannonade
+roared and blazed all down both lines till daybreak.  Hell seemed
+broken loose.
+
+Captain Jullien had followed the flying foe: but could not come up
+with them: and, as the enemy had prepared for every contingency, the
+fatal bastion, after first throwing a rocket or two to discover
+their position, poured showers of grape into them, killed many, and
+would have killed more but that Captain Neville and his gunners
+happened by mere accident to dismount one gun and to kill a couple
+of gunners at the others.  This gave the remains of the company time
+to disperse and run back.  When the men were mustered, Captain
+Jullien and twenty-five of his company did not answer to their
+names.  At daybreak they were visible from the trenches lying all by
+themselves within eighty yards of the bastion.
+
+A flag of truce came from the fort: the dead were removed on both
+sides and buried.  Some Prussian officers strolled into the French
+lines.  Civilities and cigars exchanged: "Bon jour," "Gooten daeg:"
+then at it again, ding dong all down the line blazing and roaring.
+
+At twelve o'clock the besieged had got a man on horseback, on top of
+a hill, with colored flags in his hand, making signals.
+
+"What are you up to now?" inquired Dard.
+
+"You will see," said La Croix, affecting mystery; he knew no more
+than the other.
+
+Presently off went Long Tom on the top of the bastion, and the shot
+came roaring over the heads of the speakers.
+
+The flags were changed, and off went Long Tom again at an elevation.
+
+Ten seconds had scarcely elapsed when a tremendous explosion took
+place on the French right.  Long Tom was throwing red-hot shot; one
+had fallen on a powder wagon, and blown it to pieces, and killed two
+poor fellows and a horse, and turned an artillery man at some
+distance into a seeming nigger, but did him no great harm; only took
+him three days to get the powder out of his clothes with pipe clay,
+and off his face with raw potato-peel.
+
+When the tumbril exploded, the Prussians could be heard to cheer,
+and they turned to and fired every iron spout they owned.  Long Tom
+worked all day.
+
+They got into a corner where the guns of the battery could not hit
+them or him, and there was his long muzzle looking towards the sky,
+and sending half a hundredweight of iron up into the clouds, and
+plunging down a mile off into the French lines.
+
+And, at every shot, the man on horseback made signals to let the
+gunners know where the shot fell.
+
+At last, about four in the afternoon, they threw a forty-eight-pound
+shot slap into the commander-in-chief's tent, a mile and a half
+behind trenches.
+
+Down comes a glittering aide-de-camp as hard as he can gallop.
+
+"Colonel Dujardin, what are you about, sir?  YOUR BASTION has thrown
+a round shot into the commander-in-chief's tent."
+
+The colonel did not appear so staggered as the aide-de-camp
+expected.
+
+"Ah, indeed!" said he quietly.  "I observed they were trying
+distances."
+
+"Must not happen again, colonel.  You must drive them from the gun."
+
+"How?"
+
+"Why, where is the difficulty?"
+
+"If you will do me the honor to step into the battery, I will show
+you," said the colonel.
+
+"If you please," said the aide-de-camp stiffly.
+
+Colonel Dujardin took him to the parapet, and began, in a calm,
+painstaking way, to show him how and why none of his guns could be
+brought to bear upon Long Tom.
+
+In the middle of the explanation a melodious sound was heard in the
+air above them, like a swarm of Brobdingnag bees.
+
+"What is that?" inquired the aide-de-camp.
+
+"What?  I see nothing."
+
+"That humming noise."
+
+"Oh, that?  Prussian bullets.  Ah, by-the-by, it is a compliment to
+your uniform, monsieur; they take you for some one of importance.
+Well, as I was observing"--
+
+"Your explanation is sufficient, colonel; let us get out of this.
+Ha, ha! you are a cool hand, colonel, I must say.  But your battery
+is a warm place enough: I shall report it so at headquarters."
+
+The grim colonel relaxed.
+
+"Captain," said he politely, "you shall not have ridden to my post
+in vain.  Will you lend me your horse for ten minutes?"
+
+"Certainly; and I will inspect your trenches meantime."
+
+"Do so; oblige me by avoiding that angle; it is exposed, and the
+enemy have got the range to an inch."
+
+Colonel Dujardin slipped into his quarters; off with his half-dress
+jacket and his dirty boots, and presently out he came full fig,
+glittering brighter than the other, with one French and two foreign
+orders shining on his breast, mounted the aide-de-camp's horse, and
+away full pelt.
+
+Admitted, after some delay, into the generalissimo's tent, Dujardin
+found the old gentleman surrounded by his staff and wroth: nor was
+the danger to which he had been exposed his sole cause of ire.
+
+The shot had burst through his canvas, struck a table on which was a
+large inkstand, and had squirted the whole contents over the
+despatches he was writing for Paris.
+
+Now this old gentleman prided himself upon the neatness of his
+despatches: a blot on his paper darkened his soul.
+
+Colonel Dujardin expressed his profound regret.  The commander,
+however, continued to remonstrate.  "I have a great deal of writing
+to do," said he, "as you must be aware; and, when I am writing, I
+expect to be quiet."
+
+Colonel Dujardin assented respectfully to the justice of this.  He
+then explained at full length why he could not bring a gun in the
+battery to silence "Long Tom," and quietly asked to be permitted to
+run a gun out of the trenches, and take a shot at the offender.
+
+"It is a point-blank distance, and I have a new gun, with which a
+man ought to be able to hit his own ball at three hundred yards."
+
+The commander hesitated.
+
+"I cannot have the men exposed."
+
+"I engage not to lose a man--except him who fires the gun.  HE must
+take his chance."
+
+"Well, colonel, it must be done by volunteers.  The men must not be
+ORDERED out on such a service as that."
+
+Colonel Dujardin bowed, and retired.
+
+
+"Volunteers to go out of the trenches!" cried Sergeant La Croix, in
+a stentorian voice, standing erect as a poker, and swelling with
+importance.
+
+There were fifty offers in less than as many seconds.
+
+"Only twelve allowed to go," said the sergeant; "and I am one,"
+added he, adroitly inserting himself.
+
+A gun was taken down, placed on a carriage, and posted near Death's
+Alley, but out of the line of fire.
+
+The colonel himself superintended the loading of this gun; and to
+the surprise of the men had the shot weighed first, and then weighed
+out the powder himself.
+
+He then waited quietly a long time till the bastion pitched one of
+its periodical shots into Death's Alley, but no sooner had the shot
+struck, and sent the sand flying past the two lanes of curious
+noses, than Colonel Dujardin jumped upon the gun and waved his
+cocked hat.  At this preconcerted signal, his battery opened fire on
+the bastion, and the battery to his right opened on the wall that
+fronted them; and the colonel gave the word to run the gun out of
+the trenches.  They ran it out into the cloud of smoke their own
+guns were belching forth, unseen by the enemy; but they had no
+sooner twisted it into the line of Long Tom, than the smoke was
+gone, and there they were, a fair mark.
+
+"Back into the trenches, all but one!" roared Dujardin.
+
+And in they ran like rabbits.
+
+"Quick! the elevation."
+
+Colonel Dujardin and La Croix raised the muzzle to the mark--hoo,
+hoo, hoo! ping, ping, ping! came the bullets about their ears.
+
+"Away with you!" cried the colonel, taking the linstock from him.
+
+Then Colonel Dujardin, fifteen yards from the trenches, in full
+blazing uniform, showed two armies what one intrepid soldier can do.
+He kneeled down and adjusted his gun, just as he would have done in
+a practising ground.  He had a pot shot to take, and a pot shot he
+would take.  He ignored three hundred muskets that were levelled at
+him.  He looked along his gun, adjusted it, and re-adjusted it to a
+hair's breadth.  The enemy's bullets pattered upon it: still he
+adjusted it delicately.  His men were groaning and tearing their
+hair inside at his danger.
+
+At last it was levelled to his mind, and then his movements were as
+quick as they had hitherto been slow.  In a moment he stood erect in
+the half-fencing attitude of a gunner, and his linstock at the
+touch-hole: a huge tongue of flame, a volume of smoke, a roar, and
+the iron thunderbolt was on its way, and the colonel walked
+haughtily but rapidly back to the trenches; for in all this no
+bravado.  He was there to make a shot; not to throw a chance of life
+away watching the effect.
+
+Ten thousand eyes did that for him.
+
+Both French and Prussians risked their own lives craning out to see
+what a colonel in full uniform was doing under fire from a whole
+line of forts, and what would be his fate; but when he fired the gun
+their curiosity left the man and followed the iron thunderbolt.
+
+For two seconds all was uncertain; the ball was travelling.
+
+Tom gave a rear like a wild horse, his protruding muzzle went up
+sky-high, then was seen no more, and a ring of old iron and a
+clatter of fragments was heard on the top of the bastion.  Long Tom
+was dismounted.  Oh! the roar of laughter and triumph from one end
+to another of the trenches; and the clapping of forty thousand hands
+that went on for full five minutes; then the Prussians, either
+through a burst of generous praise for an act so chivalrous and so
+brilliant, or because they would not be crowed over, clapped their
+tea thousand hands as loudly, and thus thundering, heart-thrilling
+salvo of applause answered salvo on both sides that terrible arena.
+
+That evening came a courteous and flattering message from the
+commander-in-chief to Colonel Dujardin; and several officers visited
+his quarters to look at him; they went back disappointed.  The cry
+was, "What a miserable, melancholy dog!  I expected to see a fine,
+dashing fellow."
+
+
+The trenches neared the town.  Colonel Dujardin's mine was far
+advanced; the end of the chamber was within a few yards of the
+bastion.  Of late, the colonel had often visited this mine in
+person.  He seemed a little uneasy about something in that quarter;
+but no one knew what: he was a silent man.  The third evening, after
+he dismounted Long Tom, he received private notice that an order was
+coming down from the commander-in-chief to assault the bastion.  He
+shrugged his shoulders, but said nothing.  That same night the
+colonel and one of his lieutenants stole out of the trenches, and by
+the help of a pitch-dark, windy night, got under the bastion
+unperceived, and crept round it, and made their observations, and
+got safe back.  About noon down came General Raimbaut.
+
+"Well, colonel, you are to have your way at last.  Your bastion is
+to be stormed this afternoon previous to the general assault.  Why,
+how is this? you don't seem enchanted?"
+
+"I am not."
+
+"Why, it was you who pressed for the assault."
+
+"At the right time, general, not the wrong.  In five days I
+undertake to blow that bastion into the air.  To assault it now
+would be to waste our men."
+
+General Raimbaut thought this excess of caution a great piece of
+perversity in Achilles.  They were alone, and he said a little
+peevishly,--
+
+"Is not this to blow hot and cold on the same thing?"
+
+"No, general," was the calm reply.  "Not on the same thing.  I blew
+hot upon timorous counsels; I blow cold on rash ones.  General, last
+night Lieutenant Fleming and I were under that bastion; and all
+round it."
+
+"Ah! my prudent colonel, I thought we should not talk long without
+your coming out in your true light.  If ever a man secretly enjoyed
+risking his life, it is you."
+
+"No, general," said Dujardin looking gloomily down; "I enjoy neither
+that nor anything else.  Live or die, it is all one to me; but to
+the lives of my soldiers I am not indifferent, and never will be
+while I live.  My apparent rashness of last night was pure
+prudence."
+
+Raimbaut's eye twinkled with suppressed irony.  "No doubt!" said he;
+"no doubt!"
+
+The impassive colonel would not notice the other's irony; he went
+calmly on:--
+
+"I suspected something; I went to confute, or confirm that
+suspicion.  I confirmed it."
+
+Rat! tat! tat! tat! tat! tat! tat! was heard a drum.  Relieving
+guard in the mine.
+
+Colonel Dujardin interrupted himself.
+
+"That comes apropos," said he.  "I expect one proof more from that
+quarter.  Sergeant, send me the sentinel they are relieving."
+
+Sergeant La Croix soon came back, as pompous as a hen with one
+chick, predominating with a grand military air over a droll figure
+that chattered with cold, and held its musket in hands clothed in
+great mittens.  Dard.
+
+La Croix marched him up as if he had been a file; halted him like a
+file, sang out to him as to a file, stentorian and unintelligible,
+after the manner of sergeants.
+
+"Private No. 4."
+
+DARD.  P-p-p-present!
+
+LA CROIX.  Advance to the word of command, and speak to the colonel.
+
+The shivering figure became an upright statue directly, and carried
+one of his mittens to his forehead.  Then, suddenly recognizing the
+rank of the gray-haired officer, he was morally shaken, but remained
+physically erect, and stammered,--
+
+"Colonel!--general!--colonel!"
+
+"Don't be frightened, my lad.  But look at the general and answer
+me."
+
+"Yes! general! colonel!" and he levelled his eye dead at the
+general, as he would a bayonet at a foe, being so commanded.
+
+"Now answer in as few syllables as you can."
+
+"Yes! general--colonel."
+
+"You have been on guard in the mine."
+
+"Yes, general."
+
+"What did you see there?"
+
+"Nothing; it was night down there."
+
+"What did you feel?"
+
+"Cold!  I--was--in--water--hugh!"
+
+"Did you hear nothing, then?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"What?"
+
+"Bum! bum! bum!"
+
+"Are you sure you did not hear particles of earth fall at the end of
+the trench?"
+
+"I think it did, and this (touching his musket) sounded of its own
+accord."
+
+"Good! you have answered well; go."
+
+"Sergeant, I did not miss a word," cried Dard, exulting.  He thought
+he had passed a sort of military college examination.  The sergeant
+was awe-struck and disgusted at his familiarity, speaking to him
+before the great: he pushed Private Dard hastily out of the
+presence, and bundled him into the trenches.
+
+"Are you countermined, then?" asked General Raimbaut.
+
+"I think not, general; but the whole bastion is.  And we found it
+had been opened in the rear, and lately half a dozen broad roads cut
+through the masonry."
+
+"To let in re-enforcements?"
+
+"Or to let the men run out in ease of an assault.  I have seen from
+the first an able hand behind that part of the defences.  If we
+assault the bastion, they will pick off as many of us as they can
+with their muskets then they will run for it, and fire a train, and
+blow it and us into the air."
+
+"Colonel, this is serious.  Are you prepared to lay this statement
+before the commander-in-chief?"
+
+"I am, and I do so through you, the general of my division.  I even
+beg you to say, as from me, that the assault will be mere suicide--
+bloody and useless."
+
+General Raimbaut went off to headquarters in some haste, a thorough
+convert to Colonel Dujardin's opinion.  Meantime the colonel went
+slowly to his tent.  At the mouth of it a corporal, who was also his
+body-servant, met him, saluted, and asked respectfully if there were
+any orders.
+
+"A few minutes' repose, Francois, that is all.  Do not let me be
+disturbed for an hour."
+
+"Attention!" cried Francois.  "Colonel wants to sleep."
+
+The tent was sentinelled, and Dujardin was alone with the past.
+
+Then had the fools, that took (as fools will do) deep sorrow for
+sullenness, seen the fiery soldier droop, and his wan face fall into
+haggard lines, and his martial figure shrink, and heard his stout
+heart sigh!  He took a letter from his bosom: it was almost worn to
+pieces.  He had read it a thousand times, yet he read it again.  A
+part of the sweet sad words ran thus:--
+
+
+"We must bow.  We can never be happy together on earth; let us make
+Heaven our friend.  This is still left us,--not to blush for our
+love; to do our duty, and to die."
+
+
+"How tender, but how firm," thought Camille.  "I might agitate,
+taunt, grieve her I love, but I could not shake her.  No!  God and
+the saints to my aid! they saved me from a crime I now shudder at.
+And they have given me the good chaplain: he prays with me, he weeps
+for me.  His prayers still my beating heart.  Yes, poor suffering
+angel!  I read your will in these tender, but bitter, words: you
+prefer duty to love.  And one day you will forget me; not yet
+awhile, but it will be so.  It wounds me when I think of it, but I
+must bow.  Your will is sacred.  I must rise to your level, not drag
+you to mine."
+
+Then the soldier that had stood between two armies in a hail of
+bullets, and fired a master-shot, took a little book of offices in
+one hand,--the chaplain had given it him,--and fixed his eyes upon
+the pious words, and clung like a child to the pious words, and
+kissed his lost wife's letter, and tried hard to be like her he
+loved: patient, very patient, till the end should come.
+
+"Qui vive?" cried the sentinel outside to a strange officer.
+
+"France," was his reply.  He then asked the sentinel, "Where is the
+colonel commanding the brigade?"
+
+The sentinel lowered his voice, "Asleep, my officer," said he; for
+the new-comer carried two epaulets.
+
+"Wake him," said the officer in a tone of a man used to command on a
+large scale.
+
+Dujardin heard, and did not choose a stranger should think he was
+asleep in broad day.  He came hastily out of the tent, therefore,
+with Josephine's letter in his hand, and, in the very act of
+conveying it to his bosom, found himself face to face with--her
+husband.
+
+Did you ever see two duellists cross rapiers?
+
+How unlike a theatrical duel!  How smooth and quiet the bright
+blades are! they glide into contact.  They are polished and
+slippery, yet they hold each other.  So these two men's eyes met,
+and fastened: neither spoke: each searched the other's face keenly.
+Raynal's countenance, prepared as he was for this meeting, was like
+a stern statue's.  The other's face flushed, and his heart raged and
+sickened at sight of the man, that, once his comrade and benefactor,
+was now possessor of the woman he loved.  But the figures of both
+stood alike haughty, erect, and immovable, face to face.
+
+Colonel Raynal saluted Colonel Dujardin ceremoniously.  Colonel
+Dujardin returned the salute in the same style.
+
+"You thought I was in Egypt," said Raynal with grim significance
+that caught Dujardin's attention, though he did not know quite how
+to interpret it.
+
+He answered mechanically, "Yes, I did."
+
+"I am sent here by General Bonaparte to take a command," explained
+Raynal.
+
+"You are welcome.  What command?"
+
+"Yours."
+
+"Mine?" cried Dujardin, his forehead flushing with mortification and
+anger.  "What, is it not enough that you take my"--  He stopped
+then.
+
+"Come, colonel," said the other calmly, "do not be unjust to an old
+comrade.  I take your demi-brigade; but you are promoted to
+Raimbaut's brigade.  The exchange is to be made to-morrow."
+
+"Was it then to announce to me my promotion you came to my
+quarters?" and Camille looked with a strange mixture of feelings at
+his old comrade.
+
+"That was the first thing, being duty, you know."
+
+"What? have you anything else to say to me, then?"
+
+"I have."
+
+"Is it important? for my own duties will soon demand me."
+
+"It is so important that, command or no command, I should have come
+further than the Rhine to say it to you."
+
+Let a man be as bold as a lion, a certain awe still waits upon doubt
+and mystery; and some of this vague awe crept over Camille Dujardin
+at Raynal's mysterious speech, and his grave, quiet, significant
+manner.
+
+Had he discovered something, and what?  For Josephine's sake, more
+than his own, Camille was on his guard directly.
+
+Raynal looked at him in silence a moment.
+
+"What?" said he with a slight sneer, "has it never occurred to you
+that I MUST have a serious word to say to you?  First, let me put
+you a question: did they treat you well at my house? at the chateau
+de Beaurepaire?"
+
+"Yes," faltered Camille.
+
+"You met, I trust, all the kindness and care due to a wounded
+soldier and an officer of merit.  It would annoy me greatly if I
+thought you were not treated like a brother in my house."
+
+Colonel Dujardin writhed inwardly at this view of matters.  He could
+not reply in few words.  This made him hesitate.
+
+His inquisitor waited, but, receiving no reply, went on, "Well,
+colonel, have you shown the sense of gratitude we had a right to
+look for in return?  In a word, when you left Beaurepaire, had your
+conscience nothing to reproach you with?"
+
+Dujardin still hesitated.  He scarcely knew what to think or what to
+say.  But he thought to himself, "Who has told him? does he know
+all?"
+
+"Colonel Dujardin, I am the husband of Josephine, the son of Madame
+de Beaurepaire, and the brother of Rose.  You know very well what
+brings me here.  Your answer?"
+
+"Colonel Raynal, between men of honor, placed as you and I are, few
+words should pass, for words are idle.  You will never prove to me
+that I have wronged you: I shall never convince you that I have not.
+Let us therefore close this painful interview in the way it is sure
+to close.  I am at your service, at any hour and place you please."
+
+"And pray is that all the answer you can think of?" asked Raynal
+somewhat scornfully.
+
+"Why, what other answer can I give you?"
+
+"A more sensible, a more honest, and a less boyish one.  Who doubts
+that you can fight, you silly fellow? haven't I seen you?  I want
+you to show me a much higher sort of courage: the courage to repair
+a wrong, not the paltry valor to defend one."
+
+"I really do not understand you, sir.  How can I undo what is done?"
+
+"Why, of course you cannot.  And therefore I stand here ready to
+forgive all that is past; not without a struggle, which you don't
+seem to appreciate."
+
+Camille was now utterly mystified.  Raynal continued, "But of course
+it is upon condition that you consent to heal the wound you have
+made.  If you refuse--hum! but you will not refuse."
+
+"But what is it you require of me?" inquired Camille impatiently.
+
+"Only a little common honesty.  This is the case: you have seduced a
+young lady."
+
+"Sir!" cried Camille angrily.
+
+"What is the matter?  The word is not so bad as the crime, I take
+it.  You have seduced her, and under circumstances--  But we won't
+speak of them, because I am resolved to keep cool.  Well, sir, as
+you said just now, it's no use crying over spilled milk; you can't
+unseduce the little fool; so you must marry her."
+
+"M--m--marry her?" and Dujardin flushed all over, and his heart
+beat, and he stared in Raynal's face.
+
+"Why, what is the matter again?  If she has played the fool, it was
+with you, and no other man: it is not as if she was depraved.  Come,
+my lad, show a little generosity!  Take the consequences of your own
+act--or your share of it--don't throw it all on the poor feeble
+woman.  If she has loved you too much, you are the man of all others
+that should forgive her.  Come, what do you say?"
+
+This was too much for Camille; that Raynal should come and demand of
+him to marry his own wife, for so he understood the proposal.  He
+stared at Raynal in silence ever so long, and even when he spoke it
+was only to mutter, "Are you out of your senses, or am I?"
+
+At this it cost Raynal a considerable effort to restrain his wrath.
+However, he showed himself worthy of the office he had undertaken.
+He contained himself, and submitted to argue the matter.  "Why,
+colonel," said he, "is it such a misfortune to marry poor Rose?  She
+is young, she is lovely, she has many good qualities, and she would
+have walked straight to the end of her days but for you."
+
+Now here was another surprise for Dujardin, another mystification.
+
+"Rose de Beaurepaire?" said he, putting his hand to his head, as if
+to see whether his reason was still there.
+
+"Yes, Rose de Beaurepaire--Rose Dujardin that ought to be, and that
+is to be, if you please."
+
+"One word, monsieur: is it of Rose we have been talking all this
+time?"
+
+Raynal nearly lost his temper at this question, and the cold,
+contemptuous tone with which it was put; but he gulped down his ire.
+
+"It is," said he.
+
+"One question more.  Did she tell you I had--I had"--
+
+"Why, as to that, she was in no condition to deny she had fallen,
+poor girl; the evidence was too strong.  She did not reveal her
+seducer's name; but I had not far to go for that."
+
+"One question more," said Dujardin, with a face of anguish.  "Is it
+Jos--is it Madame Raynal's wish I should marry her sister?"
+
+"Why, of course," said Raynal, in all sincerity, assuming that
+naturally enough as a matter of course; "if you have any respect for
+HER feelings, look on me as her envoy in this matter."
+
+At this Camille turned sick with disgust; then rage and bitterness
+swelled his heart.  A furious impulse seized him to expose Josephine
+on the spot.  He overcame that, however, and merely said, "She
+wishes me to marry her sister, does she? very well then, I decline."
+
+Raynal was shocked.  "Oh," said he, sorrowfully, "I cannot believe
+this of you; such heartlessness as this is not written in your face;
+it is contradicted by your past actions."
+
+"I refuse," said Dujardin, hastily; and to tell the truth, not sorry
+to inflict some pain on the honest soldier who had unintentionally
+driven the iron so deep into his own soul.
+
+"And I," said Raynal, losing his temper, "insist, in the name of my
+dear Josephine"--
+
+"Perdition!" snarled Dujardin, losing his self-command in turn.
+
+"And of the whole family."
+
+"And I tell you I will never marry her.  Upon my honor, never."
+
+"Your honor! you have none.  The only question is would you rather
+marry her--or die."
+
+"Die, to be sure."
+
+"Then die you shall."
+
+"Ah!" said Dujardin; "did I not tell you we were wasting time?
+
+"Let us waste no more then.  WHEN and WHERE?"
+
+"At the rear of the commander-in-chief's tent; when you like."
+
+"This afternoon, then--at five."
+
+"At five."
+
+"Seconds?"
+
+"What for?"
+
+"You are right.  They are only in the way of men who carry sabres;
+and besides the less gossip the better.  Good-by, till five," and
+the two saluted one another with grim ceremony; and Raynal turned on
+his heel.
+
+Camille stood transfixed; a fierce, guilty joy throbbed in his
+heart.  His rival had quarrelled with him, had insulted him, had
+challenged him.  It was not his fault.  The sun shone bright now
+upon his cold despair.  An hour ago life offered nothing.  A few
+hours more, and then joy beyond expression, or an end of all.  Death
+or Josephine!  Then he remembered that this very Josephine wished to
+marry him to Rose.  Then he remembered Raynal had saved his life.
+Cold chills crossed his breaking heart.  Of all that could happen to
+him death alone seemed a blessing without alloy.
+
+He stood there so torn with conflicting passions, that he noted
+neither the passing hours nor the flying bullets.
+
+He was only awakened from his miserable trance by the even tread of
+soldiers marching towards him; he looked up and there were several
+officers coming along the edge of the trench, escorted by a
+corporal's guard.
+
+He took a step or two to meet them.  After the usual salutes, one of
+the three colonels delivered a large paper, with a large seal, to
+Dujardin.  He read it out to his captains and lieutenants, who had
+assembled at sight of the cocked hats and full uniforms.
+
+
+"Attack by the army to-morrow upon all the lines.  Attack of the
+bastion St. Andre this evening.  The 22d, the 24th, and 12th
+brigades will furnish the contingents; the operation will be
+conducted by one of the colonels of the second division, to be
+appointed by General Raimbaut."
+
+
+"Aha!" sounded a voice like a trombone at the reader's elbow.  "I am
+just in the nick of time.  When, colonel, when?"
+
+"At five this evening, Colonel Raynal."
+
+"There," said Raynal, in a half-whisper, to Dujardin; "could they
+choose no hour but that?"
+
+"Do not be uneasy," replied Dujardin, under his breath.  He
+explained aloud--"the assault will not take place, gentlemen; the
+bastion is mined."
+
+"What of that? half of them are mined.  We will take our engineers
+in with us," said Raynal.
+
+"Such an assault will be a useless massacre," resumed Dujardin.  "I
+reconnoitred the bastion last night, and saw their preparations for
+blowing us to the devil; and General Raimbaut, at my request, is
+even now presenting my remarks to the commander-in-chief, and
+enforcing them.  There will be no assault.  In a day or two we shall
+blow the bastion, mines, and all into the air."
+
+At this moment Raynal caught sight of a gray-haired officer coming
+at some distance.  "There IS General Raimbaut," said he.  "I will go
+and pay my respects to him."  General Raimbaut shook his hand
+warmly, and welcomed him to the army.  They were old and warm
+friends.  "And you are come at the right time," said he.  "It will
+soon be as hot here as in Egypt."
+
+Raynal laughed and said all the better.
+
+General Raimbaut now joined the group of officers, and entered at
+once in the business which had brought him.  Addressing himself to
+Colonel Dujardin, first he informs that officer he had presented his
+observations to the commander-in-chief, who had given them the
+attention they merited.
+
+Colonel Dujardin bowed.
+
+"But," continued General Raimbaut, "they are overruled by imperious
+circumstances, some of which he did not reveal; they remain in his
+own breast.  However, on the eve of a general attack, which he
+cannot postpone, that bastion must be disarmed, otherwise it would
+be too fatal to all the storming parties.  It is a painful
+necessity."  He added, "Tell Colonel Dujardin I count greatly on the
+courage and discipline of his brigade, and on his own wise
+measures."
+
+Colonel Dujardin bowed.  Then he whispered in the other's ear, "Both
+will alike be wasted."
+
+The other colonels waved their hats in triumph at the commander-in-
+chief's decision, and Raynal's face showed he looked on Dujardin as
+a sort of spoil-sport happily defeated.
+
+"Well, then, gentlemen," said General Raimbaut, "we begin by
+settling the contingents to be furnished by your several brigades.
+Say, an equal number from each.  The sum total shall be settled by
+Colonel Dujardin, who has so long and ably baffled the bastion at
+this post."
+
+Colonel Dujardin bowed stiffly and not very graciously.  In his
+heart he despised these old fogies, compounds of timidity and
+rashness.
+
+"So, how many men in all, colonel?" asked General Raimbaut.
+
+"The fewer the better," replied the other solemnly, "since"--and
+then discipline tied his tongue.
+
+"I understand you," said the old man.  "Shall we say eight hundred
+men?"
+
+"I should prefer three hundred.  They have made a back door to the
+bastion, and the means of flight at hand will put flight into their
+heads.  They will pick off some of our men as we go at them.  When
+the rest jump in they will jump out, and"--  He paused.
+
+"Why, he knows all about it before it comes," said one of the
+colonels naively.
+
+"I do.  I see the whole operation and its result before me, as I see
+this hand.  Three hundred men will do."
+
+"But, general," objected Raynal, "you are not beginning at the
+beginning.  The first thing in these cases is to choose the officer
+to command the storming party."
+
+"Yes, Raynal, unquestionably; but you must be aware that is a
+painful and embarrassing part of my duty, especially after Colonel
+Dujardin's remarks."
+
+"Ah, bah!" cried Raynal.  "He is prejudiced.  He has been digging a
+thundering long mine here, and now you are going to make his child
+useless.  We none of us like that.  But when he gets the colors in
+his hand, and the storming column at his back, his misgivings will
+all go to the wind, and the enemy after them, unless he has been
+committing some crime, and is very much changed from what I knew him
+four years ago."
+
+"Colonel Raynal," said one of the other colonels, politely but
+firmly, "pray do not assume that Colonel Dujardin is to lead the
+column; there are three other claimants.  General Raimbaut is to
+select from us four."
+
+"Yes, gentlemen, and in a service of this kind I would feel grateful
+to you all if you would relieve me of that painful duty."
+
+"Gentlemen," said Dujardin, with an imperceptible sneer, "the
+general means to say this: the operation is so glorious that he
+could hardly without partiality assign the command to either of us
+four claimants.  Well, then, let us cast lots."
+
+The proposal was received by acclamation.
+
+"The general will mark a black cross on one lot, and he who draws it
+wins the command."
+
+The young colonels prepared their lots with almost boyish eagerness.
+These fiery spirits were sick to death of lying and skulking in the
+trenches.  They flung their lots into the hat.  After them, who
+should approach the hat, lot in hand, but Raynal.  Dujardin
+instantly interfered, and held his arm as he was in the act of
+dropping in his lot.
+
+"What is the matter?" said Raynal, sharply.
+
+"This is our affair, Colonel Raynal.  You have no command in this
+army."
+
+"I beg your pardon, sir, I have yours."
+
+"Not till to-morrow."
+
+"Why, you would not take such a pettifogging advantage of an old
+comrade as that."
+
+"Tell him the day ends at twelve o'clock," said one of the colonels
+interested by this strange strife.
+
+"Ah!" cried Raynal, triumphantly; "but no," said he, altering his
+tone, "let us leave that sort of argument to lawyers.  I have come a
+good many miles to fight with you, general; and now you must decide
+to pay me this little compliment on my arrival, or put a bitter
+affront on me--choose!"
+
+While the old general hesitated, Camille replied, "Since you take
+that tone there can be but one answer.  You are too great a credit
+to the French army for even an apparent slight to be put on you
+here.  The rule, I think, is, that one of the privates shall hold
+the hat.--Hallo!  Private Dard, come here--there--hold this hat."
+
+"Yes, colonel.--Lord, here is my young mistress's husband!"
+
+"Silence!"
+
+And they began to draw, and, in the act of drawing, a change of
+manner was first visible in these gay and ardent spirits.
+
+"It is not I," said one, throwing away his lot.
+
+"Nor I."
+
+"It is I," said Raynal; then with sudden gravity, "I am the lucky
+one."
+
+And now that the honor and the danger no longer floated vaguely over
+four heads, but had fixed on one, a sudden silence and solemnity
+took the place of eager voices.
+
+It was first broken by Private Dard saying, with foolish triumph,
+"And I held the hat for you, colonel."
+
+"Ah, Raynal!" said General Raimbaut, sorrowfully, "it was not worth
+while to come from Egypt for this."
+
+Raynal made no reply to this.  He drew out his watch, and said
+calmly, he had no time to lose; he must inspect the detachments he
+was to command.  "Besides," said he, "I have some domestic
+arrangements to make.  Hitherto on these occasions I was a bachelor,
+now I am married."  General Raimbaut could not help sighing.  Raynal
+read this aright, and turned to him, "A droll marriage, my old
+friend; I'll tell you all about it if ever I have the time.  It
+began with a purchase, general, and ends with--with a bequest, which
+I might as well write now, and so have nothing to think of but duty
+afterwards.  Where can I write?"
+
+"Colonel Dujardin will lend you his tent, I am sure."
+
+"Certainly."
+
+"And, messieurs," said Raynal, "if I waste time you need not.  You
+can pick me my men from your brigades.  Give me a strong spice of
+old hands."
+
+The colonels withdrew on this, and General Raimbaut walked sadly and
+thoughtfully towards the battery.  Dujardin and Raynal were left
+alone.
+
+"This postpones our affair, sir."
+
+"Yes, Raynal."
+
+"Have you writing materials in your tent?"
+
+"Yes; on the table."
+
+"You are quite sure the bastion is mined, comrade?"
+
+This unexpected word and Raynal's gentle appeal touched Dujardin
+deeply.  It was in a broken voice he replied that he was
+unfortunately too sure of it.
+
+Raynal received this reply as a sentence of death, and without
+another word walked slowly into Dujardin's tent.
+
+Dujardin's generosity was up in arms; he followed Raynal, and said
+eagerly, "Raynal, for Heaven's sake resign this command!"
+
+"Allow me to write to my wife, colonel," was the cold reply.
+
+Camille winced at this affront, and drew back a moment; but his
+nobler part prevailed.  He seized Raynal by the wrist.  "You shall
+not affront me, you cannot affront me.  You go to certain death I
+tell you, if you attack that bastion."
+
+"Don't be a fool, colonel," said Raynal: "somebody must lead the
+men."
+
+"Yes; but not you.  Who has so good a right to lead them as I, their
+colonel?"
+
+"And be killed in my place, eh?"
+
+"I know the ground better than you," said Camille.  "Besides, who
+cares for me?  I have no friends, no family.  But you are married--
+and so many will mourn if you"--
+
+Raynal interrupted him sternly.  "You forget, sir, that Rose de
+Beaurepaire is my sister, when you tell me you have no tie to life."
+He added, with wonderful dignity and sobriety, "Allow me to write to
+my wife, sir; and, while I write, reflect that you can embitter an
+old comrade's last moments by persisting in your refusal to restore
+his sister the honor you have robbed her of."
+
+And leaving the other staggered and confused by this sudden blow, he
+retired into Dujardin's tent, and finding writing materials on a
+little table that was there, sat down to pen a line to Josephine.
+
+Camille knew to whom he was writing, and a jealous pang passed
+through him.
+
+What he wrote ran thus,--
+
+
+"A bastion is to be attacked at five.  I command.  Colonel Dujardin
+proposed we should draw lots, and I lost.  The service is honorable,
+but the result may, I fear, give you some pain.  My dear wife, it is
+our fate.  I was not to have time to make you know, and perhaps love
+me.  God bless you."
+
+
+In writing these simple words, Raynal's hard face worked, and his
+mustache quivered, and once he had to clear his eye with his hand to
+form the letters.  He, the man of iron.
+
+He who stood there, leaning on his scabbard and watching the writer,
+saw this, and it stirred all that was great and good in that grand
+though passionate heart of his.
+
+"Poor Raynal!" thought he, "you were never like that before on going
+into action.  He is loath to die.  Ay, and it is a coward's trick to
+let him die.  I shall have her, but shall I have her esteem?  What
+will the army say?  What will my conscience say?  Oh! I feel already
+it will gnaw my heart to death; the ghost of that brave fellow--once
+my dear friend, my rival now, by no fault of his--will rise between
+her and me, and reproach me with my bloody inheritance.  The heart
+never deceives; I feel it now whispering in my ear: 'Skulking
+captain, white-livered soldier, that stand behind a parapet while a
+better man does your work! you assassinate the husband, but the
+rival conquers you.'  There, he puts his hand to his eyes.  What
+shall I do?"
+
+"Colonel," said a low voice, and at the same time a hand was laid on
+his shoulder.
+
+It was General Raimbaut.  The general looked pale and distressed.
+
+"Come apart, colonel, for Heaven's sake!  One word, while he is
+writing.  Ah! that was an unlucky idea of yours."
+
+"Of mine, general?"
+
+"'Twas you proposed to cast lots."
+
+"Good God! so it was."
+
+"I thought of course it was to be managed so that Raynal should not
+be the one.  Between ourselves, what honorable excuse can we make?"
+
+"None, general."
+
+"The whole division will be disgraced, and forgive me if I say a
+portion of the discredit will fall on you."
+
+"Help me to avert that shame then," cried Camille, eagerly.
+
+"Ah! that I will: but how?"
+
+"Take your pencil and write--'I authorize Colonel Dujardin to save
+the honor of the colonels of the second division.'"
+
+The general hesitated.  He had never seen an order so worded.  But
+at last he took out his pencil and wrote the required order, after
+his own fashion; i.e., in milk and water:--
+
+
+On account of the singular ability and courage with which Colonel
+Dujardin has conducted the operations against the Bastion St. Andre,
+a discretionary power is given him at the moment of assault to carry
+into effect such measures, as, without interfering with the
+commander-in-chief's order, may sustain his own credit, and that of
+the other colonels of the second division.
+
+RAIMBAUT, General of Division.
+
+
+Camille put the paper into his bosom.
+
+"Now, general, you may leave all to me.  I swear to you, Raynal
+shall not die--shall not lead this assault."
+
+"Your hand, colonel.  You are an honor to the French armies.  How
+will you do it?"
+
+"Leave it to me, general, it shall be done."
+
+"I feel it will, my noble fellow: but, alas! I fear not without
+risking some valuable life or other, most likely your own.  Tell
+me!"
+
+"General, I decline."
+
+"You refuse me, sir?"
+
+"Yes; this order gives me a discretionary power.  I will hand back
+the order at your command; but modify it I will not.  Come, sir, you
+veteran generals have been unjust to me, and listened to me too
+little all through this siege, but at last you have honored me.
+This order is the greatest honor that was ever done me since I wore
+a sword.".
+
+"My poor colonel!"
+
+"Let me wear it intact, and carry it to my grave."
+
+"Say no more!  One word--Is there anything on earth I can do for
+you, my brave soldier?"
+
+"Yes, general.  Be so kind as to retire to your quarters; there are
+reasons why you ought not to be near this post in half an hour."
+
+"I go.  Is there NOTHING else?"
+
+"Well, general, ask the good priest Ambrose, to pray for all those
+who shall die doing their duty to their country this afternoon."
+
+They parted.  General Raimbaut looked back more than once at the
+firm, intrepid figure that stood there unflinching, on the edge of
+the grave.  But HE never took his eye off Raynal.  The next minute
+the sad letter was finished, and Raynal walked out of the tent, and
+confronted the man he had challenged to single combat.
+
+I have mentioned elsewhere that Colonel Dujardin had eyes strangely
+compounded of battle and love, of the dove and the hawk.  And these,
+softened by a noble act he meditated, now rested on Raynal with a
+strange expression of warmth and goodness.  This strange gaze struck
+Raynal, so far at least as this; he saw it was no hostile eye.  He
+was glad of that, for his own heart was calmed and softened by the
+solemn prospect before him.
+
+"We, too, have a little account to settle before I order out the
+men," said he, calmly, "and I can't give you a long credit.  I am
+pressed for time."
+
+"Our quarrel is at an end.  When duty sounds the recall, a soldier's
+heart leaves private feuds.  See! I come to you without anger and
+ill-will.  Just now my voice was loud, my manner, I dare say,
+offensive, and menacing even, and that always tempts a brave fellow
+like you to resist.  But now, you see, I am harmless as a woman.  We
+are alone.  Humbug to the winds!  I know that you are the only man
+in this army fit to command a division.  I know that when you say
+the assault of that bastion is death, death it is.  To the point
+then; now that my manner is no longer irritating, now that I am
+going to die, Camille Dujardin, my old comrade, have you the heart
+to refuse me? am I to die unhappy?"
+
+"No; no: I will do whatever you like."
+
+"You will marry that poor girl, then?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Aha! did not I always say he was a good fellow?  Clench the nail;
+give me your honor."
+
+"I give you my honor to marry her, if I live."
+
+"You take a load off me; may Heaven reward you.  In one hour those
+poor women, whose support I had promised to be, will lose their
+protector; but I give them another in you.  We shall not leave that
+family in tears, Rose in shame, and your child without a name."
+
+Dujardin stared at the speaker.  What new and devilish deception was
+this?
+
+"My child!" he faltered.  "What child?"
+
+"Ah," said Raynal, "what a fool I was!  That is the first thing I
+ought to have told you.  Poor little fellow!  I surprised him in his
+cradle; his mother and Josephine were rocking him, and singing over
+him.  Oh! it was a scene, I can tell you.  My poor wife had been ill
+for some time, and was so weakened by it, that I frightened her into
+a fit, stealing a march on her that way.  She fainted away.  Perhaps
+it is as well she did; for I--I did not know what to think; it
+looked ugly; but while she lay at our feet insensible, I forced the
+truth from Rose; she owned the boy was hers."
+
+While Raynal told him this strange story, Camille turned hot and
+cold.  First came a thrill of glowing joy; he had some clew to all
+this: he was a father; that child was Josephine's and his; the next
+moment he froze within.  So Josephine had not only gulled her
+husband, but him, too; she had refused him the sad consolation of
+knowing he had a child.  Cruelty, calculation, and baseness
+unexampled!  Here was a creature who could sacrifice anything and
+anybody to her comfort, to the peace and sordid smoothness of her
+domestic life.  She stood between two men--a thing.  Between two
+truths--a double lie.
+
+His heart, in one moment, turned against her like a stone.  A
+musket-bullet through the body does not turn life to death quicker
+than Raynal turned his rival's love to despair and scorn: that love
+which neither wounds, absence, prison, nor even her want of
+constancy had prevailed to shake.
+
+"Out of my bosom!" he cried--"out of it, in this world and the
+next!"
+
+He forgot, in his lofty rage, who stood beside him.
+
+"What?--what?" cried Raynal.
+
+"No matter," said Camille; "only I esteem YOU, Raynal.  You are
+truth; you are a man, and deserve a better lot."
+
+"Don't say that," replied Raynal, quite misunderstanding him.  "It
+is a soldier's end: I never desired nor hoped a better: only, of
+course, I feel sad.  You are a happy fellow, to have a child and to
+live to see it, and her you love."
+
+"Oh, yes, I am very happy," replied the poor fellow, his lip
+quivering.
+
+"Watch over all those poor women, comrade, and sometimes speak to
+them of me.  It is foolish, but we like to be remembered."
+
+"Yes! but do not let us speak of that.  Raynal, you and I were
+lieutenants together; do you remember saving my life in the Arno?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Then promise me, if you should live, to remember not our quarrel of
+to-day, nor anything; but only those early days, AND THIS AFTERNOON."
+
+"I do."
+
+"Your hand, comrade."
+
+"There, comrade, there."
+
+They wrung one another's hands, and turned away and hid their faces
+from each other, for their eyes were moist.
+
+"This won't do, comrade, I must go.  I shall attack from your
+position.  So I shall go down the line, and bring the men up.
+Meantime, pick me your detachment.  Give me a good spice of
+veterans.  I shall get one word with you before we go out.  God
+bless you!"
+
+"God bless you, Raynal!"
+
+The moment Raynal was gone, Camille beckoned a lieutenant to him,
+and ordered half the brigade to form in a strong column on both
+sides Death's Alley.
+
+His eye fell upon private Dard, as luck would have it.  "Come here,"
+said he.  Dard came and saluted.
+
+"Have you anybody at Beaurepaire that would be sorry if you were
+killed?"
+
+"Yes, colonel!  Jacintha, that used to make your broth, colonel."
+
+"Take this line to Colonel Raynal.  You will find him with the 12th
+brigade."
+
+He wrote a few lines in pencil, folded them, and Dard went off with
+them, little dreaming that the colonel of his brigade was taking the
+trouble to save his life, because he came from Beaurepaire.  Colonel
+Dujardin then went into his tent, and closed the aperture, and took
+the good book the priest had given him, and prayed humbly, and
+forgave all the world.
+
+Then he sat down, his head in his hands, and thought of his child,
+and how hard it was he must die and never see him.  Then he lighted
+a candle, and sealed up his orders of valor, and wrote a line,
+begging that they might be sent to his sister.  He also sealed up
+his purse, and left a memorandum that the contents should be given
+to disabled soldiers of his brigade upon their being invalided.
+
+Then he took out Josephine's letter.  "Poor coward," he said, "let
+me not be unkind.  See, I burn your letter, lest it should be found,
+and disturb the peace you prize so highly.  I, too, shall soon be at
+peace."  He lighted the letter, and dropped it on the ground: it
+burned slowly away.  He eyed it, despairingly.  "Ay," said he, "you
+perish, last record of an unhappy love: and even so pass away my
+life; my hopes of glory, and my dreams of love; it all ends to-day:
+at nine and twenty."
+
+He put his white handkerchief to his eyes.  Josephine had given it
+him.  He cried a little.
+
+When he had done crying, he put his white handkerchief in his bosom,
+and the whole man was transformed beyond language to express.
+Powder does not change more when it catches fire.  He rose that
+moment and went like a flash of lightning out of the tent.  The
+next, he came down between the lines of the strong column that stood
+awaiting orders in Death's Alley.
+
+"Attention!" cried the sergeants; "the colonel!"
+
+There was a dead silence, for the bare sight of that erect and
+inspired figure made the men's bosoms thrill with the certainty of
+great deeds to come: the light of battle was in his eye.  No longer
+the moody colonel, but a thunderbolt of war, red-hot, and waiting to
+be launched.
+
+"Officers, sergeants, soldiers, a word with you!"
+
+La Croix.  Attention!
+
+"Do you know what passed here five minutes ago?"
+
+"The attack of the bastion was settled!" cried a captain.
+
+"It was; and who was to lead the assault? do you know that?"
+
+"No."
+
+"A colonel FROM EGYPT."
+
+At that there was a groan from the men.
+
+"With detachments from the other brigades."
+
+"AH!" an angry roar.
+
+Colonel Dujardin walked quickly down between the two lines, looking
+with his fiery eye into the men's eyes on his right.  Then he came
+back on the other side, and, as he went, he lighted those men's eyes
+with his own.  It was a torch passing along a line of ready gas-
+lights.
+
+"The work to us!" he cried in a voice like a clarion (it fired the
+hearts as his eye had fired the eyes)--"The triumph to strangers!
+Our fatigues and our losses have not gained the brigade the honor of
+going out at those fellows that have killed so many of our
+comrades."
+
+A fierce groan broke from the men.
+
+"What! shall the colors of another brigade and not ours fly from
+that bastion this afternoon?"
+
+"No! no!" in a roar like thunder.
+
+"Ah! you are of my mind.  Attention! the attack is fixed for five
+o'clock.  Suppose you and I were to carry the bastion ten minutes
+before the colonel from Egypt can bring his men upon the ground."
+
+At this there was a fierce burst of joy and laughter; the strange
+laughter of veterans and born invincibles.  Then a yell of exulting
+assent, accompanied by the thunder of impatient drums, and the
+rattle of fixing bayonets.
+
+The colonel told off a party to the battery.
+
+"Level the guns at the top tier.  Fire at my signal, and keep firing
+over our heads, till you see our colors on the place."
+
+He then darted to the head of the column, which instantly formed
+behind him in the centre of Death's Alley.
+
+"The colors!  No hand but mine shall hold them to-day."
+
+They were instantly brought him: his left hand shook them free in
+the afternoon sun.
+
+A deep murmur of joy rolled out from the old hands at the now
+unwonted sight.  Out flashed the colonel's sword like steel
+lightning.  He pointed to the battery.
+
+Bang! bang! bang! bang! went his cannon, and the smoke rolled over
+the trenches.  At the same moment up went the colors waving, and the
+colonel's clarion voice pealed high above all:--
+
+"Twenty-fourth brigade--FORWARD!"
+
+They went so swiftly out of the trenches that they were not seen
+through their own smoke until they had run some sixty yards.  As
+soon as they were seen, coming on like devils through their own
+smoke, two thousand muskets were levelled at them from the Prussian
+line.  It was not a rattle of small arms--it was a crash, and the
+men fell fast: but in a moment they were seen to spread out like a
+fan, and to offer less mark, and when the fan closed again, it half
+encircled the bastion.  It was a French attack: part swarmed at it
+in front like bees, part swept round the glacis and flanked it.
+They were seen to fall in numbers, shot down from the embrasures.
+But the living took the place of the dead: and the fight ranged
+evenly there.  Where are the colors?  Towards the rear there.  The
+colonel and a hundred men are fighting hand to hand with the
+Prussians, who have charged out at the back doors of the bastion.
+Success there, and the bastion must fall--both sides know this.
+
+The colors disappeared.  There was a groan from the French lines.
+The colors reappeared, and close under the bastion.
+
+And now in front the attack was so hot, that often the Prussian
+gunners were seen to jump down, driven from their posts; and the
+next moment a fierce hurrah from the rear told that the French had
+won some great advantage there.  The fire slackening told a similar
+tale and presently down came the Prussian flag-staff.  That might be
+an accident.  A few moments of thirsting expectation, and up went
+the colors of the 24th brigade upon the Bastion St. Andre.
+
+The French army raised a shout that rent the sky, and their cannon
+began to play on the Prussian lines and between the bastion and the
+nearest fort, to prevent a recapture.
+
+Sudden there shot from the bastion a cubic acre of fire: it carried
+up a heavy mountain of red and black smoke that looked solid as
+marble.  There was a heavy, sullen, tremendous explosion that
+snuffed out the sound of the cannon, and paralyzed the French and
+Prussian gunners' hands, and checked the very beating of their
+hearts.  Thirty thousand pounds of gunpowder were in that awful
+explosion.  War itself held its breath, and both armies, like
+peaceable spectators, gazed wonder-struck, terror-struck.  Great
+hell seemed to burst through the earth's crust, and to be rushing at
+heaven.  Huge stones, cannons, corpses, and limbs of soldiers, were
+seen driven or falling through the smoke.  Some of these last came
+quite clear of the ruins, ay, into the French and Prussian lines,
+that even the veterans put their hands to their eyes.  Raynal felt
+something patter on him from the sky--it was blood--a comrade's
+perhaps.
+
+
+The smoke cleared.  Where, a moment before, the great bastion stood
+and fought, was a monstrous pile of blackened, bloody stones and
+timbers, with dismounted cannon sticking up here and there.
+
+And, rent and crushed to atoms beneath the smoking mass, lay the
+relics of the gallant brigade, and their victorious colors.
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII.
+
+
+A few wounded soldiers of the brigade lay still till dusk.  Then
+they crept back to the trenches.  These had all been struck down or
+disabled short of the bastion.  Of those that had taken the place no
+one came home.
+
+Raynal, after the first stupefaction, pressed hard and even angrily
+for an immediate assault on the whole Prussian line.  Not they.  It
+was on paper that the assault should be at daybreak to-morrow.  Such
+leaders as they were cannot IMPROVISE.
+
+Rage and grief in his heart, Raynal waited chafing in the trenches
+till five minutes past midnight.  He then became commander of the
+brigade, gave his orders, and took thirty men out to creep up to the
+wreck of the bastion, and find the late colonel's body.
+
+Going for so pious a purpose, he was rewarded by an important
+discovery.  The whole Prussian lines had been abandoned since
+sunset, and, mounting cautiously on the ramparts, Raynal saw the
+town too was evacuated, and lights and other indications on a rising
+ground behind it convinced him that the Prussians were in full
+retreat, probably to effect that junction with other forces which
+the assault he had recommended would have rendered impossible.
+
+They now lighted lanterns, and searched all over and round the
+bastion for the poor colonel, in the rear of the bastion they found
+many French soldiers, most of whom had died by the bayonet.  The
+Prussian dead had all been carried off.
+
+Here they found the talkative Sergeant La Croix.  The poor fellow
+was silent enough now.  A terrible sabre-cut on the skull.  The
+colonel was not there.  Raynal groaned, and led the way on to the
+bastion.  The ruins still smoked.  Seven or eight bodies were
+discovered by an arm or a foot protruding through the masses of
+masonry.  Of these some were Prussians; a proof that some devoted
+hand had fired the train, and destroyed both friend and foe.
+
+They found the tube of Long Tom sticking up, just as he had shown
+over the battlements that glorious day, with this exception, that a
+great piece was knocked off his lip, and the slice ended in a long,
+broad crack.
+
+The soldiers looked at this.  "That is our bullet's work," said
+they.  Then one old veteran touched his cap, and told Raynal
+gravely, he knew where their beloved colonel was.  "Dig here, to the
+bottom," said he.  "HE LIES BENEATH HIS WORK."
+
+Improbable and superstitious as this was, the hearts of the soldiers
+assented to it.
+
+Presently there was a joyful cry outside the bastion.  A rush was
+made thither.  But it proved to be only Dard, who had discovered
+that Sergeant La Croix's heart still beat.  They took him up
+carefully, and carried him gently into camp.  To Dard's delight the
+surgeon pronounced him curable.  For all that, he was three days
+insensible, and after that unfit for duty.  So they sent him home
+invalided, with a hundred francs out of the poor colonel's purse.
+
+Raynal reported the evacuation of the place, and that Colonel
+Dujardin was buried under the bastion, and soon after rode out of
+the camp.
+
+The words Camille had scratched with a pencil, and sent him from the
+edge of the grave, were few but striking.
+
+
+"A dead man takes you once more by the hand.  My last thought, thank
+God, is France.  For her sake and mine, Raynal.  GO FOR GENERAL
+BONAPARTE.  Tell him, from a dying soldier, the Rhine is a river to
+these generals, but to him a field of glory.  He will lay out our
+lives, not waste them."
+
+
+There was nothing to hinder Raynal from carrying out this sacred
+request: for the 24th brigade had ceased to exist: already thinned
+by hard service, it was reduced to a file or two by the fatal
+bastion.  It was incorporated with the 12th; and Raynal rode heavy
+at heart to Paris, with a black scarf across his breast.
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII.
+
+
+You see now into what a fatal entanglement two high-minded young
+ladies were led, step by step, through yielding to the natural
+foible of their sex--the desire to hide everything painful from
+those they love, even at the expense of truth.
+
+A nice mess they made of it with their amiable dishonesty.  And pray
+take notice that after the first White Lie or two, circumstances
+overpowered them, and drove them on against their will.  It was no
+small part of all their misery that they longed to get back to truth
+and could not.
+
+We shall see presently how far they succeeded in that pious object,
+for the sake of which they first entered on concealments.  But first
+a word is due about one of the victims of their amiable, self-
+sacrificing lubricity.  Edouard Riviere fell in one night, from
+happiness and confidence, such as till that night be had never
+enjoyed, to deep and hopeless misery.
+
+He lost that which, to every heart capable of really loving, is the
+greatest earthly blessing, the woman he adored.  But worse than
+that, he lost those prime treasures of the masculine soul, belief in
+human goodness, and in female purity.  To him no more could there be
+in nature a candid eye, a virtuous ready-mantling cheek: for frailty
+and treachery had put on these signs of virtue and nobility.
+Henceforth, let him live a hundred years, whom could he trust or
+believe in?
+
+Here was a creature whose virtues seemed to make frailty impossible:
+treachery, doubly impossible: a creature whose very faults--for
+faults she had--had seemed as opposite to treachery as her very
+virtues were.  Yet she was all frailty and falsehood.
+
+He passed in that one night of anguish from youth to age.  He went
+about his business like a leaden thing.  His food turned tasteless.
+His life seemed ended.  Nothing appeared what it had been.  The very
+landscape seemed cut in stone, and he a stone in the middle of it,
+and his heart a stone in him.  At times, across that heavy heart
+came gushes of furious rage and bitter mortification; his heart was
+broken, and his faith was gone, for his vanity had been stabbed as
+fiercely as his love.  "Georges Dandin!" he would cry, "curse her!
+curse her!"  But love and misery overpowered these heats, and froze
+him to stone again.
+
+The poor boy pined and pined.  His clothes hung loose about him; his
+face was so drawn with suffering, you would not have known him.  He
+hated company.  The things he was expected to talk about!--he with
+his crushed heart.  He could not.  He would not.  He shunned all the
+world; he went alone like a wounded deer.  The good doctor, on his
+return from Paris, called on him to see if he was ill: since he had
+not come for days to the chateau.  He saw the doctor coming and bade
+the servant say he was not in the village.
+
+He drew down the blind, that he might never see the chateau again.
+He drew it up again: he could not exist without seeing it.  "She
+will be miserable, too," he cried, gnashing his teeth.  "She will
+see whether she has chosen well."  At other times, all his courage,
+and his hatred, and his wounded vanity, were drowned in his love and
+its despair, and then he bowed his head, and sobbed and cried as if
+his heart would burst.  One morning he was so sobbing with his head
+on the table, when his landlady tapped at his door.  He started up
+and turned his head away from the door.
+
+"A young woman from Beaurepaire, monsieur."
+
+"From Beaurepaire?" his heart gave a furious leap.  "Show her in."
+
+He wiped his eyes and seated himself at a table, and, all in a
+flutter, pretended to be the state's.
+
+It was not Jacintha, as he expected, but the other servant.  She
+made a low reverence, cast a look of admiration on him, and gave him
+a letter.  His eye darted on it: his hand trembled as he took it.
+He turned away again to open it.  He forced himself to say, in a
+tolerably calm voice, "I will send an answer."
+
+The letter was apparently from the baroness de Beaurepaire; a mere
+line inviting him to pay her a visit.  It was written in a tremulous
+hand.  Edouard examined the writing, and saw directly it was written
+by Rose.
+
+Being now, naturally enough, full of suspicion, he set this down as
+an attempt to disguise her hand.  "So," said he, to himself, "this
+is the game.  The old woman is to be drawn into it, too.  She is to
+help to make Georges Dandin of me.  I will go.  I will baffle them
+all.  I will expose this nest of depravity, all ceremony on the
+surface, and voluptuousness and treachery below.  O God! who could
+believe that creature never loved me!  They shall none of them see
+my weakness.  Their benefactor shall be still their superior.  They
+shall see me cold as ice, and bitter as gall."
+
+But to follow him farther just now, would be to run too far in
+advance of the main story.  I must, therefore, return to
+Beaurepaire, and show, amongst other things, how this very letter
+came to be written.
+
+
+When Josephine and Rose awoke from that startled slumber that
+followed the exhaustion of that troubled night, Rose was the more
+wretched of the two.  She had not only dishonored herself, but
+stabbed the man she loved.
+
+Josephine, on the other hand, was exhausted, but calm.  The fearful
+escape she had had softened down by contrast her more distant
+terrors.
+
+She began to shut her eyes again, and let herself drift.  Above all,
+the doctor's promise comforted her: that she should go to Paris with
+him, and have her boy.
+
+This deceitful calm of the heart lasted three days.
+
+Carefully encouraged by Rose, it was destroyed by Jacintha.
+
+Jacintha, conscious that she had betrayed her trust, was almost
+heart-broken.  She was ashamed to appear before her young mistress,
+and, coward-like, wanted to avoid knowing even how much harm she had
+done.
+
+She pretended toothache, bound up her face, and never stirred from
+the kitchen.  But she was not to escape: the other servant came down
+with a message: "Madame Raynal wanted to see her directly."
+
+She came quaking, and found Josephine all alone.
+
+Josephine rose to meet her, and casting a furtive glance round the
+room first, threw her arms round Jacintha's neck, and embraced her
+with many tears.
+
+"Was ever fidelity like yours? how COULD you do it, Jacintha? and
+how can I ever repay it?  But, no; it is too base of me to accept
+such a sacrifice from any woman."
+
+Jacintha was so confounded she did not know what to say.  But it was
+a mystification that could not endure long between two women, who
+were both deceived by a third.  Between them they soon discovered
+that it must have been Rose who had sacrificed herself.
+
+"And Edouard has never been here since," said Josephine.
+
+"And never will, madame."
+
+"Yes, he shall! there must be some limit even to my feebleness, and
+my sister's devotion.  You shall take a line to him from me.  I will
+write it this moment."
+
+The letter was written.  But it was never sent.  Rose found
+Josephine and Jacintha together; saw a letter was being written,
+asked to see it; on Josephine's hesitating, snatched it out of her
+hand, read it, tore it to pieces, and told Jacintha to leave the
+room.  She hated the sight of poor Jacintha, who had slept at the
+very moment when all depended on her watchfulness.
+
+"So you were going to send to HIM, unknown to me."
+
+"Forgive me, Rose."  Rose burst out crying.
+
+"O Josephine! is it come to this?  Would you deceive ME?"
+
+"You have deceived ME!  Yes! it has come to that.  I know all.
+Twill not consent to destroy ALL I love."
+
+She then begged hard for leave to send the letter.
+
+Rose gave an impetuous refusal.  "What could you say to him? foolish
+thing, don't you know him, and his vanity?  When you had exposed
+yourself to him, and showed him I had insulted him for you, do you
+think he would forgive me?  No! this is to make light of my love--to
+make me waste the sacrifice I have made.  I feel that sacrifice as
+much as you do, more perhaps, and I would rather die in a convent
+than waste that night of shame and agony.  Come, promise me, no more
+attempts of that kind, or we are sisters no more, friends no more,
+one heart and one blood no more."
+
+The weaker nature, weakened still more by ill-health and grief, was
+terrified into submission, or rather temporized.  "Kiss me then,"
+said Josephine, "and love me to the end.  Ah, if I was only in my
+grave!"
+
+Rose kissed her with many sighs, but Josephine smiled.  Rose eyed
+her with suspicion.  That deep smile; what did it mean?  She had
+formed some resolution.  "She is going to deceive me somehow,"
+thought Rose.
+
+From that day she watched Josephine like a spy.  Confidence was gone
+between them.  Suspicion took its place.
+
+Rose was right in her misgivings.  The moment Josephine saw that
+Edouard's happiness and Rose's were to be sacrificed for her whom
+nothing could make happy, the poor thing said to herself, "I CAN
+DIE."
+
+And that was the happy thought that made her smile.
+
+The doctor gave her laudanum: he found she could not sleep: and he
+thought it all-important that she should sleep.
+
+Josephine, instead of taking these small doses, saved them all up,
+secreted them in a phial, and so, from the sleep of a dozen nights,
+collected the sleep of death: and now she was tranquil.  This young
+creature that could not bear to give pain to any one else, prepared
+her own death with a calm resolution the heroes of our sex have not
+often equalled.  It was so little a thing to her to strike
+Josephine.  Death would save her honor, would spare her the
+frightful alternative of deceiving her husband, or of telling him
+she was another's.  "Poor Raynal," said she to herself, "it is so
+cruel to tie him to a woman who can never be to him what he
+deserves.  Rose would then prove her innocence to Edouard.  A few
+tears for a weak, loving soul, and they would all be happy and
+forget her."
+
+
+One day the baroness, finding herself alone with Rose and Dr.
+Aubertin, asked the latter what he thought of Josephine's state.
+
+"Oh, she was better: had slept last night without her usual
+narcotic."
+
+The baroness laid down her knitting and said, with much meaning,
+"And I tell you, you will never cure her body till you can cure her
+mind.  My poor child has some secret sorrow."
+
+"Sorrow!" said Aubertin, stoutly concealing the uneasiness these
+words created, "what sorrow?"
+
+"Oh, she has some deep sorrow.  And so have you, Rose."
+
+"Me, mamma! what DO you mean?"
+
+The baroness's pale cheek flushed a little.  "I mean," said she,
+"that my patience is worn out at last; I cannot live surrounded by
+secrets.  Raynal's gloomy looks when he left us, after staying but
+one hour; Josephine ill from that day, and bursting into tears at
+every word; yourself pale and changed, hiding an unaccountable
+sadness under forced smiles--  Now, don't interrupt me.  Edouard,
+who was almost like a son, gone off, without a word, and never comes
+near us now."
+
+"Really you are ingenious in tormenting yourself.  Josephine is ill!
+Well, is it so very strange?  Have you never been ill?  Rose is
+pale! you ARE pale, my dear; but she has nursed her sister for a
+month; is it a wonder she has lost color?  Edouard is gone a
+journey, to inherit his uncle's property: a million francs.  But
+don't you go and fall ill, like Josephine; turn pale, like Rose; and
+make journeys in the region of fancy, after Edouard Riviere, who is
+tramping along on the vulgar high road."
+
+This tirade came from Aubertin, and very clever he thought himself.
+But he had to do with a shrewd old lady, whose suspicions had long
+smouldered; and now burst out.  She said quietly, "Oh, then Edouard
+is not in this part of the world.  That alters the case: where IS
+he?"
+
+"In Normandy, probably," said Rose, blushing.
+
+The baroness looked inquiringly towards Aubertin.  He put on an
+innocent face and said nothing.
+
+"Very good," said the baroness.  "It's plain I am to learn nothing
+from you two.  But I know somebody who will be more communicative.
+Yes: this uncomfortable smiling, and unreasonable crying, and
+interminable whispering; these appearances of the absent, and
+disappearances of the present; I shall know this very day what they
+all mean."
+
+"Really, I do not understand you."
+
+"Oh, never mind; I am an old woman, and I am in my dotage.  For all
+that, perhaps you will allow me two words alone with my daughter."
+
+"I retire, madame," and he disappeared with a bow to her, and an
+anxious look at Rose.  She did not need this; she clenched her
+teeth, and braced herself up to stand a severe interrogatory.
+
+Mother and daughter looked at one another, as if to measure forces,
+and then, instead of questioning her as she had intended, the
+baroness sank back in her chair and wept aloud.  Rose was all
+unprepared for this.  She almost screamed in a voice of agony, "O
+mamma! mamma!  O God! kill me where I stand for making my mother
+weep!"
+
+"My girl," said the baroness in a broken voice, and with the most
+touching dignity, "may you never know what a mother feels who finds
+herself shut out from her daughters' hearts.  Sometimes I think it
+is my fault; I was born in a severer age.  A mother nowadays seems
+to be a sort of elder sister.  In my day she was something more.
+Yet I loved my mother as well, or better than I did my sisters.  But
+it is not so with those I have borne in my bosom, and nursed upon my
+knee."
+
+At this Rose flung herself, sobbing and screaming, at her mother's
+knees.  The baroness was alarmed.  "Come, dearest, don't cry like
+that.  It is not too late to take your poor old mother into your
+confidence.  What is this mystery? and why this sorrow?  How comes
+it I intercept at every instant glances that were not intended for
+me?  Why is the very air loaded with signals and secrecy?  (Rose
+replied only by sobs.)  Is some deceit going on?  (Rose sobbed.)  Am
+I to have no reply but these sullen sobs? will you really tell me
+nothing?"
+
+"I've nothing to tell," sobbed Rose.
+
+"Well, then, will you do something for me?"
+
+Such a proposal was not only a relief, but a delight to the
+deceiving but loving daughter.  She started up crying, "Oh, yes,
+mamma; anything, everything.  Oh, thank you!"  In the ardor of her
+gratitude, she wanted to kiss her mother; but the baroness declined
+the embrace politely, and said, coldly and bitterly, "I shall not
+ask much; I should not venture now to draw largely on your
+affection; it's only to write a few lines for me."
+
+Rose got paper and ink with great alacrity, and sat down all
+beaming, pen in hand.
+
+The baroness dictated the letter slowly, with an eye gimleting her
+daughter all the time.
+
+"Dear--Monsieur--Riviere."
+
+The pen fell from Rose's hand, and she turned red and then pale.
+
+"What! write to him?"
+
+"Not in your own name; in mine.  But perhaps you prefer to give me
+the trouble."
+
+"Cruel! cruel!" sighed Rose, and wrote the words as requested.
+
+The baroness dictated again,--
+
+"Oblige me by coming here at your very earliest convenience."
+
+"But, mamma, if he is in Normandy," remonstrated Rose, fighting
+every inch of the ground.
+
+"Never you mind where he is," said the baroness.  "Write as I
+request."
+
+"Yes, mamma," said Rose with sudden alacrity; for she had recovered
+her ready wit, and was prepared to write anything, being now fully
+resolved the letter should never go.
+
+"Now sign my name."  Rose complied.  "There; now fold it, and
+address it to his lodgings."  Rose did so; and, rising with a
+cheerful air, said she would send Jacintha with it directly.
+
+She was half across the room when her mother called her quietly
+back.
+
+"No, mademoiselle," said she sternly.  "You will give me the letter.
+I can trust neither the friend of twenty years, nor the servant that
+stayed by me in adversity, nor the daughter I suffered for and
+nursed.  And why don't I trust you?  Because YOU HAVE TOLD ME A
+LIE."
+
+At this word, which in its coarsest form she had never heard from
+those high-born lips till then, Rose cowered like a hare.
+
+"Ay, A LIE," said the baroness.  "I saw Edouard Riviere in the park
+but yesterday.  I saw him.  My old eyes are feeble, but they are not
+deceitful.  I saw him.  Send my breakfast to my own room.  I come of
+an ancient race: I could not sit with liars; I should forget
+courtesy; you would see in my face how thoroughly I scorn you all."
+And she went haughtily out with the letter in her hand.
+
+Rose for the first time, was prostrated.  Vain had been all this
+deceit; her mother was not happy; was not blinded.  Edouard might
+come and tell her his story.  Then no power could keep Josephine
+silent.  The plot was thickening; the fatal net was drawing closer
+and closer.
+
+She sank with a groan into a chair, and body and spirit alike
+succumbed.  But that was only for a little while.  To this
+prostration succeeded a feverish excitement.  She could not, would
+not, look Edouard in the face.  She would implore Josephine to be
+silent; and she herself would fly from the chateau.  But, if
+Josephine would not be silent?  Why, then she would go herself to
+Edouard, and throw herself upon his honor, and tell him the truth.
+With this, she ran wildly up the stairs, and burst into Josephine's
+room so suddenly, that she caught her, pale as death, on her knees,
+with a letter in one hand and a phial of laudanum in the other.
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV.
+
+
+Josephine conveyed the phial into her bosom with wonderful rapidity
+and dexterity, and rose to her feet.  But Rose just saw her conceal
+something, and resolved to find out quietly what it was.  So she
+said nothing about it, but asked Josephine what on earth she was
+doing.
+
+"I was praying."
+
+"And what is that letter?"
+
+"A letter I have just received from Colonel Raynal."
+
+Rose took the letter and read it.  Raynal had written from Paris.
+He was coming to Beaurepaire to stay a month, and was to arrive that
+very day.
+
+Then Rose forgot all about herself, and even what she had come for.
+She clung about her sister's neck, and implored her, for her sake,
+to try and love Raynal.
+
+Josephine shuddered, and clung weeping to her sister in turn.  For
+in Rose's arms she realized more powerfully what that sister would
+suffer if she were to die.  Now, while they clung together, Rose
+felt something hard, and contrived just to feel it with her cheek.
+It was the phial.
+
+A chill suspicion crossed the poor girl.  The attitude in which she
+had found Josephine; the letter, the look of despair, and now this
+little bottle, which she had hidden.  WHY HIDE IT?  She resolved not
+to let Josephine out of her sight; at all events, until she had seen
+this little bottle, and got it away from her.
+
+She helped her to dress, and breakfasted with her in the tapestried
+room, and dissembled, and put on gayety, and made light of
+everything but Josephine's health.
+
+Her efforts were not quite in vain.  Josephine became more composed;
+and Rose even drew from her a half promise that she would give
+Raynal and time a fair trial.
+
+And now Rose was relieved of her immediate apprehensions for
+Josephine, but the danger of another kind, from Edouard, remained.
+So she ran into her bedroom for her bonnet and shawl, determined to
+take the strong measure of visiting Edouard at once, or intercepting
+him.  While she was making her little toilet, she heard her mother's
+voice in the room.  This was unlucky; she must pass through that
+room to go out.  She sat down and fretted at this delay.  And then,
+as the baroness appeared to be very animated, Rose went to the
+keyhole, and listened.  Their mother was telling Josephine how she
+had questioned Rose, and how Rose had told her an untruth, and how
+she had made that young lady write to Edouard, etc.; in short, the
+very thing Rose wanted to conceal from Josephine.
+
+Rose lost all patience, and determined to fly through the room and
+out before anybody could stop her.  She heard Jacintha come in with
+some message, and thought that would be a good opportunity to slip
+out unmolested.  So she opened the door softly.  Jacintha, it
+seemed, had been volunteering some remark that was not well
+received, for the baroness was saying, sharply, "Your opinion is not
+asked.  Go down directly, and bring him up here, to this room."
+Jacintha cast a look of dismay at Rose, and vanished.
+
+Rose gathered from that look, as much as from the words, who the
+visitor was.  She made a dart after Jacintha.  But the room was a
+long one, and the baroness intercepted her: "No," said she, gravely,
+"I cannot spare you."
+
+Rose stood pale and panting, but almost defiant.  "Mamma," said she,
+"if it is Monsieur Riviere, I MUST ask your leave to retire.  And
+you have neither love nor pity, nor respect for me, if you detain
+me."
+
+"Mademoiselle!" was the stern reply, "I FORBID you to move.  Be good
+enough to sit there;" with which the baroness pointed imperiously to
+a sofa at the other side of the room.  "Josephine, go to your room."
+Josephine retired, casting more than one anxious glance over her
+shoulder.
+
+Rose looked this way and that in despair and terror; but ended by
+sinking, more dead than alive, into the seat indicated; and even as
+she drooped, pale and trembling, on that sofa, Edouard Riviere, worn
+and agitated, entered the room, and bowed low to them all, without a
+word.
+
+The baroness looked at him, and then at her daughter, as much as to
+say, now I have got you; deceive me now if you can.  "Rose, my
+dear," said this terrible old woman, affecting honeyed accents,
+"don't you see Monsieur Riviere?"
+
+The poor girl at this challenge rose with difficulty, and courtesied
+humbly to Edouard.
+
+He bowed to her, and stealing a rapid glance saw her pallor and
+distress; and that showed him she was not so hardened as he had
+thought.
+
+"You have not come to see us lately," said the baroness, quietly,
+"yet you have been in the neighborhood."
+
+These words puzzled Edouard.  Was the old lady all in the dark,
+then?  As a public man he had already learned to be on his guard; so
+he stammered out, "That he had been much occupied with public
+duties."
+
+Madame de Beaurepaire despised this threadbare excuse too much to
+notice it at all.  She went on as if he had said nothing.  "Intimate
+as you were with us, you must have some reason for deserting us so
+suddenly."
+
+"I have," said Edouard, gravely.
+
+"What is it?"
+
+"Excuse me," said Edouard, sullenly.
+
+"No, monsieur, I cannot.  This neglect, succeeding to a somewhat
+ardent pursuit of my daughter, is almost an affront.  You shall, of
+course, withdraw yourself altogether, if you choose.  But not
+without an explanation.  This much is due to me; and, if you are a
+gentleman, you will not withhold it from me."
+
+"If he is a gentleman!" cried Rose; "O mamma, do not you affront a
+gentleman, who never, never gave you nor me any ground of offence.
+Why affront the friends and benefactors we have lost by our own
+fault?"
+
+"Oh, then, it is all your fault," said the baroness.  "I feared as
+much."
+
+"All my fault, all," said Rose; then putting her pretty palms
+together, and casting a look of abject supplication on Edouard, she
+murmured, "my temper!"
+
+"Do not you put words into his mouth," said the shrewd old lady.
+"Come, Monsieur Riviere, be a man, and tell me the truth.  What has
+she said to you?  What has she done?"
+
+By this time the abject state of terror the high-spirited Rose was
+in, and her piteous glances, had so disarmed Edouard, that he had
+not the heart to expose her to her mother.
+
+"Madame," said he, stiffly, taking Rose's hint, "my temper and
+mademoiselle's could not accord."
+
+"Why, her temper is charming: it is joyous, equal, and gentle."
+
+"You misunderstand me, madame; I do not reproach Mademoiselle Rose.
+It is I who am to blame."
+
+"For what?" inquired the baroness dryly.
+
+"For not being able to make her love me."
+
+"Oh! that is it!  She did not love you?"
+
+"Ask herself, madame," said Edouard, bitterly.
+
+"Rose," said the baroness, her eye now beginning to twinkle, "were
+you really guilty of such a want of discrimination?  Didn't you love
+monsieur?"
+
+Rose flung her arms round her mother's neck, and said, "No, mamma, I
+did not love Monsieur Edouard," in an exquisite tone of love, that
+to a female ear conveyed the exact opposite of the words.
+
+But Edouard had not that nice discriminating ear.  He sighed deeply,
+and the baroness smiled.  "You tell me that?" said she, "and you are
+crying!"
+
+"She is crying, madame?" said Edouard, inquiringly, and taking a
+step towards them.
+
+"Why, you see she is, you foolish boy.  Come, I must put an end to
+this;" and she rose coolly from her seat, and begging Edouard to
+forgive her for leaving him a moment with his deadly enemy, went off
+with knowing little nods into Josephine's room; only, before she
+entered it, she turned, and with a maternal smile discharged this
+word at the pair.
+
+"Babies!"
+
+But between the alienated lovers was a long distressing silence.
+Neither knew what to say; and their situation was intolerable.  At
+last Rose ventured in a timorous voice to say, "I thank you for your
+generosity.  But I knew that you would not betray me."
+
+"Your secret is safe for me," sighed Edouard.  "Is there anything
+else I can do for you?"
+
+Rose shook her head sadly.
+
+Edouard moved to the door.
+
+Rose bowed her head with a despairing moan.  It took him by the
+heart and held him.  He hesitated, then came towards her.
+
+"I see you are sorry for what you have done to me who loved you so;
+and you loved me.  Oh! yes, do not deny it, Rose; there was a time
+you loved me.  And that makes it worse: to have given me such sweet
+hopes, only to crush both them and me.  And is not this cruel of you
+to weep so and let me see your penitence--when it is too late?"
+
+"Alas! how can I help my regrets?  I have insulted so good a
+friend."
+
+There was a sad silence.  Then as he looked at her, her looks belied
+the charge her own lips had made against herself.
+
+A light seemed to burst on Edouard from that high-minded, sorrow-
+stricken face.
+
+"Tell me it is false!" he cried.
+
+She hid her face in her hands--woman's instinct to avoid being read.
+
+"Tell me you were misled then, fascinated, perverted, but that your
+heart returned to me.  Clear yourself of deliberate deceit, and I
+will believe and thank you on my knees."
+
+"Heaven have pity on us both!" cried poor Rose.
+
+"On us!  Thank you for saying on us.  See now, you have not gained
+happiness by destroying mine.  One word--do you love that man?--that
+Dujardin?"
+
+"You know I do not."
+
+"I am glad of that; since his life is forfeited; if he escapes my
+friend Raynal, he shall not escape me."
+
+Rose uttered a cry of terror.  "Hush! not so loud.  The life of
+Camille!  Oh! if he were to die, what would become of--oh, pray do
+not speak so loud."
+
+"Own then that you DO love him," yelled Edouard; "give me truth, if
+you have no love to give.  Own that you love him, and he shall be
+safe.  It is myself I will kill, for being such a slave as to love
+you still."
+
+Rose's fortitude gave way.
+
+"I cannot bear it," she cried despairingly; "it is beyond my
+strength; Edouard, swear to me you will keep what I tell you secret
+as the grave!"
+
+"Ah!" cried Edouard, all radiant with hope, "I swear."
+
+"Then you are under a delirium.  I have deceived, but never wronged
+you; that unhappy child is not--  Hush!  HERE SHE COMES."
+
+The baroness came smiling out, and Josephine's wan, anxious face was
+seen behind her.
+
+"Well," said the baroness, "is the war at an end?  What, are we
+still silent?  Let me try then what I can do.  Edouard, lend me your
+hand."
+
+While Edouard hesitated, Josephine clasped her hands and mutely
+supplicated him to consent.  Her sad face, and the thought of how
+often she had stood his friend, shook his resolution.  He held out
+his hand, but slowly and reluctantly.
+
+"There is my hand," he groaned.
+
+"And here is mine, mamma," said Rose, smiling to please her mother.
+
+Oh! the mixture of feeling, when her soft warm palm pressed his.
+How the delicious sense baffled and mystified the cold judgment.
+
+Josephine raised her eyes thankfully to heaven.
+
+While the young lovers yet thrilled at each other's touch, yet could
+not look one another in the face, a clatter of horses' feet was
+heard.
+
+"That is Colonel Raynal," said Josephine, with unnatural calmness.
+"I expected him to-day."
+
+The baroness was at the side window in a moment.
+
+"It is he!--it is he!"
+
+She hurried down to embrace her son.
+
+Josephine went without a word to her own room.  Rose followed her
+the next minute.  But in that one minute she worked magic.
+
+She glided up to Edouard, and looked him full in the face: not the
+sad, depressed, guilty-looking humble Rose of a moment before, but
+the old high-spirited, and some what imperious girl.
+
+"You have shown yourself noble this day.  I am going to trust you as
+only the noble are trusted.  Stay in the house till I can speak to
+you."
+
+She was gone, and something leaped within Edouard's bosom, and a
+flood of light seemed to burst in on him.  Yet he saw no object
+clearly: but he saw light.
+
+Rose ran into Josephine's room, and once more surprised her on her
+knees, and in the very act of hiding something in her bosom.
+
+"What are you doing, Josephine, on your knees?" said she, sternly.
+
+"I have a great trial to go through," was the hesitating answer.
+
+Rose said nothing.  She turned paler.  She is deceiving me, thought
+she, and she sat down full of bitterness and terror, and, affecting
+not to watch Josephine, watched her.
+
+"Go and tell them I am coming, Rose."
+
+"No, Josephine, I will not leave you till this terrible meeting is
+over.  We will encounter him hand in hand, as we used to go when our
+hearts were one, and we deceived others, but never each other."
+
+At this tender reproach Josephine fell upon her neck and wept.
+
+"I will not deceive you," she said.  "I am worse than the poor
+doctor thinks me.  My life is but a little candle that a breath may
+put out any day."
+
+Rose said nothing, but trembled and watched her keenly.
+
+"My little Henri," said Josephine imploringly, "what would you do
+with him--if anything should happen to me?"
+
+"What would I do with him?  He is mine.  I should be his mother.
+Oh! what words are these: my heart! my heart!"
+
+"No, dearest; some day you will be married, and owe all the mother
+to your children; and Henri is not ours only: he belongs to some one
+I have seemed unkind to.  Perhaps he thinks me heartless.  For I am
+a foolish woman; I don't know how to be virtuous, yet show a man my
+heart.  But THEN he will understand me and forgive me.  Rose, love,
+you will write to him.  He will come to you.  You will go together
+to the place where I shall be sleeping.  You will show him my heart.
+You will tell him all my long love that lasted to the end.  YOU need
+not blush to tell him all.  I have no right.  Then you will give him
+his poor Josephine's boy, and you will say to him, 'She never loved
+but you: she gives you all that is left of her, her child.  She only
+prays you not to give him a bad mother.'"
+
+Poor soul! this was her one bit of little, gentle jealousy; but it
+made her eyes stream.  She would have put out her hand from the tomb
+to keep her boy's father single all his life.
+
+"Oh! my Josephine, my darling sister," cried Rose, "why do you speak
+of death?  Do you meditate a crime?"
+
+"No; but it was on my heart to say it: it has done me good."
+
+"At least, take me to your bosom, my well-beloved, that I may not
+SEE your tears."
+
+"There--tears?  No, you have lightened my heart.  Bless you! bless
+you!"
+
+The sisters twined their bosoms together in a long, gentle embrace.
+You might have taken them for two angels that flowed together in one
+love, but for their tears.
+
+A deep voice was now heard in the sitting-room.
+
+Josephine and Rose postponed the inevitable one moment more, by
+arranging their hair in the glass: then they opened the door, and
+entered the tapestried room.
+
+Raynal was sitting on the sofa, the baroness's hand in his.  Edouard
+was not there.
+
+Colonel Raynal had given him a strange look, and said, "What, you
+here?" in a tone of voice that was intolerable.
+
+Raynal came to meet the sisters.  He saluted Josephine on the brow.
+
+"You are pale, wife: and how cold her hand is."
+
+"She has been ill this month past," said Rose interposing.
+
+"You look ill, too, Mademoiselle Rose."
+
+"Never mind," cried the baroness joyously, "you will revive them
+both."
+
+Raynal made no reply to that.
+
+"How long do you stay this time, a day?"
+
+"A month, mother."
+
+The doctor now joined the party, and friendly greetings passed
+between him and Raynal.
+
+But ere long somehow all became conscious this was not a joyful
+meeting.  The baroness could not alone sustain the spirits of the
+party, and soon even she began to notice that Raynal's replies were
+short, and that his manner was distrait and gloomy.  The sisters saw
+this too, and trembled for what might be coming.
+
+At last Raynal said bluntly, "Josephine, I want to speak to you
+alone."
+
+The baroness gave the doctor a look, and made an excuse for going
+down-stairs to her own room.  As she was going Josephine went to her
+and said calmly,--
+
+"Mother, you have not kissed me to-day."
+
+"There!  Bless you, my darling!"
+
+Raynal looked at Rose.  She saw she must go, but she lingered, and
+sought her sister's eye: it avoided her.  At that Rose ran to the
+doctor, who was just going out of the door.
+
+"Oh! doctor," she whispered trembling, "don't go beyond the door.  I
+found her praying.  My mind misgives me.  She is going to tell him--
+or something worse."
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+"I am afraid to say all I dread.  She could not be so calm if she
+meant to live.  Be near! as I shall.  She has a phial hid in her
+bosom."
+
+She left the old man trembling, and went back.
+
+"Excuse me," said she to Raynal, "I only came to ask Josephine if
+she wants anything."
+
+"No!--yes!--a glass of eau sucree."
+
+Rose mixed it for her.  While doing this she noticed that Josephine
+shunned her eye, but Raynal gazed gently and with an air of pity on
+her.
+
+She retired slowly into Josephine's bedroom, but did not quite close
+the door.
+
+Raynal had something to say so painful that he shrank from plunging
+into it.  He therefore, like many others, tried to creep into it,
+beginning with something else.
+
+"Your health," said he, "alarms me.  You seem sad, too.  I don't
+understand that.  You have no news from the Rhine, have you?"
+
+"Monsieur!" said Josephine scared.
+
+"Do not call me monsieur, nor look so frightened.  Call me your
+friend.  I am your sincere friend."
+
+"Oh, yes; you always were."
+
+"Thank you.  You will give me a dearer title before we part this
+time."
+
+"Yes," said Josephine in a low whisper, and shuddered.
+
+"Have you forgiven me frightening you so that night?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"It was a shock to me, too, I can tell you.  I like the boy.  She
+professed to love him, and, to own the truth, I loathe all treachery
+and deceit.  If I had done a murder, I would own it.  A lie doubles
+every crime.  But I took heart; we are all selfish, we men; of the
+two sisters one was all innocence and good faith; and she was the
+one I had chosen."
+
+At these words Josephine rose, like a statue moving, and took a
+phial from her bosom and poured the contents into the glass.
+
+But ere she could drink it, if such was her intention, Raynal, with
+his eyes gloomily lowered, said, in a voice full of strange
+solemnity,--
+
+"I went to the army of the Rhine."
+
+Josephine put down the glass directly, though without removing her
+hand from it.
+
+"I see you understand me, and approve.  Yes, I saw that your sister
+would be dishonored, and I went to the army and saw her seducer."
+
+"You saw HIM.  Oh, I hope you did not go and speak to him of--of
+this?"
+
+"Why, of course I did."
+
+Josephine resolved to know the worst at once.  "May I ask," said
+she, "what you told him?"
+
+"Why, I told him all I had discovered, and pointed out the course he
+must take; he must marry your sister at once.  He refused.  I
+challenged him.  But ere we met, I was ordered to lead a forlorn
+hope against a bastion.  Then, seeing me go to certain death, the
+noble fellow pitied me.  I mean this is how I understood it all at
+the time; at any rate, he promised to marry Rose if he should live."
+
+Josephine put out her hand, and with a horrible smile said, "I thank
+you; you have saved the honor of our family;" and with no more ado,
+she took the glass in her hand to drink the fatal contents.
+
+But Raynal's reply arrested her hand.  He said solemnly, "No, I have
+not.  Have you no inkling of the terrible truth?  Do not fiddle with
+that glass: drink it, or leave it alone; for, indeed, I need all
+your attention."
+
+He took the glass out of her patient hand, and with a furtive look
+at the bedroom-door, drew her away to the other end of the room;
+"and," said he, "I could not tell your mother, for she knows nothing
+of the girl's folly; still less Rose, for I see she loves him still,
+or why is she so pale?  Advise me, now, whilst we are alone.
+Colonel Dujardin was COMPARATIVELY indifferent to YOU.  Will you
+undertake the task?  A rough soldier like me is not the person to
+break the terrible tidings to that poor girl."
+
+"What tidings?  You confuse, you perplex me.  Oh! what does this
+horrible preparation mean?"
+
+"It means he will never marry your sister; he will never see her
+more."
+
+Then Raynal walked the room in great agitation, which at once
+communicated itself to his hearer.  But the loving heart is
+ingenious in avoiding its dire misgivings.
+
+"I see," said she; "he told you he would never visit Beaurepaire
+again.  He was right."
+
+Raynal shook his head sorrowfully.
+
+"Ah, Josephine, you are far from the truth.  I was to attack the
+bastion.  It was mined by the enemy, and he knew it.  He took
+advantage of my back being turned.  He led his men out of the
+trenches; he assaulted the bastion at the head of his brigade.  He
+took it."
+
+"Ah, it was noble; it was like him."
+
+"The enemy, retiring, blew the bastion into the air, and Dujardin--
+is dead."
+
+"Dead!" said Josephine, in stupefied tones, as if the word conveyed
+no meaning to her mind, benumbed and stunned by the blow.
+
+"Don't speak so loud," said Raynal; "I hear the poor girl at the
+door.  Ay, he took my place, and is dead."
+
+"Dead!"
+
+"Swallowed up in smoke and flames, overwhelmed and crushed under the
+ruins."
+
+Josephine's whole body gave way, and heaved like a tree falling
+under the axe.  She sank slowly to her knees, and low moans of agony
+broke from her at intervals.  "Dead, dead, dead!"
+
+"Is it not terrible?" he cried.
+
+She did not see him nor hear him, but moaned out wildly, "Dead,
+dead, dead!"  The bedroom-door was opened.
+
+She shrieked with sudden violence, "Dead! ah, pity! the glass! the
+composing draught."  She stretched her hands out wildly.  Raynal,
+with a face full of concern, ran to the table, and got the glass.
+She crawled on her knees to meet it; he brought it quickly to her
+hand.
+
+"There, my poor soul!"
+
+Even as their hands met, Rose threw herself on the cup, and snatched
+it with fury from them both.  She was white as ashes, and her eyes,
+supernaturally large, glared on Raynal with terror.  "Madman!" she
+cried, "would you kill her?"
+
+He glared back on her: what did this mean?  Their eyes were fixed on
+each other like combatants for life and death; they did not see that
+the room was filling with people, that the doctor was only on the
+other side of the table, and that the baroness and Edouard were at
+the door, and all looking wonderstruck at this strange sight--
+Josephine on her knees, and those two facing each other, white, with
+dilating eyes, the glass between them.
+
+But what was that to the horror, when the next moment the patient
+Josephine started to her feet, and, standing in the midst, tore her
+hair by handfuls, out of her head.
+
+"Ah, you snatch the kind poison from me!"
+
+"Poison!"
+
+"Poison!"
+
+"Poison!" cried the others, horror-stricken.
+
+"Ah! you won't let me die.  Curse you all! curse you!  I never had
+my own way in anything.  I was always a slave and a fool.  I have
+murdered the man I love--I love.  Yes, my husband, do you hear? the
+man I love."
+
+"Hush! daughter, respect my gray hairs."
+
+"Your gray hairs!  You are not so old in years as I am in agony.  So
+this is your love, Rose!  Ah, you won't let me die--won't you?  THEN
+I'LL DO WORSE--I'LL TELL."
+
+"He who is dead; you have murdered him amongst you, and I'll follow
+him in spite of you all--he was my betrothed.  He struggled wounded,
+bleeding, to my feet.  He found me married.  News came of my
+husband's death; I married my betrothed."
+
+"Married him!" exclaimed the baroness.
+
+"Ah, my poor mother.  And she kissed me so kindly just now--she will
+kiss me no more.  Oh, I am not ashamed of marrying him.  I am only
+ashamed of the cowardice that dared not do it in face of all the
+world.  We had scarce been happy a fortnight, when a letter came
+from Colonel Raynal.  He was alive.  I drove my true husband away,
+wretch that I was.  None but bad women have an atom of sense.  I
+tried to do my duty to my legal husband.  He was my benefactor.  I
+thought it was my duty.  Was it?  I don't know: I have lost the
+sense of right and wrong.  I turned from a living creature to a lie.
+He who had scattered benefits on me and all this house; he whom it
+was too little to love; he ought to have been adored: this man came
+here one night to wife proud, joyous, and warm-hearted.  He found a
+cradle, and two women watching it.  Now Edouard, now MONSIEUR, do
+you see that life is IMPOSSIBLE to me?  One bravely accused herself:
+she was innocent.  One swooned away like a guilty coward."
+
+Edouard uttered an exclamation.
+
+"Yes, Edouard, you shall not be miserable like me; she was guilty.
+You do not understand me yet, my poor mother--and she was so happy
+this morning--I was the liar, the coward, the double-faced wife, the
+miserable mother that denied her child.  Now will you let me die?
+Now do you see that I can't and won't live upon shame and despair?
+Ah, Monsieur Raynal, my dear friend, you were always generous: you
+will pity and kill me.  I have dishonored the name you gave me to
+keep: I am neither Beaurepaire nor Raynal.  Do pray kill me,
+monsieur--Jean, do pray release me from my life!"
+
+And she crawled to his knees and embraced them, and kissed his hand,
+and pleaded more piteously for death, than others have begged for
+life.
+
+Raynal stood like a rock: he was pale, and drew his breath audibly,
+but not a word.  Then came a sight scarce less terrible than
+Josephine's despair.  The baroness, looking and moving twenty years
+older than an hour before, tottered across the room to Raynal.
+
+"Sir, you whom I have called my son, but whom I will never presume
+so to call again, I thought I had lived long enough never to have to
+blush again.  I loved you, monsieur.  I prayed every day for you.
+But she who WAS my daughter was not of my mind.  Monsieur, I have
+never knelt but to God and to my king, and I kneel to you: forgive
+us, sir, forgive us!"
+
+She tried to go down on her knees.  He raised her with his strong
+arm, but he could not speak.  She turned on the others.
+
+"So this is the secret you were hiding from me!  This secret has not
+killed you all.  Oh! I shall not live under its shame so long as you
+have.  Chateau of Beaurepaire--nest of treason, ingratitude, and
+immodesty--I loathe you as much as once I loved you.  I will go and
+hide my head, and die elsewhere."
+
+"Stay, madame!" said he, in a voice whose depth and dignity was such
+that it seemed impossible to disobey it.  "It was sudden--I was
+shaken--but I am myself again."
+
+"Oh, show some pity!" cried Rose.
+
+"I shall try to be just."
+
+There was a long, trembling silence; and during that silence and
+terrible agitation, one figure stood firm among those quaking,
+beating hearts, like a rock with the waves breaking round it--the
+MAN OF PRINCIPLE among the creatures of impulse.
+
+He raised Josephine from her knees, and placed her all limp and
+powerless in an arm-chair.  To her frenzy had now succeeded a
+sickness and feebleness like unto death.
+
+"Widow Dujardin," said he, in a broken voice, "listen to me."
+
+She moaned a sort of assent.
+
+"Your mistake has been not trusting me.  I was your friend, and not
+a selfish friend.  I was not enough in love with you to destroy your
+happiness.  Besides, I despise that sort of love.  If you had told
+me all, I would have spared you this misery.  By the present law,
+civil contracts of marriage can be dissolved by mutual consent."
+
+At this the baroness uttered some sign of surprise.
+
+"Ah!" continued Raynal, sadly, "you are aristocrats, and cannot keep
+pace with the times.  This very day our mere contract shall be
+formally dissolved.  Indeed, it ceases to exist since both parties
+are resolved to withdraw from it.  So, if you married Dujardin in a
+church, you are Madame Dujardin at this moment, and his child is
+legitimate.  What does she say?"
+
+This question was to Rose, for what Josephine uttered sounded like a
+mere articulate moan.  But Rose's quick ear had caught words, and
+she replied, all in tears, "My poor sister is blessing you, sir.  We
+all bless you."
+
+"She does not understand my position," said Raynal.  He then walked
+up to Josephine, and leaning over her arm, and speaking rather loud,
+under the impression that her senses were blunted by grief, he said,
+"Look here: Colonel Dujardin, your husband, deliberately, and with
+his eyes open, sacrificed his life for me, and for his own heroic
+sense of honor.  Now, it is my turn.  If that hero stood here, and
+asked me for all the blood in my body, I would give it him.  He is
+gone; but, dying for me, he has left me his widow and his child;
+they remain under my wing.  To protect them is my pride, and my only
+consolation.  I am going to the mayor to annul our unlucky contract
+in due form, and make us brother and sister instead.  But," turning
+to the baroness, "don't you think to escape me as your daughter has
+done: no, no, old lady, once a mother, always a mother.  Stir from
+your son's home if you dare!"
+
+And with these words, in speaking which his voice had recovered its
+iron firmness, he strode out at the door, superb in manhood and
+principle, and every eye turned with wonder and admiration after
+him.  Even when he was gone they gazed at the door by which a
+creature so strangely noble had disappeared.
+
+The baroness was about to follow him without taking any notice of
+Josephine.  But Rose caught her by the gown.  "O mother, speak to
+poor Josephine: bid her live."
+
+The baroness only made a gesture of horror and disgust, and turned
+her back on them both.
+
+Josephine, who had tottered up from her seat at Rose's words, sank
+heavily down again, and murmured, "Ah! the grave holds all that love
+me now."
+
+Rose ran to her side.  "Cruel Josephine! what, do not I love you?
+Mother, will you not help me persuade her to live?  Oh! if she dies,
+I will die too; you will kill both your children."
+
+Stern and indignant as the baroness was, yet these words pierced her
+heart.  She turned with a piteous, half apologetic air to Edouard
+and Aubertin.  "Gentlemen," said she, "she has been foolish, not
+guilty.  Heaven pardons the best of us.  Surely a mother may forgive
+her child."  And with this nature conquered utterly; and she held
+out her arms, wide, wide, as is a mother's heart.  Her two erring
+children rushed sobbing violently into them; and there was not a dry
+eye in the room for a long time.
+
+After this, Josephine's heart almost ceased to beat.  Fear and
+misgivings, and the heavy sense of deceit gnawing an honorable
+heart, were gone.  Grief reigned alone in the pale, listless,
+bereaved widow.
+
+The marriage was annulled before the mayor; and, three days
+afterwards, Raynal, by his influence, got the consummated marriage
+formally allowed in Paris.
+
+With a delicacy for which one would hardly have given him credit, he
+never came near Beaurepaire till all this was settled; but he
+brought the document from Paris that made Josephine the widow
+Dujardin, and her boy the heir of Beaurepaire; and the moment she
+was really Madame Dujardin he avoided her no longer; and he became a
+comfort to her instead of a terror.
+
+The dissolution of the marriage was a great tie between them.  So
+much that, seeing how much she looked up to Raynal, the doctor said
+one day to the baroness, "If I know anything of human nature, they
+will marry again, provided none of you give her a hint which way her
+heart is turning."
+
+They, who have habituated themselves to live for others, can suffer
+as well as do great things.  Josephine kept alive.  A passion such
+as hers, in a selfish nature, must have killed her.
+
+Even as it was, she often said, "It is hard to live."
+
+Then they used to talk to her of her boy.  Would she leave him--
+Camille's boy--without a mother?  And these words were never spoken
+to her quite in vain.
+
+Her mother forgave her entirely, and loved her as before.  Who could
+be angry with her long?  The air was no longer heavy with lies.
+Wretched as she was, she breathed lighter.  Joy and hope were gone.
+Sorrowful peace was coming.  When the heart comes to this, nothing
+but Time can cure; but what will not Time do?  What wounds have I
+seen him heal!  His cures are incredible.
+
+
+The little party sat one day, peaceful, but silent and sad, in the
+Pleasaunce, under the great oak.
+
+Two soldiers came to the gate.  They walked feebly, for one was
+lame, and leaned upon the other, who was pale and weak, and leaned
+upon a stick.
+
+"Soldiers," said Raynal, "and invalided."
+
+"Give them food and wine," said Josephine.
+
+Rose went towards them; but she had scarcely taken three steps ere
+she cried out,--
+
+"It is Dard! it is poor Dard!  Come in, Dard, come in."
+
+Dard limped towards them, leaning upon Sergeant La Croix.  A bit of
+Dard's heel had been shot away, and of La Croix's head.
+
+Rose ran to the kitchen.
+
+"Jacintha, bring out a table into the Pleasaunce, and something for
+two guests to eat."
+
+The soldiers came slowly to the Pleasaunce, and were welcomed, and
+invited to sit down, and received with respect; for France even in
+that day honored the humblest of her brave.
+
+Soon Jacintha came out with a little round table in her hands, and
+affected a composure which was belied by her shaking hands and her
+glowing cheek.
+
+After a few words of homely welcome--not eloquent, but very sincere--
+she went off again with her apron to her eyes.  She reappeared with
+the good cheer, and served the poor fellows with radiant zeal.
+
+"What regiment?" asked Raynal.
+
+Dard was about to answer, but his superior stopped him severely;
+then, rising with his hand to his forehead, he replied, with pride,
+"Twenty-fourth brigade, second company.  We were cut up at
+Philipsburg, and incorporated with the 12th."
+
+Raynal instantly regretted his question; for Josephine's eye fixed
+on Sergeant La Croix with an expression words cannot paint.  Yet she
+showed more composure, real or forced, than he expected.
+
+"Heaven sends him," said she.  "My friend, tell me, were you--ah!"
+
+Colonel Raynal interfered hastily.  "Think what you do.  He can tell
+you nothing but what we know, not so much, in fact, as we know; for,
+now I look at him, I think this is the very sergeant we found lying
+insensible under the bastion.  He must have been struck before the
+bastion was taken even."
+
+"I was, colonel, I was.  I remember nothing but losing my senses,
+and feeling the colors go out of my hand."
+
+"There, you see, he knows nothing," said Raynal.
+
+"It was hot work, colonel, under that bastion, but it was hotter to
+the poor fellows that got in.  I heard all about it from Private
+Dard here."
+
+"So, then, it was you who carried the colors?"
+
+"Yes, I was struck down with the colors of the brigade in my hand,"
+cried La Croix.
+
+"See how people blunder about, everything; they told me the colonel
+carried the colors."
+
+"Why, of course he did.  You don't think our colonel, the fighting
+colonel, would let me hold the colors of the brigade so long as he
+was alive.  No; he was struck by a Prussian bullet, and he had just
+time to hand the colors to me, and point with his sword to the
+bastion, and down he went.  It was hot work, I can tell you.  I did
+not hold them long, not thirty seconds, and if we could know their
+history, they passed through more hands than that before they got to
+the Prussian flag-staff."
+
+Raynal suddenly rose, and walked rapidly to and fro, with his hands
+behind him.
+
+"Poor colonel!" continued La Croix.  "Well, I love to think he died
+like a soldier, and not like some of my poor comrades, hashed to
+atoms, and not a volley fired over him.  I hope they put a stone
+over him, for he was the best soldier and the best general in the
+army."
+
+"O sir!" cried Josephine, "there is no stone even to mark the spot
+where he fell," and she sobbed despairingly.
+
+"Why, how is this, Private Dard?" inquired La Croix, sternly.
+
+Dard apologized for his comrade, and touching his own head
+significantly told them that since his wound the sergeant's memory
+was defective.
+
+"Now, sergeant, didn't I tell you the colonel must have got the
+better of his wound, and got into the battery?"
+
+"It's false, Private Dard; don't I know our colonel better than
+that?  Would ever he have let those colors out of his hand, if there
+had been an ounce of life left in him?"
+
+"He died at the foot of the battery, I tell you."
+
+"Then why didn't we find him?"
+
+Here Jacintha put in a word with the quiet subdued meaning of her
+class.  "I can't find that anybody ever saw the colonel dead."
+
+"They did not find him, because they did not look for him," said
+Sergeant La Croix.
+
+"God forgive you, sergeant!" said Dard, with some feeling.  "Not
+look for OUR COLONEL!  We turned over every body that lay there,--
+full thirty there were,--and you were one of them."
+
+"Only thirty!  Why, we settled more Prussians than that, I'll
+swear."
+
+"Oh! they carried off their dead."
+
+"Ay! but I don't see why they should carry our colonel off.  His
+epaulets was all the thieves could do any good with.  Stop! yet I
+do, Private Dard; I have a horrible suspicion.  No, I have not; it
+is a certainty.  What! don't you see, ye ninny?  Thunder and
+thousands of devils, here's a disgrace.  Dogs of Prussians! they
+have got our colonel, they have taken him prisoner."
+
+"O God bless them!" cried Josephine; "O God bless the mouth that
+tells me so!  O sir, I am his wife, his poor heart-broken wife.  You
+would not be so cruel as to mock my despair.  Say again that he may
+be alive, pray, say it again!"
+
+"His wife!  Private Dard, why didn't you tell me?  You tell me
+nothing.  Yes, my pretty lady, I'll say it again, and I'll prove it.
+Here is an enemy in full retreat, would they encumber themselves
+with the colonel?  If he was dead, they'd have whipped off his
+epaulets, and left him there.  Alive? why not?  Look at me: I am
+alive, and I was worse wounded than he was.  They took me for dead,
+you see.  Courage, madame! you will see him again, take an old
+soldier's word for it.  Dard, attention! this is the colonel's
+wife."
+
+She gazed on the speaker like one in a trance.
+
+Every eye and every soul had been so bent on Sergeant La Croix that
+it was only now Raynal was observed to be missing.  The next minute
+he came riding out of the stable-yard, and went full gallop down the
+road.
+
+"Ah!" cried Rose, with a burst of hope; "he thinks so too; he has
+hopes.  He is gone somewhere for information.  Perhaps to Paris."
+
+Josephine's excitement and alternations of hope and fear were now
+alarming.  Rose held her hand, and implored her to try and be calm
+till they could see Raynal.
+
+Just before dark he came riding fiercely home.  Josephine flew down
+the stairs.  Raynal at sight of her forgot all his caution.  He
+waved his cocked hat in the air.  She fell on her knees and thanked
+God.  He gasped out,--
+
+"Prisoner--exchanged for two Prussian lieutenants--sent home--they
+say he is in France!"
+
+The tears of joy gushed in streams from her.
+
+Some days passed in hope and joy inexpressible; but the good doctor
+was uneasy for Josephine.  She was always listening with
+supernatural keenness and starting from her chair, and every fibre
+of her lovely person seemed to be on the quiver.
+
+Nor was Rose without a serious misgiving.  Would husband and wife
+ever meet?  He evidently looked on her as Madame Raynal, and made it
+a point of honor to keep away from Beaurepaire.
+
+They had recourse to that ever-soothing influence--her child.
+Madame Jouvenel was settled in the village, and Josephine visited
+her every day, and came back often with red eyes, but always
+soothed.
+
+One day Rose and she went to Madame Jouvenel, and, entering the
+house without ceremony, found the nurse out, and no one watching the
+child.
+
+"How careless!" said Rose.
+
+Josephine stopped eagerly to kiss him.  But instead of kissing him,
+she uttered a loud cry.  There was a locket hanging round his neck.
+
+It was a locket containing some of Josephine's hair and Camille's.
+She had given it him in the happy days that followed their marriage.
+She stood gasping in the middle of the room.  Madame Jouvenel came
+running in soon after.  Josephine, by a wonderful effort over
+herself, asked her calmly and cunningly,--
+
+"Where is the gentleman who put this locket round my child's neck?
+I want to speak with him."
+
+Madame Jouvenel stammered and looked confused.
+
+"A soldier--an officer?--come, tell me!"
+
+"Woman," cried Rose, "why do you hesitate?"
+
+"What am I to do?" said Madame Jouvenel.  "He made me swear never to
+mention his coming here.  He goes away, or hides whenever you come.
+And since Madame does not love the poor wounded gentleman, what can
+he do better?"
+
+"Not love him!" cried Rose: "why, she is his wife, his lawful wedded
+wife; he is a fool or a monster to run away for her.  She loves him
+as no woman ever loved before.  She pines for him.  She dies for
+him."
+
+The door of a little back room opened at these words of Rose, and
+there stood Camille, with his arm in a sling, pale and astounded,
+but great joy and wonder working in his face.
+
+Josephine gave a cry of love that made the other two women weep, and
+in a moment they were sobbing for joy upon each other's neck.
+
+Away went sorrow, doubt, despair, and all they had suffered.  That
+one moment paid for all.  And in that moment of joy and surprise, so
+great as to be almost terrible, perhaps it was well for Josephine
+that Camille, weakened by his wound, was quite overcome, and nearly
+fainted.  She was herself just going into hysterics; but, seeing him
+quite overcome, she conquered them directly, and nursed, and
+soothed, and pitied, and encouraged him instead.
+
+Then they sat hand in hand.  Their happiness stopped their very
+breath.  They could not speak.  So Rose told him all.  He never
+owned why he had slipped away when he saw them coming.  He forgot
+it.  He forgot all his hard thoughts of her.  They took him home in
+the carriage.  His wife would not let him out of her sight.  For
+years and years after this she could hardly bear to let him be an
+hour out of her sight.
+
+The world is wide; there may be a man in it who can paint the sudden
+bliss that fell on these two much suffering hearts; but I am not
+that man; this is beyond me; it was not only heaven, but heaven
+after hell.
+
+Leave we the indescribable and the unspeakable for a moment, and go
+to a lighter theme.
+
+The day Rose's character was so unexpectedly cleared, Edouard had no
+opportunity of speaking to her, or a reconciliation would have taken
+place.  As it was, he went home intensely happy.  But he did not
+resume his visits to the chateau.  When he came to think calmly over
+it, his vanity was cruelly mortified.  She was innocent of the
+greater offence; but how insolently she had sacrificed him, his
+love, and his respect, to another's interest.
+
+More generous thoughts prevailed by degrees.  And one day that her
+pale face, her tears, and her remorse got the better of his offended
+pride, he determined to give her a good lecture that should drown
+her in penitent tears; and then end by forgiving her.  For one thing
+he could not be happy till he had forgiven her.
+
+She walked into the room with a calm, dignified, stately air, and
+before he could utter one word of his grave remonstrance, attacked
+him thus: "You wish to speak to me, sir.  If it is to apologize to
+me, I will save your vanity the mortification.  I forgive you."
+
+"YOU forgive ME!" cried Edouard furiously.
+
+"No violence, if you please," said the lady with cold hauteur.  "Let
+us be friends, as Josephine and Raynal are.  We cannot be anything
+more to one another now.  You have wounded me too deeply by your
+jealous, suspicious nature."
+
+Edouard gasped for breath, and was so far out-generalled that he
+accepted the place of defendant.  "Wasn't I to believe your own
+lips?  Did not Colonel Raynal believe you?"
+
+"Oh, that's excusable.  He did not know me.  But you were my lover;
+you ought to have seen I was forced to deceive poor Raynal.  How
+dare you believe your eyes; much more your ears, against my truth,
+against my honor; and then to believe such nonsense?"  Then, with a
+grand assumption of superior knowledge, says she, "You little
+simpleton, how could the child be mine when I wasn't married at
+all?"
+
+At this reproach, Edouard first stared, then grinned.  "I forgot
+that," said he.
+
+"Yes, and you forgot the moon isn't made of green cheese.  However,
+if I saw you very humble, and very penitent, I might, perhaps,
+really forgive you--in time."
+
+"No, forgive me at once.  I don't understand your angelical,
+diabolical, incomprehensible sex: who on earth can? forgive me."
+
+"Oh! oh! oh! oh!"
+
+Lo! the tears that could not come at a remonstrance were flowing in
+a stream at his generosity.
+
+"What is the matter now?" said he tenderly.  She cried away, but at
+the same time explained,--
+
+"What a f--f--foolish you must be not to see that it is I who am
+without excuse.  You were my betrothed.  It was to you I owed my
+duty; not my sister.  I am a wicked, unhappy girl.  How you must
+hate me!"
+
+"I adore you.  There, no more forgiving on either side.  Let our
+only quarrel be who shall love the other best."
+
+"Oh, I know how that will be," said the observant toad.  "You will
+love me best till you have got me; and then I shall love you best;
+oh, ever so much."
+
+However, the prospect of loving best did not seem disagreeable to
+her; for with this announcement she deposited her head on his
+shoulder, and in that attitude took a little walk with him up and
+down the Pleasaunce: sixty times; about eight miles.
+
+These two were a happy pair.  This wayward, but generous heart never
+forgot her offence, and his forgiveness.  She gave herself to him
+heart and soul, at the altar, and well she redeemed her vow.  He
+rose high in political life: and paid the penalty of that sort of
+ambition; his heart was often sore.  But by his own hearth sat
+comfort and ever ready sympathy.  Ay, and patient industry to read
+blue-books, and a ready hand and brain to write diplomatic notes for
+him, off which the mind glided as from a ball of ice.
+
+In thirty years she never once mentioned the servants to him.
+
+"Oh, let eternal honor crown her name!"
+
+It was only a little bit of heel that Dard had left in Prussia.
+More fortunate than his predecessor (Achilles), he got off with a
+slight but enduring limp.  And so the army lost him.
+
+He married Jacintha, and Josephine set them up in Bigot's,
+(deceased) auberge.  Jacintha shone as a landlady, and custom flowed
+in.  For all that, a hankering after Beaurepaire was observable in
+her.  Her favorite stroll was into the Beaurepaire kitchen, and on
+all fetes and grand occasions she was prominent in gay attire as a
+retainer of the house.  The last specimen of her homely sagacity I
+shall have the honor to lay before you is a critique upon her
+husband, which she vented six years after marriage.
+
+"My Dard," said she, "is very good as far as he goes.  What he has
+felt himself, that he can feel FOR: nobody better.  You come to him
+with an empty belly, or a broken head, or all bleeding with a cut,
+or black and blue, and you shall find a friend.  But if it is a sore
+heart, or trouble, and sorrow, and no hole in your carcass to show
+for it, you had better come to ME; for you might as well tell your
+grief to a stone wall as to my man."
+
+
+The baroness took her son Raynal to Paris, and there, with keen eye,
+selected him a wife.  She proved an excellent one.  It would have
+been hard if she had not, for the baroness with the severe sagacity
+of her age and sex, had set aside as naught a score of seeming
+angels, before she could suit herself with a daughter-in-law.  At
+first the Raynals very properly saw little of the Dujardins; but
+when both had been married some years, the recollection of that
+fleeting and nominal connection waxed faint, while the memory of
+great benefits conferred on both sides remained lively as ever in
+hearts so great, and there was a warm, a sacred friendship between
+the two houses--a friendship of the ancient Greeks, not of the
+modern club-house.
+
+Camille and Josephine were blessed almost beyond the lot of
+humanity: none can really appreciate sunshine but those who come out
+of the cold dark.  And so with happiness.  For years they could
+hardly be said to live like mortals: they basked in bliss.  But it
+was a near thing; for they but just scraped clear of life-long
+misery, and death's cold touch grazed them both as they went.
+
+Yet they had heroic virtues to balance White Lies in the great
+Judge's eye.
+
+A wholesome lesson, therefore, and a warning may be gathered from
+this story: and I know many novelists who would have preached that
+lesson at some length in every other chapter, and interrupted the
+sacred narrative to do it.  But when I read stories so mutilated, I
+think of a circumstance related by Mr. Joseph Miller.
+
+"An Englishman sojourning in some part of Scotland was afflicted
+with many hairs in the butter, and remonstrated.  He was told, in
+reply, that the hairs and the butter came from one source--the cow;
+and that the just and natural proportions hitherto observed, could
+not be deranged, and bald butter invented--for ONE.  'So be it,'
+said the Englishman; 'but let me have the butter in one plate, and
+the hairs in another.'"
+
+Acting on this hint, I have reserved some admirable remarks,
+reflections, discourses, and tirades, until the story should be
+ended, and the other plate be ready for the subsidiary sermon.
+
+And now that the proper time is come, that love of intruding one's
+own wisdom in one's own person on the reader, which has marred so
+many works of art, is in my case restrained--first, by pure fatigue;
+secondly, because the moral of this particular story stands out so
+clear in the narrative, that he who runs may read it without any
+sermon at all.
+
+Those who will not take the trouble to gather my moral from the
+living tree, would not lift it out of my dead basket: would not
+unlock their jaw-bones to bite it, were I to thrust it into their
+very mouths.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of The Project Gutenberg Etext of White Lies, by Charles Reade
+
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