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Title: The works of Guy de Maupassant, Vol. 5

Author: Guy de Maupassant

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Language: English

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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WORKS OF
GUY DE MAUPASSANT, VOL. 5 ***

Transcriber's Notes

1. Inconsistencies in hyphenation have been
maintained.

2. Several misprints and punctuation errors corrected.
Hover over underlined word in the text to see the
corrections made. A list of corrections can be found
at the end of the text.

The Works of Guy de Maupassant

VOLUME V
UNE VIE
AND OTHER STORIES

ILLUSTRATED

NATIONAL LIBRARY COMPANY
NEW YORK

Copyright, 1909
By BIGELOW, SMITH & CO.

CONTENTS
Introduction
A Woman's Life (Une Vie)
Hautot Senior and Hautot Junior
Little Rouise Roqué
Mother and Daughter
A Passion
No Quarter
The Impolite Sex
Woman's Wiles

INTRODUCTION
By Edmund Gosse

The most robust and masculine of recent French novelists is a typical
Norman, sprung from an ancient noble family, originally of Lorraine, but
long settled in the Pays de Caux. The traveler from England towards Paris,
soon after leaving Dieppe, sees on his left hand, immediately beyond the
station of St. Aubin, a handsome sixteenth-century house, the Château de
Miromesnil, on a hill above the railway. Here, surrounded by the relics of
his warlike and courtly ancestors, Henri René Albert Guy de Maupassant
was born on the 5th of August, 1850. He was early associated with the great
Norman master of fiction, Gustave Flaubert, who perceived his genius and
enthusiastically undertook the training of his intelligence. Through 1870
and 1871 the young man served in the war as a common soldier. He was
somewhat slow in taking up the profession of letters, and was thirty years of
age before he became in any degree distinguished. In 1879 the Troisième
Théâtre Français produced a short play of his, Histoire du Vieux Temps (An
Old-World Story), gracefully written in rhyme, but showing no very
remarkable aptitude for the stage.
It was in 1880 that De Maupassant was suddenly made famous by two
published volumes. The one was a volume of Verses (Des Vers), twenty
pieces, most of them of a narrative character, extremely brilliant in
execution, and audacious in tone. One of these, slightly exceeding its
fellows in crudity, was threatened with a prosecution in law as an outrage
upon manners, and the fortune of the volume was secured. The early poems
of De Maupassant like those of Paul Bourget, are not without sterling merit
as poetry, but their main interest is that they reflect the characteristics of
their author's mind. Such pieces as "Fin-d'Amour," and "Au Bord de l'Eau,"
in the 1880 volume, are simply short stories told in verse, instead of in
prose. In this same year, Guy de Maupassant, who had thrown in his lot
with the Naturalist Novelists, contributed a short tale to the volume called
Les Soirées de Médan, to which Zola, Huysmans, Hennique, Céard and
Paul Alexis also affixed their names. He was less known than any of these

men, yet it was his story, Boule de Suif (Lump of Suet, or Ball of Fat),
which ensured the success of the book. This episode of the war, treated with
cynicism, tenderness, humor and pathos mingled in quite a new manner,
revealed a fresh genius for the art of narrative. There was an instant demand
for more short stories from the same pen, and it was soon discovered that
the fecundity and resource of the new writer were as extraordinary as the
charm of his style and the objective force of his vision.
It is unnecessary to recount here the names of even the chief of De
Maupassant's stories. If we judge them merely by their vivacity, richness
and variety, they are the best short tales which have been produced
anywhere during the same years. But it is impossible not to admit that they
have grave faults, which exclude them from all possible recommendation to
young and ingenuous readers. No bibliography of them can be attempted,
the publishers of M. Guy de Maupassant having reprinted his lesser stories
so frequently, and with such infinite varieties of arrangement, that the
positive sequence of these little masterpieces has been hopelessly confused.
Three stories in particular, however, may be mentioned, La Maison Tellier,
1881; Les Sœurs Rondoli, 1884, and Miss Harriett, 1885, because the
collections which originally bore these names were pre-eminently
successful in drawing the attention of the critics to the author's work.
It was not until he had won a very great reputation as a short story-teller,
that De Maupassant attempted a long novel. He published only six single
volume stories, all of which are included in the present edition. The first
was Une Vie (A Life), 1883, a very careful study of Norman manners,
highly finished in the manner of Flaubert, whom he has styled "that
irreproachable master whom I admire above all others." In certain
directions, I do not think that De Maupassant has surpassed Une Vie, in
fidelity to nature, in a Dutch exactitude of portraiture, in a certain
distinction of tone; it was the history of an unhappy gentlewoman, doomed
throughout life to be deceived, impoverished, disdained and overwhelmed.
Bel-Ami, 1885, which succeeded this quiet and Quaker-colored book, was a
much more vivid novel, an extremely vigorous picture of the rise in social
prominence of a penniless fellow in Paris, without a brain or a heart, who
depends wholly upon his impudence and his good looks. After 1885 De
Maupassant published four novels—Mont-Oriol, 1887; Pierre et Jean,

1888; Fort comme la Mort (As Strong as Death, or The Ruling Passion),
1889; and Nôtre Cœur (Our Heart), 1890.
Of these six remarkable books, the Pierre et Jean is certainly the most
finished and the most agreeable. In Mont-Oriol, a beautiful landscape of
Auvergne mountain and bath enshrines a singularly pessimistic rendering of
the adage "He loved and he rode away." Few of the author's thoughtful
admirers will admit that in Fort comme la Mort he has done justice to his
powers. In Nôtre Cœur he has taken up one of the psychological problems
which have hitherto lain in the undisputed province of M. Bourget, and has
shown how difficult it is in the musky atmosphere of fashionable Paris for
two hearts to recover the Mayday freshness of their impulses, the
spontaneous flow of their illusions; he displays himself here in a new light,
less brutal than of old, more delicate and analytical. With regard to Pierre et
Jean, it would be difficult to find words wherewith to describe it and its
relation to the best English fiction more just or more felicitous than those in
which Mr. Henry James welcomed its first appearance:—"Pierre et Jean is,
so far as my judgment goes, a faultless production.... It is the best of M. de
Maupassant's novels, mainly because M. de Maupassant has never before
been so clever. It is a pleasure to see a mature talent able to renew itself,
strike another note, and appear still young.... The author's choice of a
milieu, moreover, will serve to English readers as an example of how much
more democratic contemporary French fiction is than that of his own
country. The greater part of it—almost all the work of Zola and of Daudet,
the list of Flaubert's novels, and the best of those of the brothers De
Goncourt—treat of that vast, dim section of society, which, lying between
those luxurious walks on whose behalf there are easy suppositions and that
darkness of misery which, in addition to being picturesque, brings
philanthropy also to the writer's aid, constitutes really, in extent and
expressiveness, the substance of every nation. In England, where the
fashion of fiction still sets mainly to the country-house and the hunting-
field, and yet more novels are published than anywhere else in the world,
that thick twilight of mediocrity of condition has been little explored. May
it yield triumphs in the years to come!"
The great merit of M. de Maupassant as a writer is his frank and masculine
directness. He sees life clearly, and he undertakes to describe it as he sees it,
in concise and vigorous language. He is a realist, yet without the

gloominess of Zola, over whom he claims one great advantage, that of
possessing a rich sense of humor, and a large share of the old Gallic wit. His
pessimism, indeed, is inexorable, and he pushes the misfortune, or more
often the degradation, of his characters to its extreme logical conclusion.
Yet, even in his saddest stories, the general design is rarely sordid. For a
long while he was almost exclusively concerned with impressions of
Normandy; a little later he became one of the many painters of Paris. Then
he traveled widely, in the south of Europe, in Africa; wherever he went he
took with him a quick and sensitive eye for the aspects of nature, and his
descriptive passages, which are never pushed to a tiresome excess of length,
are often faultlessly vivid. He attempted, with a good deal of cleverness, to
analyze character, but his real power seems to lie in describing, in a sober
style and with a virile impartiality, the superficial aspects of action and
intrigue.

UNE VIE
(A WOMAN'S LIFE)

I

Jeanne, having finished her packing, went to the window, but it had not
stopped raining.
All night long the downpour had pattered against the roofs and the window-
panes. The low, heavy clouds seemed as though they had burst, and were
emptying themselves on the world, to reduce it to a pulp and melt it as
though it were a sugar-loaf. A hot wind swept by in gusts; the murmur of
the overflowing gutters filled the empty streets, and the houses, like
sponges, absorbed the moisture which, penetrating to the interior, made the
walls wet from cellar to attic.
Jeanne, who had left the convent the day before, free at last and ready for
all the happiness of a life of which she had dreamed for so long, feared that
her father would hesitate about starting if the weather did not clear up, and,
for the hundredth time since the morning, she studied the horizon.
Looking round, she saw that she had forgotten to put her almanac in her
traveling bag. She took from the wall the little card which bore in the center
of a design, the date of the current year 1819 in gilt letters, and crossed out
with a pencil the first four columns, drawing a line through each saint's
name till she came to the second of May, the day she had left the convent.
A voice outside the door called: "Jeannette!"
Jeanne answered: "Come in, papa." And her father appeared.
The Baron Simon-Jecques Le Perthuis des Vauds was a gentleman of the
old school, eccentric and good-hearted. An enthusiastic follower of Jean-
Jacques Rousseau, he had a loving tenderness for all nature; for the fields,
the woods, and for animals. An aristocrat by birth, he hated '93 by instinct;

but of a philosophical temperament and liberal by education, he loathed
tyranny with an inoffensive and declamatory hatred. The strongest, and at
the same time the weakest, trait in his character was his generosity; a
generosity which had not enough arms to caress, to give, to embrace; the
generosity of a creator which was utterly devoid of system, and to which he
gave way with no attempt to resist his impulses, as though part of his will
were paralyzed; it was a want of energy, and almost amounted to a vice.
A man of theories, he had thought out a whole plan of education for his
daughter, wishing to make her happy and good, straightforward and
affectionate. Till she was twelve years old she had stayed at home; then, in
spite of her mother's tears, she was sent to the Sacred Heart Convent. He
had kept her strictly immured there, totally ignorant of worldly things, for
he wished her to return to him, at the age of seventeen, innocent, that he
might himself immerse her in a sort of bath of rational poetry; and, in the
fields, surrounded by the fertile earth, he meant to instruct her, and
enlighten her by the sight of the serene laws of life, the innocent loves and
the simple tenderness of the animals.
And now she was leaving the convent, radiant and brimful of happiness,
ready for every joy and for all the charming adventures that, in the idle
moments of her days and during the long nights, she had already pictured to
herself.
She looked like a portrait by Veronese, with her shining, fair hair, which
looked as though it had given part of its color to her skin, the creamy skin
of a high-born girl, hardly tinted with pink and shaded by a soft velvety
down, which could just be seen when she was kissed by a sun-ray. Her eyes
were blue, an opaque blue, like the eyes of a Dutch china figure. On her left
nostril was a little mole, another on the right side of her chin, where curled
a few hairs so much like the color of the skin that they could hardly be seen.
She was tall, with a well-developed chest and supple waist. Her clear voice
sometimes sounded too shrill, but her merry laugh made everyone around
her feel happy. She had a way of frequently putting both hands to her
forehead, as though to smooth her hair.
She ran to her father, put her arms around his neck and kissed him.
"Well, are we going to start?" she asked.

He smiled, shook back his white hair, which he wore rather long, and
pointing towards the window:
"How can you think of traveling in such weather?" he said.
Then she pleaded coaxingly and affectionately, "Oh, papa, please do let us
start. It will be fine in the afternoon."
"But your mother will never consent to it."
"Oh, yes, I promise you she shall; I will answer for her."
"Well, if you can persuade your mother, I am quite willing to start."
She hastened towards the baroness's room, for she had looked forward to
this day with great impatience. Since she had entered the convent she had
not left Rouen, as her father would allow no distracting pleasures before the
age he had fixed. Only twice had she been taken to Paris for a fortnight, but
that was another town, and she longed for the country. Now she was going
to spend the summer on their estate, Les Peuples, in an old family château
built on the cliff near Yport; and she was looking forward to the boundless
happiness of a free life beside the waves. And then it was understood that
the manor was to be given to her, and that she was to live there always
when she was married; and the rain which had been falling incessantly
since the night before was the first real grief of her life.
In three minutes she came running out of her mother's room, crying:
"Papa! papa! Mamma is quite willing. Tell them to harness the horses."
The rain had not given over in the least, in fact, it was coming down still
faster when the landau came round to the door. Jeanne was ready to jump in
when the baroness came down the stairs, supported on one side by her
husband, and on the other by a tall maid, whose frame was as strong and as
well-knit as a boy's. She was a Normandy girl from Caux, and looked at
least twenty years old, though she really was scarcely eighteen. In the
baron's family she was treated somewhat like a second daughter, for she
was Jeanne's foster-sister. She was named Rosalie, and her principal duty
consisted in aiding her mistress to walk, for, within the last few years, the

baroness had attained an enormous size, owing to an hypertrophy of the
heart, of which she was always complaining.
Breathing very hard, the baroness reached the steps of the old hotel; there
she stopped to look at the court-yard where the water was streaming down,
and murmured:
"Really, it is not prudent."
Her husband answered with a smile:
"It was you who wished it, Madame Adélaïde."
She bore the pompous name of Adélaïde, and he always prefaced it by
"Madame" with a certain little look of mock-respect.
She began to move forward again, and with difficulty got into the carriage,
all the springs of which bent under her weight. The baron sat by her side,
and Jeanne and Rosalie took their places with their backs to the horses.
Ludivine, the cook, brought a bundle of rugs, which were thrown over their
knees, and two baskets, which were pushed under their legs; then she
climbed up beside old Simon and enveloped herself in a great rug, which
covered her entirely. The concierge and his wife came to shut the gate and
wish them good-bye, and after some parting instructions about the baggage,
which was to follow in a cart, the carriage started.
Old Simon, the coachman, with his head held down and his back bent under
the rain, could hardly be seen in his three-caped coat; and the moaning wind
rattled against the windows and swept the rain along the road.
The horses trotted briskly down to the quay, passed the row of big ships,
whose masts and yards and ropes stood out against the gray sky like bare
trees, and entered the long Boulevard du Mont Riboudet. Soon they reached
the country, and from time to time the outline of a weeping-willow, with its
branches hanging in a corpse-like inertness, could be vaguely seen through
the watery mist. The horses' shoes clattered on the road; and the four wheels
made regular rings of mud.
Inside the carriage they were silent; their spirits seemed damped, like the
earth. The baroness leaned back, rested her head against the cushions, and

closed her eyes. The baron looked out mournfully at the monotonous, wet
fields, and Rosalie, with a parcel on her knees, sat musing in the animal-like
way in which the lower classes indulge. But Jeanne felt herself revive under
this warm rain like a plant which is put into the open air after being shut up
in a dark closet; and the greatness of her joy seemed to prevent any sadness
reaching her heart. Although she did not speak, she wanted to sing and to
put her hand outside and drink the water with which it would be filled; and
the desolate look of the country only added to the enjoyment she felt at
being carried along so swiftly, and at feeling herself sheltered in the midst
of this deluge.
Under the ceaseless rain a cloud of steam rose from the backs of the two
horses.
The baroness gradually fell asleep; her face, surrounded by six stiff curls,
sank lower and lower, though it was partly sustained by the three big waves
of her neck, the last curves of which lost themselves in the amplitude of her
chest. Her head, raised by each respiration, as regularly sank again; her
cheeks puffed out, and from her half-opened lips issued a deep snore. Her
husband leaned over towards her and softly placed in her hands, crossed on
her ample lap, a leather pocket-book. The touch awoke her, and she looked
at the object in her lap with the stupefied look of one suddenly aroused
from sleep. The pocket-book fell and opened, and the gold and bank-notes it
contained were scattered all over the carriage. That woke her up altogether,
and the light-heartedness of her daughter found vent in a burst of laughter.
The baron picked up the money and placed it on her knees.
"There, my dear," he said. "That is all that is left of the farm at Eletot. I
have sold it to pay for the doing up of Les Peuples as we shall live there so
much now."
She counted the six thousand, four hundred francs, and put them quietly
into her pocket.
It was the ninth farm that they had sold out of the thirty-one left them by
their parents; but they still had about twenty thousand livres a year coming
in from property which, well-managed, would have easily brought in thirty
thousand francs. As they lived quietly, this income would have been amply

sufficient for them, if their lavish generosity had not constantly exhausted
their supplies. It drained their money from them as the sun draws water
from a swamp. The gold melted, vanished, disappeared. How? No one
knew. One of them was always saying: "I don't know how it is, but I have
spent a hundred francs to-day, and I haven't anything to show for it."
To give was one of the great joys of their existence, and they perfectly
understood each other on this point in a way that was at once grand and
touching.
Jeanne asked: "Is my château looking beautiful now?"
"You will see, my child," answered the baron, gaily.
Little by little the violence of the storm diminished; soon there was nothing
more than a sort of mist, a very fine drizzling rain. The arch of the clouds
seemed to get higher and lighter; and suddenly a long oblique sunbeam fell
on the fields. Through the break in the clouds a streak of blue sky could be
seen, and then the rift got bigger as though a veil were being drawn back,
and a beautiful sky of a pure deep blue spread itself out over the world.
There was a fresh mild breeze like a happy sigh from the earth, and from
the gardens and woods came now and again the merry song of a bird drying
his wings.
The evening was drawing in; everyone inside the carriage, except Jeanne,
was asleep. Twice they had stopped at an inn, to rest the horses and give
them water and corn. The sun had set, and in the distance the bells were
ringing; in a little village the lamps were being lighted, and the sky was
studded with stars. Sometimes the lights of a homestead could be seen, their
rays piercing the darkness; and, all at once among the fir-trees, behind a
hill, the large, red, sleepy moon arose.
It was so mild that the windows were left down, and Jeanne, tired of
dreaming, and her stock of happy visions exhausted, was now sleeping.
Sometimes the numbness caused by resting too long in one position aroused
her, and she looked outside and saw the trees fly past her in the clear night,
or some cows, lying in a field, raise their heads at the noise of the carriage.
Then she settled herself in a fresh position, and tried to continue an
interrupted dream, but the continual rumbling of the carriage sounded in her

ears, confusing her thoughts, and she shut her eyes again, her mind feeling
as tired as her body.
At last the carriage stopped, and men and women came to the doors with
lanterns in their hands. They had arrived, and Jeanne, suddenly awakened,
sprang out, while her father and Rosalie, lighted by a farmer, almost carried
in the baroness; she was quite worn out, and, catching her breath, she kept
saying in a weak little voice: "Ah, my children! what shall I do?" She would
have nothing to eat or drink, but went to bed and fell asleep at once.
Jeanne and the baron had supper alone. They smiled when their glances
met, and, at every moment, took each other's hands across the table; then,
both of them filled with a childish delight, they went over the manor which
had just been put in thorough repair.
It was one of those big, high, Normandy houses generally built of white
stone which turns gray, and which, large enough to accommodate a
regiment, have something of the farm about them as well as the château.
An immense hall, going from end to end, divided the house into two parts,
its large doors opening opposite each other. A double staircase bestrode this
entrance hall leaving the center empty, and, meeting at the height of the first
floor, formed a sort of bridge. On the ground-floor, to the right, was the
huge drawing-room hung with tapestry with a design of birds and flowers.
All the furniture was in tapestry, the subjects of the designs being taken
from La Fontaine's fables. Jeanne was delighted at recognizing a chair she
had liked when she was quite a child, and which represented the history of
the Fox and the Stork. The library, full of old books, and two other rooms,
which were not used, came next to the drawing-room. On the left were the
dining-room, which had been newly wainscoted, the linen-press, the pantry,
the kitchen, and a little room with a bath in it.
A corridor ran the whole length of the first story, the ten doors of as many
rooms opening on to it, and Jeanne's room was quite at the end, on the right.
The baron had just had it freshly furnished by simply using some hangings
and furniture that had been stored away in a garret. Very old Flemish
tapestry peopled the room with strange characters, and when she saw the
bed Jeanne gave a cry of delight. At the four corners four birds of carved
oak, quite black and polished till they shone, supported the bed, looking as

though they were its guardians. The sides were decorated with two large
garlands of carved flowers and fruit; and the four bed-posts, finely fluted
and crowned with Corinthian capitals, supported a cornice of entwined
roses and cupids. It was a monumental couch, and yet was very graceful,
despite the somber appearance of the wood darkened by age. The
counterpane and canopy, made of old dark blue silk, starred here and there
with great fleurs de lis embroidered in gold, sparkled like two firmaments.
When she had finished admiring the bed, Jeanne, raising her light,
examined the tapestry, trying to discover the subject of the design.
A young nobleman and a young lady, dressed in the strangest way in green,
red, and yellow, were talking under a blue tree on which white fruit was
ripening. A big rabbit of the same color as the fruit was nibbling a little gray
grass. Just above the figures, in a conventional distance, five little round
houses with pointed roofs could be seen, and up at the top, nearly in the sky,
was a red wind-mill. Great branches of flowers twined in and out over the
whole.
The next two panels were very like the first, except that out of the houses
came four little men, dressed in Flemish costume, who raised their heads to
heaven as if to denote their extreme surprise and anger. But the last set of
hangings depicted a drama. Near the rabbit, which was still nibbling, the
young man was stretched out, apparently dead. The young lady, with her
eyes fixed on him, was thrusting a sword into her breast, and the fruit on the
tree had become black.
Jeanne was just giving up trying to understand it when she discovered in a
corner a microscopic animal, which the rabbit could have eaten as easily as
a blade of grass, and which was meant for a lion. Then she recognized the
misfortunes of Pyramis and Thisbe; and, although she smiled at the
simplicity of the designs, she felt happy at being surrounded by these
pictures which would always accord with her dearest hopes; and at the
thought that every night this antique and legendary love would watch over
her dreams.
The rest of the furniture was of the most different styles, and bore the traces
of many generations. A superb Louis XVI chest of drawers, bound with
polished brass, stood between two Louis XV armchairs which were still

covered with their original brocaded silk. A rosewood escritoire was
opposite the mantelpiece, on which, under a glass shade, was a clock made
in the time of the Empire. It was in the form of a bronze bee-hive hanging
on four marble columns over a garden of gilded flowers. On a small
pendulum, coming out of the hive through a long slit, swung a little bee,
with enamel wings, backwards and forwards over the flowers; the dial was
of painted china and was let into the side of the hive. It struck eleven, and
the baron kissed his daughter and went to his own room.
Then Jeanne regretfully went to bed, giving a last look round her room
before she put out her candle. Only the head of the bed was against the wall,
and on the left was a window through which a stream of moonlight entered,
making a pool of light on the floor, and casting pale reflections on the walls
over the motionless loves of Pyramis and Thisbe. Through the other
window, opposite the foot of the bed, Jeanne could see a big tree bathed in a
soft light. She turned over and closed her eyes, but after a little while
opened them again, for she still seemed to feel the jolting of the carriage,
and its rumbling was yet in her ears.
For some time she lay quite still, hoping thus to soon fall asleep, but the
restlessness of her mind communicated itself to her body, and at last she got
out of bed. With her arms and feet bare, in her long chemise, which made
her look like a phantom, she crossed the flood of light on the boards,
opened her window and looked out.
The night was so clear that everything could be seen as plainly as in broad
daylight; and the young girl recognized all the country she had so loved as a
child.
First of all, just opposite her, was a big lawn looking as yellow as gold
under the light of the night. There were two enormous trees before the
château, a plane-tree to the north, a linden to the south, and quite at the end
of the grass, a little thicket ended the estate which was protected from the
hurricanes by five rows of old elms twisted, torn, and sloped like a roof, by
the sea wind which was constantly blowing.
This kind of park was bounded on the right and left by two long avenues of
immense poplar-trees (called peuples in Normandy) which separated the
squire's residence from the two farms adjoining, one of which was occupied

by the Couillards, the other by the Martins. These peuples had given the
names to the château.
Beyond this enclosure lay a large piece of uncultivated ground covered with
gorse, over which the wind rustled and blew day and night. Then the coast
suddenly fell a hundred yards, forming a high, white cliff, the foot of which
was washed by the sea; and Jeanne gazed at the vast, watery expanse whose
waves seemed to be sleeping under the stars.
In this repose of nature, when the sun was absent, the earth gave out all her
perfumes. A jasmine, which had climbed round the lower windows, exhaled
its penetrating fragrance which united with the subtler odor of the budding
leaves, and the soft breeze brought with it the damp, salt smell of the
seaweeds and the beach.
At first the young girl gave herself up to the pleasure of simply breathing,
and the peace of the country calmed her as would a cool bath. All the
animals which wake at evening-time, and hide their obscure existence in the
peacefulness of the night, filled the clear darkness with a silent restlessness.
Great birds fled silently through the air like shadows; the humming of
invisible insects could be heard, and noiseless races took place across the
dewy grass or along the quiet sandy roads. The short monotonous croak of
the frogs was the only sound that could be distinguished.
It seemed to Jeanne that her heart was getting bigger, becoming full of
whisperings like this clear evening, and of a thousand wandering desires
like these nocturnal insects whose quivering life surrounded her. An
unconscious sympathy drew her towards this living poetry and she felt that
joy and happiness were floating towards her through the soft white night,
and she began to dream of love.
Love! For two years she had been anxiously awaiting the time when it
would come to her, and now she was free to love, she had only to meet—
him! What should he be like? She did not know, and did not trouble herself
even to think about it. He would be himself, that was enough. She only
knew that she should adore him with her whole heart, and that he would
love her with all his strength, and she pictured herself walking with him on
evenings such as this, under the luminous glow of the stars. They would
walk hand in hand, pressing close to one another, listening to the beating of

their hearts, mingling their love with the sweet clearness of the summer
nights, and so united that by the simple power of their love, they would
easily divine each other's inmost thoughts. And that would endure
indefinitely, in the serenity of an indestructible affection.
Suddenly she fancied he was there—close to her; and a vague feeling of
sensuality swept over her from head to foot. She unconsciously pressed her
arms against her breast, as if to clasp her dream to her; and something
passed over her mouth, held out towards the unknown, which almost made
her faint, as if the springtide wind had given her a kiss of love.
All at once, on the road behind the château, she heard someone walking in
the night, and in the rapture of her love-filled soul, in a transport of faith in
the impossible, in providential hazards, in divine presentiment, in the
romantic combinations of Fate, she thought: "If it should be he!" She
anxiously listened to the steps of the traveler, sure that he would stop at the
gate to demand hospitality. But he had passed by and she felt sad, as though
she had experienced a deception; then after a moment she understood the
feverish excitement of her hopes, and smiled at her own folly.
A little calmer, she let her thoughts float down the stream of a more
reasonable reverie, trying to pierce the shadows of the future and planning
out her life.
She would live here with him, in their quiet château overlooking the sea.
She would have two children, a son for him, and a daughter for herself, and
she pictured them running on the grass between the plane-tree and the
linden, while their father and mother followed their movements with proud
eyes, sometimes exchanging looks full of love above their heads.
She stayed dreaming until the moon had finished her journey across the sky,
and began to descend into the sea. The air became cooler. Towards the east
the horizon was getting lighter. A cock crowed in the farm on the right,
others answered from the farm on the left, their hoarse notes, coming
through the walls of the poultry-houses, seeming to be a long way off, and
the stars were disappearing from the immense dome of the sky which had
gradually whitened. The little chirp of a bird sounded; warblings, timid at
first, came from among the leaves; then, getting bolder, they became
vibrating, joyous, and spread from branch to branch, from tree to tree.

Jeanne suddenly felt a bright light; and raising her head, which she had
buried in her hands, she shut her eyes, dazzled by the splendor of the dawn.
A mountain of crimson clouds, partly hidden by the avenue of poplars, cast
a red glow over the awakened earth, and, breaking through the bright
clouds, bathing the trees, the plain, the ocean, the whole horizon, in a fiery
light, the blazing orb appeared.
Jeanne felt mad with happiness. A delirious joy, an infinite tenderness
before the splendor of nature filled her heart. It was her sunrise! her dawn!
the beginning of her life! the rising of her hopes! She stretched out her arms
towards the radiant space, with a longing to embrace the sun; she wanted to
speak, to cry aloud something divine like this day-break; but she remained
dumb in a state of impotent ecstasy. Then, laying her forehead on her hands,
her eyes filled with tears, and she cried for joy.
When she again raised her head the glorious colors of the dawning day had
already disappeared. She felt calmer and a little tired and chilled. Leaving
the window open, she threw herself on the bed, mused for a few minutes
longer, then fell into such a sound sleep that she did not hear her father
calling her at eight o'clock, and only awoke when he came into her room.
He wanted to show her the improvements that had been made in the
château; in her château.
The back of the house was separated from the village road, which half-a-
mile further on joined the high road from Havre to Fécamp, by a large sort
of court planted with apple-trees. A straight path went across it leading from
the steps of the house to the wooden fence, and the low, thatched out-
houses, built of flints from the beach, ran the whole length of two sides of
the court, which was separated from the adjoining farms by two long
ditches.
The roof of the château had been repaired, the woodwork restored, and the
walls mended; all the inside of the house had been painted and the rooms
had fresh hangings, and on the old decaying gray walls the snowy shutters
and the new plaster stood out like white stains. One of Jeanne's windows
was in the front of the house, which looked out over the little wood and the
wall of wind-torn elms, on to the sea.

Arm in arm Jeanne and the baron went all over the château without missing
a single corner, and then they walked slowly along the long poplar avenues
which enclosed the park, as it was called. The grass had grown under the
trees, making a green carpet, and the grove at the bottom was delightfully
pretty with its little winding paths, separated by leafy walls, running in and
out.
Jeanne was startled by a hare springing suddenly across their path; it ran
down the slope and made off towards the cliff, among the rushes.
After breakfast, Madame Adélaïde went to lie down as she had not yet
recovered from the fatigue of the journey, and the baron proposed that he
and Jeanne should walk to Yport. They set off, going through the hamlet of
Etouvent in which was situated Les Peuples, and three peasants saluted
them as if they had known them all their lives.
They entered the sloping woods which go right down to the sea, and soon
the village of Yport came in sight. The women, sitting at their doors
mending clothes, looked up as they passed. There was a strong smell of
brine in the steep street with the gutter in the middle and the heaps of
rubbish lying before the doors. The brown nets to which a few shining
shells, looking like fragments of silver, had clung, were drying before the
doors of huts whence came the odors of several families living in the same
room, and a few pigeons were looking for food at the side of the gutter. To
Jeanne it was all as new and curious as a scene at a theater.
Turning a sharp corner, they suddenly came upon the smooth opaque blue
sea, and opposite the beach they stopped to look around.
Boats, with sails looking like the wings of white birds, were in the offing; to
the right and left rose the high cliffs; a sort of cape interrupted the view on
one side, while on the other the coast-line stretched out till it could no
longer be distinguished, and a harbor and some houses could be seen in a
bay a little way off. Tiny waves fringing the sea with foam, broke on the
beach with a faint noise, and some Normandy boats, hauled up on the
shingle, lay on their sides with the sun shining on their tarred planks; a few
fishermen were getting them ready to go out with the evening tide.

A sailor came up with some fish to sell, and Jeanne bought a brill that she
insisted on carrying home herself. Then the man offered his services if ever
they wanted to go sailing, telling them his name, "Lastique, Joséphin
Lastique," over and over again so that they should not forget it. The baron
promised to remember him, and then they started to go back to the château.
As the large fish was too heavy for Jeanne, she passed her father's stick
through its gills, and carrying it between them, they went gaily up the hill,
with the wind in their faces, chattering like two children; and as the brill
made their arms ache, they let it drop lower and lower till its big tail swept
along the grass.

II

A delightful life of freedom began for Jeanne. She read, dreamed, and
wandered about all alone, walking slowly along the road, building castles in
the air, or dancing down the little winding valleys whose sloping sides were
covered with golden gorse. Its strong, sweet odor, increased by the heat,
intoxicated her like a perfumed wine, while she was lulled by the distant
sound of the waves breaking on the beach. When she was in an idle mood
she would throw herself down on the thick grass of the hill-side, and
sometimes when at the turn of a road she suddenly caught a glimpse of the
blue sea, sparkling in the light of the sun, with a white sail at the horizon,
she felt an inordinate joy, a mysterious presentiment of future happiness.
She loved to be alone with the calm beauty of nature, and would sit
motionless for so long on the top of a hill, that the wild rabbits would bound
fearlessly up to her; or she would run swiftly along the cliff, exhilarated by
the pure air of the hills, and finding an exquisite pleasure in being able to
move without fatigue, like the swallows in the air and the fish in the water.
Very fond of bathing, and strong, fearless, and unconscious of danger, she
would swim out to sea till she could no longer be perceived from the shore,
feeling refreshed by the cool water, and enjoying the rocking of its clear
blue waves. When she was a long way out, she floated, and, with her arms

crossed on her breast, gazed at the deep, blue sky, against which a swallow
or the white outline of a sea-gull could sometimes be seen. No noise could
be heard except the far away murmur of the waves breaking on the beach,
and the vague, confused, almost imperceptible sound of the pebbles being
drawn down by the receding waves. When she went out too far, a boat put
off to bring her in and she would return to the château pale with hunger, but
not at all tired, with a smile on her lips, and her eyes dancing with joy.
The baron was planning great agricultural improvements; he wanted to
make experiments, to try new machines, to acclimatize foreign plants, and
he passed part of his time talking to the peasants, who shook their heads and
refused to believe in his ideas.
He often went on the sea with the sailors of Yport, and when he had seen
the caves, the springs, and the rocks that were of any interest in the
neighborhood, he fished like a common seaman. On windy days, when the
breeze filled the sails and forced the boat over till its edge touched the
water, and the mackerel-nets trailed over the sides, he would hold a slender
fishing-line, waiting with anxiety for the bite of a fish. Then he went out in
the moonlight to take up the nets set the night before (for he loved to hear
the creaking of the masts, and to breathe the fresh night air), and, after a
long time spent in tacking about to find the buoys, guided by a ridge of
rocks, the spire of a church, or the light-house at Fécamp, he liked to lie still
under the first rays of the rising sun, which turned into a glittering mass the
slimy rays and the white-bellied turbot which lay on the deck of the boat.
At every meal, he gave a glowing account of his excursions, and the
baroness, in her turn, would tell him how many times she had walked up
and down the long poplar-avenues on the right next to the Couillards's farm,
the other one not having enough sun on it.
She had been advised to "take exercise," and she walked for hours together.
As soon as the sun was high enough for its warmth to be felt she went out,
leaning on Rosalie's arm, and enveloped in a cloak and two shawls, with a
red scarf on her head and a black hood over that.
Then she began a long, uninteresting walk from the corner of the château to
the first shrubs of the wood and back again. Her left foot, which dragged a
little, had traced two furrows where the grass had died. At each end of the

path she had had a bench placed, and every five minutes she stopped,
saying to the poor, patient maid who supported her: "Let us sit down, my
girl; I am a little tired."
And at each rest she left on one or other of the benches first the scarf which
covered her head, then one shawl, then the other, then the hood, and then
the cloak; and all these things made two big bundles of wraps, which
Rosalie carried on her free arm, when they went in to lunch.
In the afternoon the baroness recommenced her walk in a feebler way,
taking longer rests, and sometimes dozing for an hour at a time on a couch
that was wheeled out of doors for her. She called it taking "her exercise," in
the same way as she spoke of "my hypertrophy."
A doctor she had consulted ten years before because she suffered from
palpitations, had hinted at hypertrophy. Since then she had constantly used
this word, though she did not in the least understand what it meant, and she
was always making the baron, and Jeanne, and Rosalie put their hands on
her heart, though its beatings could not be felt, so buried was it under her
bosom. She obstinately refused to be examined by any other doctor in case
he should say she had another malady, and she spoke of "her hypertrophy"
so often that it seemed as though this affection of the heart were peculiar to
her, and belonged to her, like something unique, to which no one else had
any right. The baron and Jeanne said "my wife's" or "mamma's
hypertrophy" in the same way as they would have spoken of her dress or
her umbrella.
She had been very pretty when she was young, and as slender as a reed.
After flirting with the officers of all the regiments of the Empire, she had
read Corinne, which had made her cry, and, in a certain measure, altered her
character.
As her waist got bigger her mind became more and more poetical, and
when, through her size, she had to remain nearly all day in her armchair, she
dreamed of love adventures, of which she was always the heroine; always
thinking of the sort she liked best, like a hand-organ continually repeating
the same air. The languishing romances, where they talk about captives and
swallows, always made her cry; and she even liked some of Béranger's
coarse verses, because of the grief they expressed. She would sit motionless

for hours, lost in thought, and she was very fond of Les Peuples, because it
served as a scene for her dreams, the surrounding woods, the sea, and the
waste land reminding her of Sir Walter Scott's books, which she had lately
been reading.
On rainy days she stayed in her room looking over what she called her
"relics." They were all her old letters; those from her father and mother, the
baron's when she was engaged to him, and some others besides. She kept
them in a mahogany escritoire with copper sphinxes at the corners, and she
always used a particular tone when she said: "Rosalie, bring me my
souvenir-drawer."
The maid would open the escritoire, take out the drawer, and place it on a
chair beside her mistress, who slowly read the letters one by one,
occasionally letting fall a tear.
Jeanne sometimes took Rosalie's place and accompanied her mother's
walks, and listened to her reminiscences of childhood. The young girl
recognized herself in these tales, and was astonished to find that her
mother's thoughts and hopes had been the same as hers; for every one
imagines that he is the first to experience those feelings which made the
hearts of our first parents beat quicker, and which will continue to exist in
human hearts till the end of time.
These tales, often interrupted for several seconds by the baroness's want of
breath, were told as slowly as she walked, and Jeanne let her thoughts run
on to the happy future, without waiting to hear the end of her mother's
anecdotes.
One afternoon, as they were resting on the seat at the bottom of the walk,
they saw a fat priest coming towards them from the other end of the avenue.
He bowed, put on a smiling look, bowed again when he was about three
feet off, and cried:
"Well, Madame la baronne, and how are we to-day?"
He was the curé of the parish.
The baroness, born in a philosophical century and brought up in
revolutionary times by a father who did not believe very much in anything,

did not often go to church, although she liked priests with the sort of
religious instinct that most women have. She had forgotten all about the
Abbé Picot, her curé, and her face colored when she saw him. She began to
make excuses for not having gone to see him, but the good-natured priest
did not seem at all put out. He looked at Jeanne, complimented her on her
good looks, sat down, put his hat on his knees, and wiped his forehead.
He was a very fat, red-faced man, who perspired very freely. Every minute
he drew an enormous, checked handkerchief from his pocket and wiped his
face and neck; but he had hardly put it back again when fresh drops
appeared on his skin and, falling on his cassock, made the dust on it into
little, round spots. He was a true country-priest, lively and tolerant, talkative
and honest. He told anecdotes, talked about the peasants, and did not seem
to have noticed that his two parishioners had not been to mass; for the
baroness always tried to reconcile her vague ideas of religion to her
indolence, and Jeanne was too happy at having left the convent, where she
had been sickened of holy ceremonies, to think about going to church.
The baron joined them. His pantheistic religion made him indifferent to
doctrine, and he asked the abbé, whom he knew by sight, to stay to dinner.
The priest had the art of pleasing every one, and thanks to the unconscious
tact that is acquired by the most ordinary men called by fate to exercise any
moral power over their fellow creatures, and the baroness, attracted perhaps
by one of these affinities which draw similar natures together, paid every
attention to him, the fat man's sanguine face and short breath agreeing with
her gasping obesity. By the time dessert was placed on the table he had
begun telling funny stories, with the laisser-aller of a man who had had a
good dinner in congenial society.
All at once, as though a good idea had just occurred to him, he exclaimed:
"Oh, I have a new parishioner I must introduce to you, M. le Vicomte de
Lamare."
The baroness, who had all the heraldy of the province at her finger ends,
asked:
"Does he belong to the family of Lamare de l'Eure?"
The priest bowed:

"Yes, madame; he is the son of the Vicomte Jean de Lamare, who died last
year."
Then Madame Adélaïde, who loved the aristocracy above everything, asked
a great many questions, and learnt that the young man had sold the family
château to pay his father's debts, and had come to live on one of the three
farms that he owned at Etouvent.
This property only brought in about five or six thousand livres a year, but
the vicomte was of a foreseeing, economical disposition and meant to live
quietly for two or three years, so that he might save enough to go into
society and marry well, without having to get into debt or mortgage his
farms.
"He is a charming young fellow," added the curé; "and so steady, so quiet.
But he can't find many amusements in the country."
"Bring him to see us, M. l'Abbé," said the baron; "he might like to come
here sometimes." And then the conversation turned to other subjects.
When they went into the drawing-room the priest asked if he might go out
into the garden, as he was used to a little exercise after meals. The baron
went out with him, and they walked backwards and forwards the whole
length of the château, while their two shadows, the one thin, and the other
quite round and looking as though it had a mushroom on its head, fell
sometimes before and sometimes behind them, according as they walked
towards the moon or turned their backs on it. The curé chewed a sort of
cigarette that he had taken from his pocket; he told the baron why he used it
in the plain speech of a countryman:
"It is to help the digestion; my liver is rather sluggish."
Looking at the sky where the bright moon was sailing along, he suddenly
said:
"That is a sight one never gets tired of."
Then he went in to say good-bye to the ladies.

III

The next Sunday the baroness and Jeanne went to mass out of deference to
their curé, and after it was over they waited to ask him to luncheon for the
following Thursday. He came out of the vestry with a tall, good-looking,
young man who had familiarly taken his arm.
As soon as he saw the two ladies he gave a look of pleased surprise, and
exclaimed:
"What a lucky thing! Madame la baronne and Mlle. Jeanne, permit me to
present to you your neighbor, M. le Vicomte de Lamare."
The vicomte bowed, expressed the desire he had long felt to make their
acquaintance, and began to talk with the ease of a man accustomed to good
society. His face was one that women raved about and that all men disliked.
His black, curly hair fell over a smooth, bronzed forehead, and long, regular
eyebrows gave a depth and tenderness to his dark eyes. Long, thick lashes
lent to his glance the passionate eloquence which thrills the heart of the
high-born lady in her boudoir, and makes the poor girl, with her basket on
her arm, turn round in the street, and the languorous charm of his eyes, with
their whites faintly tinged with blue, gave importance to his least word and
made people believe in the profoundness of his thought. A thick, silky beard
hid a jaw which was a little heavy.
After mutual compliments he said good-bye to the ladies; and two days
afterwards made his first call at the château.
He arrived just as they were looking at a rustic-seat, placed only that
morning under the big plane-tree opposite the drawing-room windows. The
baron wanted to have another one under the linden to make a pair, but the
baroness, who disliked things to be exactly symmetrical, said no. The
vicomte, on being asked his opinion, sided with the baroness.
Then he talked about the surrounding country, which he thought very
"picturesque," and about the charming "bits" he had come across in his
solitary walks. From time to time his eyes met Jeanne's, as though by
chance; and she felt a strange sensation at these sudden looks which were

quickly turned away and which expressed a lively admiration and
sympathy.
M. de Lamare's father, who had died the year before, had known an intimate
friend of M. des Cultaux, the baroness's father, and the discovery of this
mutual acquaintance gave rise to endless conversation about marriages,
births, and relationships. The baroness, with prodigious feats of memory,
talked about the ancestors and descendants of numerous families, and
traversed the complicated labyrinths of different genealogies without ever
losing herself.
"Tell me, vicomte, have you ever heard of the Saunoys de Varfleur?
Gontran, the elder son, married Mademoiselle de Coursil, one of the
Coursil-Courvilles; and the younger married a cousin of mine,
Mademoiselle de la Roche-Aubert, who was related to the Crisanges. Now,
M. de Crisange was an intimate friend of my father, and no doubt knew
yours also."
"Yes, madame; was it not the M. de Crisange who emigrated, and whose
son ruined himself?"
"That is the very man. He had proposed for my aunt after the death of her
husband, the Comte d'Eretry, but she would not accept him because he took
snuff. By the way, do you know what has become of the Viloises? They left
Touraine about 1813, after a reverse of fortune, to go and live in Auvergne;
and I have never heard anything of them since."
"I believe, madame, that the old marquis was killed by a fall from a horse,
leaving one daughter married to an Englishman, and the other to a rich
merchant who had seduced her."
Names they had heard their parents mention when they were children
returned to their minds, and the marriages of these people seemed as
important to them as great public events. They talked about men and
women they had never seen as if they knew them well, and these people,
living so far away, talked about them in the same manner, and they felt as
though they were acquainted with each other, almost as if they were friends,
or relations, simply because they belonged to the same class and were of
equal rank.

The baron was rather unsociable, his philosophic views disagreeing with the
beliefs and prejudices of the people of his own rank, did not know any of
the families living near, and asked the vicomte about them.
"Oh, there are very good families around here," answered M. de Lamare, in
the same tone as he would have said that there were not many rabbits on the
hills, and he entered into details about them.
There were only three families of rank in the neighborhood; the Marquis de
Coutelier, the head of the Normandy aristocracy; the Vicomte and
Vicomtesse de Briseville, people who were very well-born but held
themselves rather aloof; and lastly, the Comte de Fourville, a sort of fire-
eater who was said to be worrying his wife to death, and who lived in the
Château de la Vrillette, which was built on a lake, passing his time in
hunting and shooting. A few parvenus had bought property in the
neighborhood, but the vicomte did not know them.
He rose to go, and his last look was for Jeanne as though he would have
made his adieu to her specially friendly and tender.
The baroness thought him charming and very comme il faut, and the baron
remarked that he was a very well-educated man. He was asked to dinner the
following week, and after that he visited the château regularly.
Generally he came about four o'clock, joined the baroness in "her avenue,"
and insisted on her leaning on his arm to take "her exercise." When Jeanne
was at home she supported her mother on the other side and all three
walked slowly up and down the long path. He did not talk to the young girl
but often his dark, velvety eyes met Jeanne's, which were like blue agate.
Sometimes they walked down to Yport with the baron, and one evening, as
they were standing on the beach, old Lastique came up to them, and,
without taking his pipe from his mouth, for it would have been stranger to
see him without his pipe than without his nose, said:
"With this wind, M'sieu l'baron, you'd be able to go to Etretat and back to-
morrow quite easily."
Jeanne clasped her hands together; "Oh, papa! If only you would!"

The baron turned to M. de Lamare.
"Will you go, vicomte? We could have lunch over there." And the excursion
was planned for the following day.
The next morning Jeanne was up at daybreak. She waited for her father,
who took longer to dress, and then they walked over the dewy plain and
through the wood filled with the sweet song of the birds, down to Yport,
where they found the vicomte and old Lastique sitting on the capstan of
their little vessel.
Two sailors helped to start the boat, by putting their shoulders to the sides
and pushing with all their might. It was hard to move over the level part of
the beach, and Lastique slipped rollers of greased wood under the keel, then
went back to his place and drawled out his long "Heave oh!" which was the
signal for them all to push together, and when they came to the slant of the
beach, the boat set off all at once, sliding over the round pebbles, and
making a grating noise like the tearing of linen. It stopped short at the edge
of the waves and they all got in, except the two sailors, who pushed the boat
off.
A light, steady breeze blowing towards the land just ruffled the surface of
the water. The sail was hoisted, filled out a little, and the boat moved gently
along hardly rocked by the waves.
At first they sailed straight out to sea. At the horizon the sky could not be
distinguished from the ocean; on land the high steep cliff had a deep
shadow at its foot. Behind could be seen the brown sails of the boats
leaving the white pier of Fécamp, and before lay a rounded rock with a hole
right through it, looking like an elephant thrusting its trunk into the water.
Jeanne, feeling a little dizzied by the rocking of the boat, sat holding one
side with her hand, and looking out to sea; light, space and the ocean
seemed to her to be the only really beautiful things in creation. No one
spoke. From time to time old Lastique, who was steering, drank something
out of a bottle placed within his reach under the seat. He smoked his stump
of a pipe which seemed unextinguishable, and a small cloud of blue smoke
went up from it while another issued from the corner of his mouth; he was
never seen to relight the clay bowl, which was colored blacker than ebony,

or to refill it with tobacco, and he only removed the pipe from his mouth to
eject the brown saliva.
The baron sat in the bows and managed the sail, performing the duties of a
sailor, and Jeanne and the vicomte were side by side, both feeling a little
agitated. Their glances were continually meeting, a hidden sympathy
making them raise their eyes at the same moment, for there was already that
vague, subtle fondness between them which springs up so quickly between
two young people when the youth is good-looking and the girl is pretty.
They felt happy at being close together, perhaps because each was thinking
of the other.
The sun rose higher in the sky as if to consider from a better vantage point
the vast sea stretched out beneath him, while the latter, like a coquette,
enveloped herself in a light mist which veiled her from his rays. It was a
transparent golden haze which hid nothing but softened everything. It
gradually melted away before the sun's flaming darts, and when the full heat
of the day began it disappeared entirely, and the sea, smooth as glass, lay
glittering in the sun.
Jeanne murmured enthusiastically, "How lovely it is!"
The vicomte answered "Yes, it is indeed beautiful." And their hearts felt as
bright as the clear morning itself.
Suddenly, looking as if the cliff bestrode part of the sea, appeared the great
arcades of Etretat, high enough for a ship to pass underneath him without
the point of a sharp white rock rising out of the water before the first one.
When they reached the shore, the vicomte lifted Jeanne out that she should
not wet her feet in landing, while the baron held the boat close to the beach
with a rope; then they went up the steep, shingly beach side by side, both
agitated by this short embrace, and they heard old Lastique say to the baron:
"In my opinion they'd make a very handsome couple."
They had lunch in a little inn near the beach. On the sea they had been
quiet, but at the table they had as much to say as children let out of school.

The most simple things gave rise to endless laughter. Old Lastique carefully
put his pipe, which was still alight, into his cap before he sat down to table;
and everyone laughed. A fly, attracted, no doubt, by the sailor's red nose,
persisted on settling on it, and when moving too slowly to catch it he
knocked it away, it went over to a very fly-spotted curtain whence it seemed
to eagerly watch the sailor's highly-colored nasal organ, for it soon flew
back and settled on it again.
Each time the insect returned a loud laugh burst out, and when the old man,
annoyed by its tickling, murmured: "What a confoundly obstinate fly!"
Jeanne and the vicomte laughed till they cried, holding their serviettes to
their mouths to prevent themselves shrieking out loud.
When the coffee had been served Jeanne said:
"Suppose we go for a walk?"
The vicomte got up to go with her, but the baron preferred going out on the
beach to take his nap.
"You two go," he said. "You will find me here in an hour's time."
They walked straight along the road, passed a few cottages and a little
château which looked more like a big farm, and then found themselves in
an open valley. Jeanne had a singing in her ears, and was thrilled by a
strange sensation which she had never before experienced. Overhead was a
blazing sun, and on each side of the road lay fields of ripe corn drooping
under the heat. The feeble, continuous chirp of the swarms of grasshoppers
in the corn and hedges was the only sound to be heard, and the sky of
dazzling blue, slightly tinged with yellow, looked as though it would
suddenly turn red, like brass when it is put into a furnace.
They entered a little wood where the trees were so thick that no sunbeams
could penetrate their foliage; the grass had died from want of light and fresh
air, but the ground was covered with moss, and all around was a cool
dampness which chilled them after the heat of the sun.
"See, we could sit down over there," said Jeanne, looking around her as
they walked on.

Two trees had died, and through the break in the foliage fell a flood of light,
warming the earth, calling to life the grass and dandelion seeds, and
expanding the delicate flowers of the anemone and digitalis. A thousand
winged insects—butterflies, bees, hornets, big gnats looking like skeleton-
flies, ladybirds with red spots on them, beetles with greenish reflections on
their wings, others which were black and horned—peopled this one warm
and luminous spot in the midst of the cool shadow of the trees.
Jeanne and the vicomte sat down with their heads in the shadow and their
feet in the light. They watched these tiny moving insects that a sunbeam had
called forth, and Jeanne said softly:
"How lovely the country is! Sometimes I wish I were a bee or a butterfly
that I might bury myself in the flowers."
They began talking about their own habits and tastes in a low, confidential
tone. He declared himself tired of his useless life, disgusted with society; it
was always the same, one never found any truth, any sincerity. She would
have liked to know what town-life was like but she was convinced
beforehand that society would never be so pleasant as a country-life.
The nearer their hearts drew to one another the more studiously did they
address each other as "monsieur" and "mademoiselle"; but they could not
help their eyes smiling and their glances meeting, and it seemed to them
that new and better feelings were entering their hearts, making them ready
to love and take an interest in things they had before cared nothing about.
When they returned from their walk they found that the baron had gone to a
cave formed in the cliff, called the Chambre aux Desmoiselles, so they
waited for him at the inn, where he did not appear till five o'clock, and then
they started to go home. The boat glided along so smoothly that it hardly
seemed to be moving; the wind came in gentle puffs filling the sail one
second only to let it flap loosely against the mast the next, and the tired sun
was slowly approaching the sea. The stillness around made them all silent
for a long while, but at last Jeanne said:
"How I should like to travel!"
"Yes, but it would be rather dull traveling alone," said the vicomte. "You
want a companion to whom you could confide your impressions."

"That is true," she answered thoughtfully; "still, I like to go for long walks
alone. When there is no one with me I build such castles in the air."
"But two people can better still plan out a happy future," he said, looking
her full in the face.
Her eyes fell; did he mean anything? She gazed at the horizon as though she
would look beyond it; then she said slowly:
"I should like to go to Italy—and to Greece—and to Corsica, it must be so
wild and so beautiful there."
He preferred the chalets and lakes of Switzerland.
She said: "No, I should like to go either to a country with little or no history
like Corsica, or else to one with very old associations like Greece. It must
be so interesting to find the traces of those nations whose history one has
known from childhood, and to see the places where such great and noble
deeds were done."
"Well, for my part, I should like to go to England; it is such an instructive
country," said the vicomte, who was more practical than Jeanne.
Then they discussed the beauties of every country from the poles to the
equator, and went into raptures over the unconventional customs of such
nations as the Chinese or the Laplanders; but they came to the conclusion
that the most beautiful land in the world is France, with her temperate
climate—cool in summer and warm in winter—her fertile fields, her green
forests, her great, calm rivers, and her culture in the fine arts which has
existed nowhere else since the palmy days of Athens.
Silence again fell over the little party. The blood-red sun was sinking, and a
broad pathway of light lay in the wake of the boat leading right up to the
dazzling globe. The wind died out, there was not a ripple on the water, and
the motionless sail was reddened by the rays of the setting sun. The air
seemed to possess some soothing influence which silenced everything
around this meeting of the elements. The sea, like some huge bird, awaited
the fiery lover who was approaching her shining, liquid bosom, and the sun
hastened his descent, empurpled by the desire of their embrace. At length he
joined her, and gradually disappeared. Then a freshness came from the

horizon, and a breath of air rippled the surface of the water as if the
vanished sun had given a sigh of satisfaction.
The twilight was very short, and the sky soon became came dark and
studded with stars. Lastique got out the oars, and Jeanne and the vicomte sat
side by side watching the trembling, phosphorescent glimmer behind the
boat and feeling a keen enjoyment even in breathing the cool night air. The
vicomte's fingers were resting against Jeanne's hand which was lying on the
seat, and she did not draw it away, the slight contact making her feel happy
and yet confused.
When she went to her room that evening Jeanne felt so moved that the least
thing would have made her cry. She looked at the clock and fancied that the
little bee throbbed like a friendly heart; she thought of how it would be the
silent witness of her whole life, how it would accompany all her joys and
sorrows with its quick, regular beat, and she stopped the gilded insect to
drop a kiss upon its wings. She could have kissed anything, no matter what,
and suddenly remembering an old doll she had hidden away in the bottom
of a drawer, she got it out and found as much joy in seeing it again as if it
had been an old well-loved friend. Pressing it to her bosom she covered its
painted cheeks and flaxen hair with warm kisses, then, still holding it in her
arms, she began to think.
Was HE the husband referred to by so many inward voices, and was it by a
supremely-kind Providence that he was thus sent into her life? Was he
really the being created for her, to whom her whole existence would be
devoted? Were he and she really predestined to unite their hearts and so
beget Love? She did not yet experience those tumultuous feelings, those
wild raptures, that profound stirring of her whole soul, which she believed
to be love; still she thought she was beginning to love him, for sometimes
she felt her senses fail her when she thought of him and she always was
thinking of him. Her heart throbbed in his presence, her color came and
went when she met his glance, and the sound of his voice sent a thrill
through her. That night she hardly slept at all.
Each day her longing for love became greater. She was always consulting
the marguerites, or the clouds, or tossing a coin in the air to see whether she
was loved or not.

One evening her father said to her:
"Make yourself look very pretty to-morrow morning, Jeanne."
"Why, papa?" she asked.
"That's a secret," replied the baron.
When she came down the next morning, looking fresh and bright in a light
summer dress, she found the drawing-room table covered with bon-bon
boxes, and an enormous bouquet on a chair.
A cart turned in at the gateway with "Lérat, Confectioner, Contractor for
Wedding-breakfasts" on it, and Ludivine, with the aid of a scullery-maid,
took from it a great many flat baskets from which issued an appetizing odor.
The vicomte came in soon after; his trousers were fastened tightly under the
varnished boots which showed off his small feet to perfection. His tightly-
fitting coat was closely fastened, except on the chest, where it opened to
show the lace shirt-frill; and a fine cravat, twisted several times round his
neck, forced him to hold up his handsome dark head. His careful toilet
made him look different from usual, and Jeanne stared at him as though she
had never seen him before; she thought he looked a perfect gentleman from
head to foot.
He bowed, and asked with a smile:
"Well, godmother, are you ready?"
"What do you mean?" stammered out Jeanne. "What is it all about?"
"Oh, you shall know just now," answered the baron.
The carriage drew up before the door and Madame Adélaïde, in a handsome
dress, came downstairs leaning on Rosalie, who was struck with such
admiration at the sight of M. de Lamare's elegant appearance, that the baron
murmured:
"I say, vicomte, I think our maid likes the look of you."
The vicomte blushed up to the roots of his hair, pretended not to hear what
the baron said, and, taking up the big bouquet, presented it to Jeanne. She

took it, feeling still more astonished, and all four got into the carriage.
"Really, madame, it looks like a wedding!" exclaimed the cook, Ludivine,
who had brought some cold broth for the baroness to have before she
started.
When they reached Yport they got out, and, as they walked through the
village, the sailors in new clothes which still showed where the cloth had
been folded, came out of the houses, touched their hats, shook the baron by
the hand, and followed behind them, forming a procession, at the head of
which walked the vicomte with Jeanne on his arm.
On arriving at the church a halt was made. A choir-boy came out carrying a
great silver cross, followed by another pink and white urchin carrying the
holy water with the brush in it; behind them came three old choristers, one
of whom limped, then the serpent-player, then the curé in a stole with a gold
cross embroidered on it. He saluted the baron's party with a smile and a
nod, then, with half-closed eyes, his lips moving in prayer, his miter pushed
down over his eyes, he followed his surpliced subordinates down to the sea.
On the beach a crowd was waiting round a new boat decorated all over with
garlands; its mast, sail, and ropes were covered with long ribbons which
fluttered in the breeze, and its name, "Jeanne," was on the stern in gilt
letters. Old Lastique was the master of this boat that the baron had had
built, and he advanced to meet the procession.
At the sight of the cross all the men took off their caps, and a line of nuns,
enveloped in their long, straight, black mantles, knelt down. The curé went
to one end of the boat with the two choir-boys, while at the other the three
old choristers, with their dirty faces and hairy chins shown up by their white
surplices, sang at the top of their voices. Each time they paused to take
breath, the serpent-player continued his music alone, and he blew out his
cheeks till his little gray eyes could not be seen and the very skin of his
forehead and neck looked as if it was separated from the flesh.
The calm, transparent sea, its ripples breaking on the shore with a faint,
grating noise, seemed to be watching the christening of the tiny boat. Great,
white sea-gulls flew by with outstretched wings, and then returned over the

heads of the kneeling crowd with a sweeping flight as though they wanted
to see what was going on.
The chanting stopped after an "Amen" which was repeated and sustained
for five minutes, and the priest gabbled some Latin words of which only the
sonorous terminations could be made out. Then he walked all round the
boat sprinkling it with holy water, and commenced to murmur the oremus,
stopping opposite the two sponsors, who were standing hand in hand.
The young man's handsome face was quite calm, but the young girl, almost
suffocated by the palpitation of her heart, felt as though she should faint,
and she trembled so violently that her teeth chattered. The dream that had
haunted her for so long seemed all at once to have become a reality. She had
heard this ceremony compared to a wedding, the priest was there uttering
blessings, and surpliced men were chanting prayers; surely she was being
married!
Did the vicomte feel the nervous trembling of her fingers? Did his heart
sympathize with hers? Did he understand? did he guess? was he also under
the influence of an all-absorbing love-dream? Or was it only the knowledge
that women found him irresistible that made him press her hand, gently at
first, then harder and harder till he hurt her? Then, without changing the
expression of his face, that no one might notice him, he said very distinctly:
"Oh, Jeanne, if you liked, this might be our betrothal!"
She slowly bent her head with a movement which perhaps meant "yes"; and
some drops of holy water fell on their hands.
The ceremony was over; the women rose from their knees, and everyone
began to hurry back. The choir-boy let the cross swing from side to side, or
tilt forward till it nearly fell; the curé, no longer praying, hurried behind
him; the choristers and the serpent-player disappeared down a narrow
turning to get back and undress quickly, the sailors hastened past in twos
and threes; a good lunch was waiting for them at Les Peuples and the very
thought of it quickened their pace and made their mouths water.
Sixty sailors and peasants sat down to the long table laid in the courtyard
under the apple trees. The baroness sat at the middle of the table with the
curé from Yport on one side of her and the Abbé Picot on the other;

opposite her was the baron between the mayor and his wife. The mayoress
was a thin, elderly country woman with a nod for everyone; her big
Normandy cap fitted close round her thin face, making her head, with its
round, astonished-looking eyes, look like a white-tufted fowl's, and she ate
in little jerks as if she were pecking at her plate.
Jeanne was silent, seeing nothing, hearing nothing, her head turned with
joy. At last she asked the vicomte, who was sitting beside her:
"What is your Christian name?"
"Julien," he replied; "did you not know?"
She did not answer him, for she was thinking: "How often I shall repeat that
name to myself."
When lunch was over, the courtyard was left to the sailors. The baroness
began to take her exercise, leaning on the baron and accompanied by the
two priests, and Jeanne and Julien walked down to the wood, and wandered
along its little winding paths. All at once he took her hands in his.
"Tell me," he said, "will you be my wife?"
She hung her head, and he pleaded:
"Do not keep me in suspense, I implore you."
Then she slowly raised her eyes to his, and in that look he read her answer.

IV

The baron went into Jeanne's room before she was up one morning soon
after the christening of the boat, and sat down at the foot of the bed.
"M. le Vicomte de Lamare has proposed for you," he said.
Jeanne would have liked to hide her head under the bed-clothes.

"We told him we must think over his proposal before we could give him an
answer," continued the baron, who was smiling. "We did not wish to
arrange anything without first consulting you; your mother and I made no
objection to the marriage, but at the same time we did not make any
promise. You are a great deal richer than he is, but when the happiness of a
life is at stake the question of money ought not to be considered. He has no
relations, so if you married him we should gain a son, whereas if you
married anyone else you would have to go among strangers, and we should
lose our daughter. We like the young fellow, but the question is, do you like
him?"
"I am quite willing to marry him, papa," she stammered out, blushing to the
roots of her hair.
The baron looked into her eyes, and said with a smile: "I thought as much,
mademoiselle."
Until that evening Jeanne hardly knew what she was doing. She went
through everything mechanically, feeling thoroughly worn out with fatigue,
although she had done nothing to tire her. The vicomte came about six
o'clock and found her sitting with her mother under the plane-tree, and
Jeanne's heart beat wildly as the young man came calmly towards them. He
kissed the baroness's fingers, then, raising the young girl's trembling hand
to his lips, he imprinted on it a long, tender kiss of gratitude.
The happy betrothal time began. The young couple spent their days sitting
on the slope leading to the waste land beyond the wood, or walking up and
down the baroness's avenue, she with her eyes fixed on the dusty track her
mother's foot had made, he talking of the future. Once the marriage agreed
to, they wanted it to take place as soon as possible, so it was decided that
they should be married in six weeks' time, on the 15th of August, and that
they should start on their wedding tour almost immediately afterwards.
When Jeanne was asked to what country she should like to go, she chose
Corsica, where they would be more alone than in Italy.
They awaited the time of their union without very much impatience,
vaguely desiring more passionate embraces, and yet satisfied with a slight
caress, a pressure of the hand, a gaze so long that each seemed to read the
other's heart through their eyes.

No one was to be asked to the wedding besides Aunt Lison, the baroness's
sister, who was a lady-boarder in a convent at Versailles.
After their father's death the baroness wanted her sister to live with her, but
the old maid was convinced that she was a nuisance to everybody, and
always in the way, and she took apartments in one of the convents which
open their doors to the solitary and unhappy, though she occasionally spent
a month or two with her relations. She was a small woman with very little
to say, and always kept in the background; when she stayed with the
baroness she was only seen at meal times, the rest of the day she spent shut
up in her room. She had a kind, rather old-looking face, although she was
only forty-two, with sad, meek eyes. Her wishes had always been sacrificed
to those of everyone else. As a child she had always sat quietly in some
corner, never kissed because she was neither pretty nor noisy, and as a
young girl no one had ever troubled about her. Her sister, following the
example of her parents, always thought of her as of someone of no
importance, almost like some object of furniture which she was accustomed
to see every day but which never occupied her thoughts.
She seemed ashamed of her name, Lise, because it was so girlish and pretty,
and when there seemed no likelihood of her marrying, "Lise" had gradually
changed to "Lison." Since the birth of Jeanne she had become "Aunt
Lison," a sort of poor relation whom everyone treated with a careless
familiarity which hid a good-natured contempt. She was prim and very
timid even with her sister and brother-in-law, who liked her as they liked
everyone, but whose affection was formed of an indifferent kindness, and
an unconscious compassion.
Sometimes when the baroness was speaking of the far-away time of her
childhood she would say to fix a date: "It was about the time of Lison's mad
attempt." She never said anything more, and there was a certain mystery
about this "mad attempt."
One evening, when she was about nineteen years old, Lise had tried to
drown herself. No one could understand the reason of this act of folly; there
was nothing in her life or habits to at all account for it. She had been
rescued half-dead, and her parents, shocked at the deed, had not attempted
to discover its cause, but had only talked about her "mad attempt," in the

same way as they had spoken of the accident to the horse Coco, when he
had broken his leg in a ditch and had to be killed. Since then Lise had been
thought very weak-minded, and everyone around her gradually came to
look upon her with the mild contempt with which her relations regarded
her; even little Jeanne, perceiving with the quickness of a child how her
parents treated her aunt, never ran to kiss her or thought of performing any
little services for her. No one ever went to her room, and Rosalie, the maid,
alone seemed to know where it was situated. If anyone wanted to speak to
her a servant was sent to find her, and if she could not be found no one
troubled about her, no one thought of her, no one would ever have dreamt of
saying:
"Dear me! I have not seen Lison this morning."
When she came down to breakfast of a morning, little Jeanne went and held
up her face for a kiss, and that was the only greeting she received. She had
no position in the house and seemed destined never to be understood even
by her relations, never able to gain their love or confidence, and when she
died she would leave no empty chair, no sense of loss behind her.
When anyone said "Aunt Lison" the words caused no more feeling of
affection in anyone's heart than if the coffee pot or sugar basin had been
mentioned. She always walked with little, quick, noiseless steps, never
making any noise, never stumbling against anything, and her hands seemed
to be made of velvet, so light and delicate was their handling of anything
she touched.
Lison arrived at the château about the middle of July, quite upset by the idea
of the marriage; she brought a great many presents which did not receive
much attention as she was the giver, and the day after her arrival no one
noticed she was there. She could not take her eyes off the sweethearts, and
busied herself about the trousseau with a strange energy, a feverish
excitement, working in her room, where no one came to see her, like a
common seamstress. She was always showing the baroness some
handkerchiefs she had hemmed, or some towels on which she had
embroidered the monogram, and asking:
"Do you like that, Adélaïde?"

The baroness would carelessly look at the work and answer:
"Don't take so much trouble over it, my dear Lison."
About the end of the month, after a day of sultry heat, the moon rose in one
of those warm, clear nights which seem to draw forth all the hidden poetry
of the soul. The soft breeze fluttered the hangings of the quiet drawing-
room, and the shaded lamp cast a ring of soft light on the table where the
baroness and her husband were playing cards. Aunt Lison was sitting by
them knitting, and the young people were leaning against the open window,
looking out at the garden as it lay bathed in light.
The shadows of the linden and the plane tree fell on the moonlit grass
which stretched away to the shadows of the wood.
Irresistibly attracted by the beauty of the sight, Jeanne turned and said:
"Papa, we are going for a walk on the grass."
"Very well, my dear," answered the baron, without looking up from his
game.
Jeanne and the vicomte went out and walked slowly down the grass till they
reached the little wood at the bottom. They stayed out so long that at last the
baroness, feeling tired and wanting to go to her room, said:
"We must call in the lovers."
The baron glanced at the moonlit garden, where the two figures could be
seen walking slowly about.
"Leave them alone," he answered, "it is so pleasant out of doors; Lison will
wait up for them; won't you, Lison?"
The old maid looked up, and answered in her timid voice: "Oh, yes,
certainly."
The baron helped his wife to rise, and, tired himself by the heat of the day,
"I will go to bed, too," he said. And he went upstairs with the baroness.

Then Aunt Lison got up, and, leaving her work on the arm of the easy chair,
leant out of the window and looked at the glorious night. The two
sweethearts were walking backwards and forwards across the grass, silently
pressing each other's hands, as they felt the sweet influence of the visible
poetry that surrounded them.
Jeanne saw the old maid's profile in the window, with the lighted lamp
behind.
"Look," she said, "Aunt Lison is watching us."
"Yes, so she is," answered the vicomte in the tone of one who speaks
without thinking of what he is saying; and they continued their slow walk
and their dreams of love. But the dew was falling, and they began to feel
chilled.
"We had better go in now," said Jeanne.
They went into the drawing-room, and found Aunt Lison bending over the
knitting she had taken up again; her thin fingers were trembling as if they
were very tired. Jeanne went up to her.
"Aunt, we will go to bed now," she said.
The old maid raised her eyes; they were red as if she had been crying, but
neither of the lovers noticed it. Suddenly the young man saw that Jeanne's
thin slippers were quite wet, and fearing she would catch cold:
"Are not your dear little feet cold?" he asked affectionately.
Aunt Lison's fingers trembled so they could no longer hold the work; her
ball of wool rolled across the floor, and, hiding her face in her hands, she
began to sob convulsively. For a moment Jeanne and the vicomte stood
looking at her in mute surprise, then Jeanne, feeling frightened, knelt down
beside her, drew away her hands from her face, and asked in dismay:
"What is it, Aunt Lison? What is the matter with you?"
The poor, old maid, trembling all over, stammered out in a broken voice:

"When he asked you—'Are—are not your dear little feet—cold?'—I—I
thought how no one had—had ever said anything like that to me."
Jeanne felt full of pity for her aunt, but it seemed very funny to think of
anyone making love to Lison, and the vicomte turned his head away to hide
his laughter. Lison started up, left her wool on the ground and her knitting
on the armchair, and abruptly leaving the room, groped her way up the dark
staircase to her bedroom.
The two young people looked at one another, feeling sorry for her, and yet
rather amused.
"Poor auntie," murmured Jeanne.
"She must be a little mad this evening," replied Julien.
They were holding each other's hands as if they could not make up their
minds to say good-night, and very gently they exchanged their first kiss
before Aunt Lison's empty chair. The next day they had forgotten all about
the old maid's tears.
The fortnight before her marriage, Jeanne passed calmly and peacefully, as
if she were almost exhausted by the number of pleasant hours she had lately
had. The morning of the eventful day she had no time to think; she was only
conscious of a great sense of nothingness within her, as if beneath her skin,
her flesh, and blood, and bones had vanished, and she noticed how her
fingers trembled when she touched anything.
She did not regain her self-possession till she was going through the
marriage service. Married! She was married! Everything which had
happened since dawn seemed a dream, and all around her seemed changed;
people's gestures had a new meaning; even the hours of the day did not
seem to be in their right places. She felt stunned at the change. The day
before nothing had been altered in her life; her dearest hope had only
become nearer—almost within her grasp. She had fallen asleep a girl, now
she was a woman. She had crossed the barrier which hides the future with
all its expected joys and fancied happiness, and she saw before her an open
door; she was at last going to realize her dreams.

After the ceremony they went into the vestry, which was nearly empty, for
there were no wedding guests; but when they appeared at the door of the
church a loud noise made the bride start and the baroness shriek; it was a
salvo fired by the peasants, who had arranged to salute the bride, and the
shots could be heard all the way to Les Peuples.
Breakfast was served for the family, the curé from Yport, the Abbé Picot,
and the witnesses. Then everyone went to walk in the garden till dinner was
ready. The baron and the baroness, Aunt Lison, the mayor, and the abbé
walked up and down the baroness's path, and the priest from Yport strode
along the other avenue reading his breviary.
From the other side of the château came the noisy laughter of the peasants
drinking cider under the apple-trees. The whole countryside in its Sunday
garb was in the court, and the girls and young men were playing games and
chasing each other.
Jeanne and Julien went across the wood, and at the top of the slope stood
silently looking at the sea. It was rather chilly, although it was the middle of
August; there was a north wind, and the sun was shining in the midst of a
cloudless sky, so the young couple crossed the plain to find shelter in the
wooded valley leading to Yport. In the coppice no wind could be felt, and
they left the straight road and turned into a narrow path running under the
trees.
They could hardly walk abreast, and he gently put his arm round her waist;
she did not say anything, but her heart throbbed, and her breath came
quickly; the branches almost touched their heads, and they often had to
bend low to pass under them. She broke off a leaf; underneath it lay two
lady-birds looking like delicate, red shells.
"Look, it's a husband and wife," she said, innocently, feeling a little more at
ease.
Julien's mouth brushed her ear.
"To-night you will be my little wife," he said.
Although she had learnt a great deal since she had been living among the
fields, as yet only the poetical side of love had presented itself to her mind,

and she did not understand him. Was she not already his wife?
Then he began to drop little kisses on her forehead, and on her neck just
where some soft, stray hairs curled; instinctively she drew her head away
from him, startled and yet enraptured by these kisses to which she was not
accustomed. Looking up they found they had reached the end of the wood.
She stopped, a little confused at finding herself so far from home; what
would everyone think?
"Let us go back," she said.
He withdrew his arm from her waist, and as they turned round they came
face to face, so close together that she felt his breath on her cheek. They
looked into each other's eyes, each seeking to read the other's soul, and
trying to learn its secrets by a determined, penetrating gaze. What would
each be like? What would be the life they were commencing together?
What joys, what disillusions did married life reserve for them? Suddenly
Julien placed his hands on his wife's shoulders, and pressed on her lips such
a kiss as she had never before received, a kiss which thrilled her whole
being, a kiss which gave her such a strange shock that she almost fell to the
ground. She wildly pushed him from her.
"Let us go back. Let us go back," she stammered out.
He did not make any answer, but took both her hands and held them in his
own, and they walked back to the house in silence.
At dusk a simple dinner was served, but there was a restraint upon the
conversation. The two priests, the mayor, and the four farmers, who had
been invited as witnesses, alone indulged in a little coarse gayety which
generally accompanies a wedding, and when the laughter died away the
mayor would try to revive it with a jest. It was about nine o'clock when the
coffee was served. Out of doors, under the apple-trees, the open-air ball had
just commenced; the tapers which had been hung on the branches made the
leaves look the color of verdigris, and through the open windows of the
dining-room all the revelry could be seen. The rustics skipped round,
howling a dance-tune, accompanied by two violins and a clarionet, the
musicians being perched upon a kitchen table. The noisy voices of the
peasants sometimes entirely drowned the sound of the instruments, and the

thin music sounded as if it was dropping from the sky in little bits, a few
notes being scattered every now and then.
Two big barrels, surrounded by flaming torches, provided drink for the
crowd, and two servants did nothing but rinse glasses and bowls in a tub,
and then hold them, dripping wet, under the taps whence flowed a crimson
stream of wine, or a golden stream of cider. The thirsty dancers crowded
round, stretched out their hands to get hold of any drinking vessel, and
poured the liquid down their dust-filled throats. Bread, butter, cheese, and
sausages were laid on a table, and everyone swallowed a mouthful from
time to time. As they watched this healthy, noisy fête, the melancholy
guests in the dining-room felt that they too would have liked to join the
dance, to drink from the great casks, and eat a slice of bread-and-butter and
a raw onion.
"By Jove! they are enjoying themselves!" said the mayor, beating time to
the music with his knife. "It makes one think of the wedding feast at
Ganache."
There was a murmur of suppressed laughter.
"You mean at Cana," replied the Abbé Picot, the natural enemy of every
civil authority.
But the mayor held his ground.
"No, M. le curé, I know quite well what I am saying; when I say Ganache, I
mean Ganache."
After dinner they went among the peasants for a little while, and then the
guests took their leave. The baron and his wife had a little quarrel in a low
voice. Madame Adélaïde, more out of breath than ever, seemed to be
refusing something her husband was asking her to do; and at last she said
almost out loud: "No, my dear, I cannot. I shouldn't know how to begin."
The baron abruptly left her, and went up to Jeanne.
"Will you come for a walk with me, my child?" he said.
"If you like, papa," she answered, feeling a little uneasy.

As soon as they were outside the door they felt the wind in their faces—a
cold, dry wind which drove the clouds across the sky, and made the summer
night feel like autumn. The baron pressed his daughter's arm closely to him,
and affectionately pressed her hand. For some minutes they walked on in
silence; he could not make up his mind to begin, but, at last, he said:
"My pet, I have to perform a very difficult duty which really belongs to
your mother; as she refuses to do what she ought, I am obliged to take her
place. I do not know how much you already know of the laws of existence;
there are some things which are carefully hidden from children, from girls
especially, for girls ought to remain pure-minded and perfectly innocent
until the hour their parents place them in the arms of the man who,
henceforth, has the care of their happiness; it is his duty to raise the veil
drawn over the sweet secret of life. But, if no suspicion of the truth has
crossed their minds, girls are often shocked by the somewhat brutal reality
which their dreams have not revealed to them. Wounded in mind, and even
in body, they refuse to their husband what is accorded to him as an absolute
right by both human and natural laws. I cannot tell you any more, my
darling; but remember this, only this, that you belong entirely to your
husband."
What did she know in reality? What did she guess? She began to tremble,
and she felt low-spirited, and overcome by a presentiment of something
terrible. When she and her father went in again they stopped in surprise at
the drawing-room door. Madame Adélaïde was sobbing on Julien's
shoulder. Her noisy tears seemed to be forced from her, and issued at the
same time from her nose, mouth and eyes, and the amazed vicomte was
awkwardly supporting the huge woman, who had thrown herself in his arms
to ask him to be gentle with her darling, her pet, her dear child. The baron
hurried forward.
"Oh, pray do not make a scene, do not let us have any tears," he said, taking
hold of his wife, and seating her in an armchair while she wiped her face.
Then turning towards Jeanne:
"Now then, my dear, kiss your mother and go to bed," he said.
Ready to cry herself, Jeanne quickly kissed her parents and ran away. Aunt
Lison had already gone to her room, so the baron and his wife were left

alone with Julien. They all three felt very awkward, and could think of
nothing to say; the two men, in their evening-dress, remained standing,
looking into space, and Madame Adélaïde leant back in her armchair, her
breast still heaved by an occasional sob. At last the silence became
unbearable, and the baron began to talk about the journey the young couple
were going to take in a few days.
Jeanne, in her room, was being undressed by Rosalie, whose tears fell like
rain; her trembling hands could not find the strings and pins, and she
certainly seemed a great deal more affected than her mistress. But Jeanne
did not notice her maid's tears; she felt as though she had entered another
world, and was separated from all she had known and loved. Everything in
her life seemed turned upside down; the strange idea came to her: "Did she
really love her husband?" He suddenly seemed some stranger she hardly
knew. Three months before she had not even been aware of his existence,
and now she was his wife. How had it happened? Did people always plunge
into marriage as they might into some uncovered hole lying in their path?
When she was in her night-dress she slipped into bed, and the cold sheets
made her shiver, and increased the sensation of cold, and sadness and
loneliness which had weighed on her mind for two hours. Rosalie went
away still sobbing, and Jeanne lay still, anxiously awaiting the revelation
she had partly guessed, and that her father had hinted at in confused words
—awaiting the unveiling of love's great secret.
There came three soft knocks at the door, though she had heard no one
come upstairs. She started violently, and made no answer; there was another
knock, and then the door-handle was turned. She hid her head under the
clothes as if a thief had got into her room, and then came a noise of boots
on the boards, and all at once some one touched the bed. She started again,
and gave a little cry; then, uncovering her head, she saw Julien standing
beside the bed, looking at her with a smile.
"Oh, how you frightened me!" she said.
"Did you not expect me, then?" he asked.
She made no answer, feeling horribly ashamed of being seen in bed by this
man, who looked so grave and correct in his evening-dress. They did not
know what to say or do next; they hardly dared to look at one another, in

this decisive hour, on which the intimate happiness of their life depended.
Perhaps he vaguely felt what perfect self-possession, what affectionate
stratagems are needed not to hurt the modesty, the extreme delicacy of a
maiden's heart. He gently took her hand and kissed it; then, kneeling by the
bed as he would before an altar, he murmured, in a voice soft as a sigh:
"Will you love me?"
She felt a little reassured, and raised her head, which was covered with a
cloud of lace.
"I love you already, dear," she said, with a smile.
He took his wife's little slender fingers in his mouth, and, his voice changed
by this living gag, he asked:
"Will you give me a proof of your love?"
The question frightened her again, and, only remembering her father's
words, and not quite understanding what she said:
"I am yours, dear," she answered.
He covered her hand with humid kisses, and, slowly rising, he bent towards
her face, which she again began to hide. Suddenly he threw one arm across
the bed, winding it around his wife over the clothes, and slipped his other
arm under the bolster, which he raised with her head upon it; then he asked,
in a low whisper:
"Then you will make room for me beside you?"
She had an instinctive fear, and stammered out: "Oh, not yet, I entreat you."
He seemed disappointed and a little hurt; then he went on in a voice that
was still pleading, but a little more abrupt:
"Why not now, since we have got to come to it sooner or later?"
She did not like him for saying that, but, perfectly resigned and submissive,
she said, for the second time:
"I am yours, dear."

Then he went quickly into his dressing-room, and she could distinctly hear
the rustling of his clothes as he took them off, the jingling of the money in
his pockets, the noise his boots made as he let them drop on the floor. All at
once he ran across the room in his drawers and socks to put his watch on
the mantelpiece; then he returned to the other room, where he moved about
a little while longer. Jeanne turned quickly over to the other side and shut
her eyes when she heard him coming. She nearly started out of bed when
she felt a cold, hairy leg slide against hers, and, distractedly hiding her face
in her hands, she moved right to the edge of the bed, almost crying with fear
and horror. He took her in his arms, although her back was turned to him,
and eagerly kissed her neck, the lace of her nightcap, and the embroidered
collar of her night-dress. Filled with a horrible dread, she did not move, and
then she felt his strong hands caressing her. She gasped for breath at this
brutal touch, and felt an intense longing to escape and hide herself
somewhere out of this man's reach. Soon he lay still, and she could feel the
warmth of his body against her back. She did not feel so frightened then,
and all at once the thought flashed across her mind that she had only to turn
round and her lips would touch his.
At last he seemed to get impatient, and, in a sorrowful voice, he said:
"Then you will not be my little wife?"
"Am I not your wife already?" she said, through her hands.
"Come now, my dear, don't try to make a fool of me," he answered, with a
touch of bad temper in his voice.
She felt very sorry when she heard him speak like that, and with a sudden
movement she turned towards him to ask his pardon. He passionately seized
her in his arms and imprinted burning kisses all over her face and neck. She
had taken her hands from her face and lay still, making no response to his
efforts, her thoughts so confused that she could understand nothing, until
suddenly she felt a sharp pain, and then she began to moan and writhe in his
arms.
What happened next? She did not know, for her head was in a whirl. She
was conscious of nothing more until she felt him raining grateful kisses on
her lips. Then he spoke to her and she had to answer; then he made other

attempts, which she repelled with horror, and as she struggled she felt
against her chest the thick hair she had already felt against her leg, and she
drew back in dismay. Tired at last of entreating her without effect, he lay
still on his back; then she could think. She had expected something so
different, and this destruction of her hopes, this shattering of her
expectations of delight, filled her with despair, and she could only say to
herself: "That, then, is what he calls being his wife; that is it, that is it."
For a long time she lay thus, feeling very miserable, her eyes wandering
over the tapestry on the walls, with its tale of love. As Julien did not speak
or move, she slowly turned her head towards him, and then she saw that he
was asleep, with his mouth half opened and his face quite calm. Asleep! she
could hardly believe it, and it made her feel more indignant, more outraged
than his brutal passion had done. How could he sleep on such a night?
There was no novelty for him, then, in what had passed between them? She
would rather he had struck her, or bruised her with his odious caresses till
she had lost consciousness, than that he should have slept. She leant on her
elbow, and bent towards him to listen to the breath which sometimes
sounded like a snore as it passed through his lips.
Daylight came, dim at first, then brighter, then pink, then radiant. Julien
opened his eyes, yawned, stretched his arms, looked at his wife, smiled, and
asked:
"Have you slept well, dear?"
She noticed with great surprise that he said "thou" to her now, and she
replied:
"Oh, yes; have you?"
"I? Oh, very well indeed," he answered, turning and kissing her. Then he
began to talk, telling her his plans, and using the word "economy" so often
that Jeanne wondered. She listened to him without very well understanding
what he said, and, as she looked at him, a thousand thoughts passed rapidly
through her mind.
Eight o'clock struck.

"We must get up," he said; "we shall look stupid if we stay in bed late to-
day;" and he got up first.
When he had finished dressing, he helped his wife in all the little details of
her toilet, and would not hear of her calling Rosalie. As he was going out of
the room, he stopped to say:
"You know, when we are by ourselves, we can call each other 'thee' and
'thou,' but we had better wait a little while before we talk like that before
your parents. It will sound quite natural when we come back after our
honeymoon." And then he went downstairs.
Jeanne did not go down till lunch-time; and the day passed exactly the same
as usual, without anything extraordinary happening. There was only an
extra man in the house.

V

Four days after the wedding, the berlin in which they were to travel to
Marseilles arrived. After the anguish of that first night, Jeanne soon became
accustomed to Julien's kisses and affectionate caresses, though their more
intimate relations still revolted her. When they went away she had quite
regained her gayety of heart, and the baroness was the only one who
showed any emotion at the parting. Just as the carriage was going off, she
put a heavy purse in her daughter's hand.
"That is for any little thing you may want to buy," she said.
Jeanne dropped it into her pocket and the carriage started.
"How much did your mother give you in that purse?" asked Julien in the
evening.
Jeanne had forgotten all about it, so she turned it out on her knees, and
found there were two thousand francs in gold.
"What a lot of things I shall be able to buy!" she cried, clapping her hands.

At the end of a week they arrived at Marseilles, where the heat was terrible,
and the next day they embarked on the Roi Louis, the little packet-boat
which calls at Ajaccio on its way to Naples, and started for Corsica. It
seemed to Jeanne as if she were in a trance which yet left her the full
possession of all her senses, and she could hardly believe she was really
going to Corsica, the birthplace of Napoleon, with its wild undergrowth, its
bandits, and its mountains. She and her husband stood side by side on the
deck of the boat watching the cliffs of Provence fly past. Overhead was a
bright blue sky, and the waves seemed to be getting thicker and firmer
under the burning heat of the sun.
"Do you remember when we went to Etretat in old Lastique's boat?" asked
Jeanne; and, instead of answering her, Julien dropped a kiss right on her ear.
The steamer's paddles churned up the sea, and behind the boat, as far as the
eye could reach, lay a long foaming track where the troubled waves frothed
like champagne. All at once an immense dolphin leapt out of the water a
few fathoms ahead, and then dived in again head foremost. It startled
Jeanne, and she threw herself in Julien's arms with a little cry of fear; then
she laughed at her terror, and watched for the reappearance of the enormous
fish. In a few seconds up it came again, like a huge mechanical toy; then it
dived again, and again disappeared; then came two more, then three, then
six, which gamboled round the boat, and seemed to be escorting their large
wooden brother with the iron fins. Sometimes they were on the left of the
boat, sometimes on the right, and, one following the other in a kind of
game, they would leap into the air, describe a curve, and replunge into the
sea one after the other. Jeanne clapped her hands, delighted at each
reappearance of the big, pliant fish, and felt a childish enjoyment in
watching them. Suddenly they disappeared, rose to the surface a long way
out to sea, then disappeared for good, and Jeanne felt quite sorry when they
went away.
The calm, mild, radiant evening drew on; there was not a breath of air to
cause the smallest ripple on the sea; the sun was slowly sinking towards that
part of the horizon beyond which lay the land of burning heat, Africa,
whose glow could almost be felt across the ocean; then, when the sun had
quite disappeared, a cool breath of wind, so faint that it could not be called
a breeze, came over the sea. There were all the horrible smells of a packet-

boat in their cabin, so Jeanne and Julien wrapped themselves in their cloaks
and lay down side by side on deck. Julien went to sleep directly, but Jeanne
lay looking up at the host of stars which sparkled with so bright and clear a
light in this soft Southern sky; then the monotonous noise of the engines
made her drowsy, and at last she fell asleep. In the morning she was
awakened by the voices of the sailors cleaning the boat, and she aroused her
husband and got up. The sea was still all around them, but straight ahead
something gray could be faintly seen in the dawn; it looked like a bank of
strange-shaped clouds, pointed and jagged, lying on the waves. This vague
outline gradually became more distinct, until, standing out against the
brightening sky, a long line of mountain-peaks could be seen. It was
Corsica, hidden behind a light veil of mist.
The sun rose, throwing black shadows around and below every prominence,
and each peak had a crown of light, while all the rest of the island remained
enveloped in mist.
The captain, a little elderly man, bronzed, withered, and toughened by the
rough salt winds, came up on deck.
"Can you smell my lady over there?" he asked Jeanne, in a voice that thirty
years of command, and shouting above the noise of the wind, had made
hoarse.
She had indeed noticed a strong, peculiar odor of herbs and aromatic plants.
"It's Corsica that smells like that, madame," went on the captain. "She has a
perfumed breath, just like a pretty woman. I am a Corsican, and I should
know that smell five miles off, if I'd been away twenty years. Over there, at
St. Helena, I hear he is always speaking of the perfume of his country; he
belongs to my family."
And the captain took off his hat and saluted Corsica, and then, looking
across the ocean, he saluted the great emperor who was a prisoner on that
far-away isle, and Jeanne's heart was touched by this simple action. Then
the sailor pointed towards the horizon.
"There are the Sanguinaires," he said.

Julien had his arm round his wife's waist, and they both strained their eyes
to see what the captain was pointing out. As last they saw some pointed
rocks that the boat rounded before entering a large, calm bay, surrounded by
high mountains, whose steep sides looked as though they were covered with
moss.
"That is the undergrowth," said the captain, pointing out this verdure.
The circle of mountains seemed to close in behind the boat as she slowly
steamed across the azure water which was so transparent that in places the
bottom could be seen. Ajaccio came in sight; it was a white town at the foot
of the mountains, with a few small Italian boats lying at anchor in the
harbor, and four or five row-boats came beside the Roi Louis to take off the
passengers. Julien, who was looking after the luggage, asked his wife in a
low tone:
"A franc is enough, isn't it, to give the steward?"
The whole week he had been constantly asking her this question which she
hated.
"When you don't know what is enough, give too much," she answered, a
little impatiently.
He haggled with every one, landlords and hotel-waiters, cabmen and
shopmen, and when he had obtained the reduction he wanted, he would rub
his hands, and say to Jeanne: "I don't like to be robbed." She trembled when
the bills were brought, for she knew beforehand the remarks he would make
on each item, and felt ashamed of his bargaining; and when she saw the
scornful look of the servants as her husband left his small fee in their hands,
she blushed to the roots of her hair. Of course he had a discussion with the
boatmen who took them ashore.
The first tree she saw on landing was a palm, which delighted her. They
went to a big empty hotel standing at the corner of a vast square, and
ordered lunch. When they had finished dessert, Jeanne got up to go and
wander about the town, but Julien, taking her in his arms, whispered
tenderly in her ear:
"Shall we go upstairs for a little while, my pet?"

"Go upstairs?" she said, with surprise; "but I am not at all tired."
He pressed her to him: "Don't you understand? For two days—"
She blushed crimson.
"Oh, what would everyone say? what would they think? You could not ask
for a bedroom in the middle of the day. Oh, Julien, don't say anything about
it now, please don't."
"Do you think I care what the hotel-people say or think?" he interrupted.
"You'll see what difference they make to me." And he rang the bell.
She did not say anything more, but sat with downcast eyes, disgusted at her
husband's desires, to which she always submitted with a feeling of shame
and degradation; her senses were not yet aroused, and her husband treated
her as if she shared all his ardors. When the waiter answered the bell, Julien
asked him to show them to their room; the waiter, a man of true Corsican
type, bearded to the eyes, did not understand, and kept saying that the room
would be quite ready by the evening. Julien got out of patience.
"Get it ready at once," he said. "The journey has tired us and we want to
rest."
A slight smile crept over the waiter's face, and Jeanne would have liked to
run away; when they came downstairs again, an hour later, she hardly dared
pass the servants, feeling sure that they would whisper and laugh behind her
back. She felt vexed with Julien for not understanding her feelings, and
wondering at his want of delicacy; it raised a sort of barrier between them,
and, for the first time, she understood that two people can never be in
perfect sympathy; they may pass through life side by side, seemingly in
perfect union, but neither quite understands the other, and every soul must
of necessity be for ever lonely.
They stayed three days in the little town which was like a furnace, for every
breath of wind was shut out by the mountains. Then they made out a plan of
the places they should visit, and decided to hire some horses. They started
one morning at daybreak on the two wiry little Corsican horses they had
obtained, and accompanied by a guide mounted on a mule which also
carried some provisions, for inns are unknown in this wild country. At first

the road ran along the bay, but soon it turned into a shallow valley leading
to the mountains. The uncultivated country seemed perfectly bare, and the
sides of the hills were covered with tall weeds, turned sere and yellow by
the burning heat; they often crossed ravines where only a narrow stream
still ran with a gurgling sound, and occasionally they met a mountaineer,
sometimes on foot, sometimes riding his little horse, or bestriding a donkey
no bigger than a dog; these mountaineers always carried a loaded gun
which might be old and rusty, but which became a very formidable weapon
in their hands. The air was filled with the pungent smell of the aromatic
plants with which the isle is covered, and the road sloped gradually
upwards, winding round the mountains.
The peaks of blue and pink granite made the island look like a fairy palace,
and, from the heights, the forests of immense chestnut trees on the lower
parts of the hills looked like green thickets. Sometimes the guide would
point to some steep height, and mention a name; Jeanne and Julien would
look, at first seeing nothing, but at last discovering the summit of the
mountain. It was a village, a little granite hamlet, hanging and clinging like
a bird's nest to the vast mountain. Jeanne got tired of going at a walking
pace for so long.
"Let us gallop a little," she said, whipping up her horse.
She could not hear her husband behind her, and, turning round to see where
he was, she burst out laughing. Pale with fright, he was holding onto his
horse's mane, almost jolted out of the saddle by the animal's motion. His
awkwardness and fear were all the more funny, because he was such a
grave, handsome man. Then they trotted gently along the road between two
thickets formed of juniper trees, green oaks, arbutus trees, heaths, bay trees,
myrtles, and box trees, whose branches were formed into a network by the
climbing clematis, and between and around which grew big ferns,
honeysuckles, rosemary, lavender, and briars, forming a perfectly
impassable thicket, which covered the hill like a cloak. The travelers began
to get hungry, and the guide rejoined them and took them to one of those
springs so often met with in a mountainous country, with the icy water
flowing from a little hole in the rock where some passer-by has left the big
chestnut leaf which conveyed the water to his mouth. Jeanne felt so happy

that she could hardly help shouting aloud; and they again remounted and
began to descend, winding round the Gulf of Sagone.
As evening was drawing on they went through Cargése, the Greek village
founded so long ago by fugitives driven from their country. Round a
fountain was a group of tall, handsome and particularly graceful girls, with
well formed hips, long hands, and slender waists; Julien cried "Good-night"
to them, and they answered him in the musical tongue of their ancestors.
When they got to Piana they had to ask for hospitality quite in the way of
the middle ages, and Jeanne trembled with joy as they waited for the door to
open in answer to Julien's knock. Oh, that was a journey! There they did
indeed meet with adventures!
They had happened to appeal to a young couple who received them as the
patriarch received the messenger of God, and they slept on a straw mattress
in an old house whose woodwork was so full of worms that it seemed alive.
At sunrise they started off again, and soon they stopped opposite a regular
forest of crimson rocks; there were peaks, columns, and steeples, all
marvelously sculptured by time and the sea. Thin, round, twisted, crooked,
and fantastic, these wonderful rocks nine hundred feet high, looked like
trees, plants, animals, monuments, men, monks in their cassocks, horned
demons and huge birds, such as one sees in a nightmare, the whole forming
a monstrous tribe which seemed to have been petrified by some eccentric
god.
Jeanne could not speak, her heart was too full, but she took Julien's hand
and pressed it, feeling that she must love something or some one before all
this beauty; and then, leaving this confusion of forms, they came upon
another bay surrounded by a wall of blood-red granite, which cast crimson
reflections into the blue sea. Jeanne exclaimed, "Oh, Julien!" and that was
all she could say; a great lump came in her throat and two tears ran down
her cheeks. Julien looked at her in astonishment.
"What is it, my pet?" he asked.
She dried her eyes, smiled, and said in a voice that still trembled a little.
"Oh, it's nothing, I suppose I am nervous. I am so happy that the least thing
upsets me."

He could not understand this nervousness; he despised the hysterical
excitement to which women give way and the joy or despair into which
they are cast by a mere sensation, and he thought her tears absurd. He
glanced at the bad road.
"You had better look after your horse," he said.
They went down by a nearly impassable road, then turning to the right,
proceeded along the gloomy valley of Ota. The path looked very dangerous,
and Julien proposed that they should go up on foot. Jeanne was only too
delighted to be alone with him after the emotion she had felt, so the guide
went on with the mule and horses, and they walked slowly after him. The
mountain seemed cleft from top to bottom, and the path ran between two
tremendous walls of rock which looked nearly black. The air was icy cold,
and the little bit of sky that could be seen looked quite strange, it seemed so
far away. A sudden noise made Jeanne look up. A large bird flew out of a
hole in the rock; it was an eagle, and its open wings seemed to touch the
two sides of the chasm as it mounted towards the sky. Farther on, the
mountain again divided, and the path wound between the two ravines,
taking abrupt turns. Jeanne went first, walking lightly and easily, sending
the pebbles rolling from under her feet and fearlessly looking down the
precipices. Julien followed her, a little out of breath, and keeping his eyes
on the ground so that he should not feel giddy and it seemed like coming
out of Hades when they suddenly came into the full sunlight.
They were very thirsty, and, seeing a damp track, they followed it till they
came to a tiny spring flowing into a hollow stick which some goat-herd had
put there; all around the spring the ground was carpeted with moss, and
Jeanne knelt down to drink. Julien followed her example, and as she was
slowly enjoying the cool water, he put his arm around her and tried to take
her place at the end of the wooden pipe. In the struggle between their lips
they would in turns seize the small end of the tube and hold it in their
mouths for a few seconds; then, as they left it, the stream flowed on again
and splashed their faces and necks, their clothes and their hands. A few
drops shone in their hair like pearls, and with the water flowed their kisses.
Then Jeanne had an inspiration of love. She filled her mouth with the clear
liquid, and, her cheeks puffed out like bladders, she made Julien understand

that he was to quench his thirst at her lips. He stretched his throat, his head
thrown backwards and his arms open, and the deep draught he drank at this
living spring enflamed him with desire. Jeanne leant on his shoulder with
unusual affection, her heart throbbed, her bosom heaved, her eyes, filled
with tears, looked softer, and she whispered:
"Julien, I love you!"
Then, drawing him to her, she threw herself down and hid her shame-
stricken face in her hands. He threw himself down beside her, and pressed
her passionately to him; she gasped for breath as she lay nervously waiting,
and all at once she gave a loud cry as though thunderstruck by the sensation
she had invited. It was a long time before they reached the top of the
mountain, so fluttered and exhausted was Jeanne, and it was evening when
they got to Evisa, and went to the house of Paoli Palabretti, a relation of the
guide's. Paoli was a tall man with a slight cough, and the melancholy look
of a consumptive; he showed them their room, a miserable-looking chamber
built of stone, but which was handsome for this country, where no
refinement is known. He was expressing in his Corsican patois (a mixture
of French and Italian) his pleasure at receiving them, when a clear voice
interrupted him, and a dark little woman, with big black eyes, a sun-kissed
skin, and a slender waist, hurried forward, kissed Jeanne, shook Julien by
the hand and said: "Good-day, madame; good-day, monsieur; are you quite
well?" She took their hats and shawls and arranged everything with one
hand, for her other arm was in a sling; then she turned them all out, saying
to her husband: "Take them for a walk till dinner is ready."
M. Palabretti obeyed at once, and, walking between Jeanne and her
husband, he took them round the village. His steps and his words both
drawled, and he coughed frequently, saying at each fit, "The cold air has got
on my lungs." He led them under some immense chestnut-trees, and,
suddenly stopping, he said in his monotonous voice:
"It was here that Mathieu Lori killed my cousin Jean Rinaldi. I was standing
near Jean, just there, when we saw Mathieu about three yards off. 'Jean,' he
cried; 'don't go to Albertacce; don't you go, Jean, or I'll kill you:' I took
Jean's arm. 'Don't go Jean,' I said, 'or he'll do it.' It was about a girl, Paulina
Sinacoupi, that they were both after. Then Jean cried out, 'I shall go,

Mathieu; and you won't stop me, either.' Then Mathieu raised his gun, and,
before I could take aim, he fired. Jean leaped two feet from the ground,
monsieur, and then fell right on me, and my gun dropped and rolled down
to that chestnut there. Jean's mouth was wide open, but he didn't say a word;
he was dead."
The young couple stared in astonishment at this calm witness of such a
crime.
"What became of the murderer?" asked Jeanne.
Paoli coughed for some time, then he went on:
"He gained the mountain, and my brother killed him the next year. My
brother, Philippi Palabretti, the bandit, you know."
Jeanne shuddered. "Is your brother a bandit?" she asked.
The placid Corsican's eye flashed proudly.
"Yes, madame, he was a celebrated bandit, he was; he put an end to six
gendarmes. He died with Nicolas Morali after they had been surrounded for
six days, and were almost starved to death."
Then they went in to dinner, and the little woman treated them as if she had
known them twenty years. Jeanne was haunted by the fear that she would
not again experience the strange shock she had felt in Julien's arms beside
the fountain, and when they were alone in their room she was still afraid his
kisses would again leave her insensible, but she was soon reassured, and
that was her first night of love. The next day she could hardly bear to leave
this humble abode, where a new happiness had come to her; she drew her
host's little wife into her bedroom, and told her she did not mean it as a
present in return for their hospitality, but she must absolutely insist on
sending her a souvenir from Paris, and to this souvenir she seemed to attach
a superstitious importance. For a long time the young Corsican woman
refused to accept anything at all, but at last she said:
"Well, send me a little pistol, a very little one."
Jeanne opened her eyes in astonishment, and the woman added in her ear, as
though she were confiding some sweet and tender secret to her:

"It's to kill my brother-in-law with."
And with a smile on her face, she quickly unbandaged the arm she could
not use, and showed Jeanne the soft, white flesh which had been pierced
right through with a stiletto, though the wound had nearly healed.
"If I had not been as strong as he is," she said, "he would have killed me.
My husband is not jealous, for he understands me, and then he is ill, you
see, so he is not so hot-blooded; besides, I am an honest woman, madame.
But my brother-in-law believes everything that is told him about me, and he
is jealous for my husband. I am sure he will make another attempt upon my
life, but if I have a little pistol I shall feel safe, and I shall be sure of having
my revenge."
Jeanne promised to send the weapon, affectionately kissed her new friend
and said good-bye. The rest of her journey was a dream, an endless
embrace, an intoxication of caresses; she no longer saw country or people
or the places where they stopped, she had eyes only for Julien. When they
got to Bastia the guide had to be paid; Julien felt in his pockets, and not
finding what he wanted, he said to Jeanne:
"Since you don't use the two thousand francs your mother gave you, I might
as well carry them; they will be safer in my pocket, and, besides, then I
shan't have to change any notes."
They went to Leghorn, Florence, and Genoa, and, one windy morning, they
found themselves again at Marseilles. It was then the fifteenth of October,
and they had been away from Les Peuples two months. The cold wind,
which seemed to blow from Normandy, chilled Jeanne and made her feel
miserable. There had lately been a change in Julien's behavior towards her,
he seemed tired, and indifferent, and she had a vague presentiment of evil.
She persuaded him to stay at Marseilles four days longer, for she could not
bear to leave these warm, sunny lands where she had been so happy, but at
last they had to go. They intended to buy all the things they wanted for their
housekeeping at Paris, and Jeanne was looking forward to buying all sorts
of things for Les Peuples, thanks to her mother's present; but the very first
thing she meant to purchase was the pistol she had promised to the young
Corsican woman at Evisa.

The day after they reached Paris, she said to Julien:
"Will you give me mamma's money, dear? I want to buy some things."
He looked rather cross.
"How much do you want?" he asked.
"Oh—what you like," she answered in surprise.
"I will give you a hundred francs," he answered; "and whatever you do,
don't waste it."
She did not know what to say, she felt so amazed and confused, but at last
she said in a hesitating way:
"But—I gave you that money to—"
He interrupted her.
"Yes, exactly. What does it matter whether it's in your pocket or mine now
that we share everything? I am not refusing you the money, am I? I am
going to give you a hundred francs."
She took the five pieces of gold without another word; she did not dare ask
for more, so she bought nothing but the pistol.
A week later they started for Les Peuples.

VI

When the post-chaise drove up, the baron and baroness and all the servants
were standing outside the white railings to give the travelers a hearty
welcome home. The baroness cried, Jeanne quietly wiped away two tears,
and her father walked backwards and forwards nervously. Then, while the
luggage was being brought in, the whole journey was gone over again
before the drawing-room fire. The eager words flowed from Jeanne's lips,
and in half-an-hour she had related everything, except a few little details

she forgot in her haste. Then she went to unpack, with Rosalie, who was in
a state of great excitement, to help her; when she had finished and
everything had been put away in its proper place Rosalie left her mistress,
and Jeanne sat down, feeling a little tired. She wondered what she could do
next, and she tried to think of some occupation for her mind, some task for
her fingers. She did not want to go down to the drawing-room again to sit
by her mother who was dozing, and she thought of going for a walk, but it
was so miserable out of doors that only to glance out of the window made
her feel melancholy.
Then the thought flashed across her mind that now there never would be
anything for her to do. At the convent the future had always given her
something to think about, and her dreams had filled the hours, so that their
flight had passed unnoticed; but she had hardly left the convent when her
love-dreams had been realized. In a few weeks she had met, loved, and
married a man who had borne her away in his arms without giving her time
to think of anything. But now the sweet reality of the first few weeks of
married life was going to become a daily monotony, barring the way to all
the hopes and delicious fears of an unknown future. There was nothing
more to which she could look forward, nothing more for her to do, to-day,
to-morrow, or ever. She felt all that with a vague sensation of disillusion
and melancholy. She rose and went to lean her forehead against the cold
window-pane, and, after looking for some time at the dull sky and heavy
clouds, she made up her mind to go out.
Could it really be the same country, the same grass, the same trees as she
had seen with such joy in May? What had become of the sun-bathed leaves,
and the flaming dandelions, the blood-red poppies, the pure marguerites that
had reared their heads amidst the green grass above which had fluttered
innumerable yellow butterflies? They were all gone, and the very air
seemed changed, for now it was no longer full of life, and fertilizing germs
and intoxicating perfumes. The avenues were soaked by the autumn rains
and covered with a thick carpet of dead leaves, and the thin branches of the
poplars trembled in the wind which was shaking off the few leaves that still
hung on them. All day long these last, golden leaves hovered and whirled in
the air for a few seconds and then fell, in an incessant, melancholy rain.

Jeanne walked on down to the wood. It gave her the sad impression of
being in the room of a dying man. The leafy walls which had separated the
pretty winding paths no longer existed, the branches of the shrubs blew
mournfully one against the other, the rustling of the fallen leaves, that the
wind was blowing about and piling into heaps, sounded like a dying sigh,
and the birds hopped from tree to tree with shivering little chirps, vainly
seeking a shelter from the cold. Shielded by the elms which formed a sort of
vanguard against the sea-wind, the linden and the plane-tree were still
covered with leaves, and the one was clothed in a mantle of scarlet velvet,
the other in a cloak of orange silk. Jeanne walked slowly along the
baroness's avenue, by the side of Couillard's farm, beginning to realize what
a dull, monotonous life lay before her; then she sat down on the slope where
Julien had first told his love, too sad even to think and only feeling that she
would like to go to bed and sleep, so that she might escape from this
melancholy day. Looking up she saw a seagull blown along by a gust of
wind, and she suddenly thought of the eagle she had seen in Corsica in the
somber valley of Ota. As she sat there she could see again the island with its
sun-ripened oranges, its strong perfumes, its pink-topped mountains, its
azure bays, its ravines, with their rushing torrents, and it gave her a sharp
pain to think of that happy time that was past and gone; and the damp,
rugged country by which she was now surrounded, the mournful fall of the
leaves, the gray clouds hurrying before the wind, made her feel so
miserable that she went indoors, feeling that she should cry if she stayed out
any longer. She found her mother, who was accustomed to these dull days,
dozing over the fire. The baron and Julien had gone for a walk, and the
night was drawing on filling the vast drawing-room with dark shadows
which were sometimes dispersed by the fitful gleams of the fire; out of
doors the gray sky and muddy fields could just be seen in the fading light.
The baron and Julien came in soon after Jeanne. As soon as he came into
the gloomy room the baron rang the bell, exclaiming:
"How miserable you look in here! Let us have some lights."
He sat down before the fire, putting his feet near the flame, which made the
mud drop off his steaming boots.

"I think it is going to freeze," he said, rubbing his hands together cheerfully.
"The sky is clearing towards the north, and it's a full moon this evening. We
shall have a hard frost to-night."
Then, turning towards his daughter:
"Well, my dear," he asked, "are you glad to get back to your own house and
see the old people at home again?"
This simple question quite upset Jeanne. Her eyes filled with tears, and she
threw herself into her father's arms, covering his face with kisses as though
she would ask him to forgive her discontent. She had thought she should be
so pleased to see her parents again, and now, instead of joy, she felt a
coldness around her heart, and it seemed as if she could not regain all her
former love for them until they had all dropped back into their ordinary
ways again.
Dinner seemed very long that evening; no one spoke, and Julien did not pay
the least attention to his wife. In the drawing-room after dinner, Jeanne
dozed over the fire opposite the baroness who was quite asleep, and, when
she was aroused for a moment by the voices of the two men, raised in
argument over something, she wondered if she would ever become quite
content with a pleasureless, listless life like her mother. The crackling fire
burnt clear and bright, and threw sudden gleams on the faded tapestry
chairs, on the fox and the stork, on the melancholy-looking heron, on the
ant and the grasshopper. The baron came over to the fireplace, and held his
hands to the blaze.
"The fire burns well to-night," he said; "there is a frost, I am sure."
He put his hands on Jeanne's shoulder, and, pointing to the fire:
"My child," he said, "the hearth with all one's family around it is the
happiest spot on earth; there is no place like it. But don't you think we had
better go to bed? You must both be quite worn out with fatigue."
Up in her bedroom Jeanne wondered how this second return to the place she
loved so well could be so different from the first. "Why did she feel so
miserable?" she asked herself; "why did the château, the fields, everything
she had so loved, seem to-day so desolate?" Her eyes fell on the clock. The

little bee was swinging from left to right and from right to left over the
gilded flowers, with the same quick even movement as of old. She suddenly
felt a glow of affection for this little piece of mechanism, which told her the
hour in its silvery tones, and beat like a human heart, and the tears came
into her eyes as she looked at it; she had not felt so moved when she had
kissed her father and mother on her return, but the heart has no rules or
logic, to guide it.
Julien had made his fatigue the pretext for not sharing his wife's chamber
that night, so, for the first time since her marriage, she slept alone. It had
been agreed that henceforth they should have separate rooms, but she was
not yet accustomed to sleep alone, and, for a long time she lay awake while
the moaning wind swept round the house. In the morning she was aroused
by the blood-red light falling on her bed. Through the frozen window-panes
it looked as if the whole sky were on fire. Throwing a big dressing-gown
round her, Jeanne ran to the window and opened it, and in rushed an icy
wind, stinging her skin and bringing the water to her eyes. In the midst of a
crimson sky, the great red sun was rising behind the trees, and the white
frost had made the ground so hard that it rang under the farm-servant's feet.
In this one night all the branches of the poplars had been entirely stripped of
their few remaining leaves, and, through the bare trees, beyond the plain,
appeared the long, green line of the sea, covered with white-crested waves.
The plane-tree and the linden were being rapidly stripped of their bright
coverings by the cold wind, and showers of leaves fell to the ground as each
gust swept by.
Jeanne dressed herself, and for want of something better to do, went to see
the farmers. The Martins were very surprised to see her. Madame Martin
kissed her on both cheeks, and she had to drink a little glass of noyau; then
she went over to the other farm. The Couillards were also very surprised
when she came in; the farmer's wife gave two pecks at her ears and insisted
on her drinking a little glass of cassis; then she went in to breakfast. And
that day passed like the previous one, only it was cold instead of damp, and
the other days of the week were like the first two, and all the weeks of the
month were like the first one.
Little by little, Jeanne's regrets for those happy, distant lands vanished; she
began to get resigned to her life, to feel an interest in the many unimportant

details of the days, and to perform her simple, regular occupations with
care. A disenchantment of life, a sort of settled melancholy gradually took
possession of her. What did she want? She did not know herself. She had no
desire for society, no thirst for the excitement of the world, the pleasures
she might have had possessed no attraction for her, but all her dreams and
illusions had faded away, leaving her life as colorless as the old tapestry
chairs in the château drawing-room.
Her relations with Julien had completely changed, for he became quite a
different man when they settled down after their wedding tour, like an actor
who becomes himself again as soon as he has finished playing his part. He
hardly ever took any notice of his wife, or even spoke to her; all his love
seemed to have suddenly disappeared, and it was very seldom that he
accompanied her to her room of a night. He had taken the management of
the estate and the household into his own hands, and he looked into all the
accounts, saw that the peasants paid their arrears of rent, and cut down
every expense. No longer the polished, elegant man who had won Jeanne's
heart, he looked and dressed like a well-to-do farmer, neglecting his
personal appearance with the carelessness of a man who no longer strives to
fascinate. He always wore an old velvet shooting-jacket, covered all over
with stains, which he had found one day as he was looking over his old
clothes; then he left off shaving, and his long, untrimmed beard made him
look quite plain, while his hands never received any attention.
After each meal, he drank four or five small glasses of brandy, and when
Jeanne affectionately reproached him, he answered so roughly: "Leave me
alone, can't you?" that she never tried to reason with him again.
She accepted all this in a calm way that astonished herself, but she looked
upon him now as a stranger who was nothing whatever to her. She often
thought of it all, and wondered how it was that after having loved and
married each other in a delicious passion of affection they should suddenly
awake from their dream of love as utter strangers, as if they had never lain
in each other's arms. How was it his indifference did not hurt her more?
Had they been mistaken in each other? Would she have been more pained if
Julien had still been handsome, elegant and attractive?

It was understood that at the new year the baron and baroness were to spend
a few months in their Rouen house, leaving Les Peuples to the young
people who would become settled that winter, and so get accustomed to the
place where they were to pass their lives. Julien wanted to present his wife
to the Brisevilles, the Couteliers and the Fourvilles, but they could not pay
these visits yet because they had not been able to get the painter to change
the coat-of-arms on the carriage; for nothing in the world would have
persuaded Julien to go to the neighboring château in the old family carriage,
which the baron had given up to him, until the arms of the De Lamares had
been quartered on it with those of the Leperthius des Vauds. Now there was
only one man in the whole province who made a speciality of coats-of-
arms, a painter from Bolbec, named Bataille, who was naturally in great
request among all the Normandy aristocracy; so Julien had to wait for some
time before he could secure his services.
At last, one December morning just as they were finishing lunch at Les
Peuples, they saw a man, with a box on his back, open the gate and come up
the path; it was Bataille. He was shown into the dining-room, and lunch was
served to him just as if he had been a gentleman, for his constant
intercourse with the provincial aristocracy, his knowledge of the coats-of-
arms, their mottoes and signification, made him a sort of herald with whom
no gentleman need be ashamed to shake hands.
Pencils and paper were brought, and while Bataille ate his lunch, the baron
and Julien made sketches of their escutcheons with all the quarters. The
baroness, always delighted when anything of this sort was discussed, gave
her advice, and even Jeanne took part in the conversation, as if it aroused
some interest in her. Bataille, without interrupting his lunch, occasionally
gave an opinion, took the pencil to make a sketch of his idea, quoted
examples, described all the aristocratic carriages in Normandy, and seemed
to scatter an atmosphere of nobility all around him. He was a little man with
thin gray hair and paint-daubed hands which smelt of oil. It was said that he
had once committed a grave offense against public morality, but the esteem
in which he was held by all the titled families had long ago effaced this
stain on his character.
As soon as the painter had finished his coffee, he was taken to the coach-
house and the carriage was uncovered. Bataille looked at it, gave an idea of

the size he thought the shield ought to be, and then, after the others had
again given their opinions, he began his work. In spite of the cold the
baroness ordered a chair and a foot-warmer to be brought out for her that
she might sit and watch the painter. Soon she began to talk to him, asking
him about the marriages and births and deaths of which she had not yet
heard, and adding these fresh details to the genealogical trees which she
already knew by heart. Beside her, astride a chair, sat Julien, smoking a pipe
and occasionally spitting on the ground as he watched the growth of the
colored certificate of his nobility. Soon old Simon on his way to the kitchen
garden stopped, with his spade on his shoulder, to look at the painting, and
the news of Bataille's arrival having reached the two farms the farmers'
wives came hurrying up also. Standing on either side of the baroness, they
went into ecstasies over the drawing and kept repeating: "He must be clever
to paint like that."
The shields on both carriage-doors were finished the next morning about
eleven o'clock. Everyone came to look at the work now it was done, and the
carriage was drawn out of the coach-house that they might the better judge
of the effect. The design was pronounced perfect, and Bataille received a
great many compliments before he strapped his box on his back and went
off again; the baron, his wife, Jeanne and Julien all agreed that the painter
was a man of great talent, and would, no doubt, have become an artist, if
circumstances had permitted.
For the sake of economy, Julien had accomplished some reforms which
brought with them the need of fresh arrangements. The old coachman now
performed the duties of gardener, the vicomte himself undertaking to drive,
and as he was obliged to have someone to hold the horses when the family
went to make a visit, he had made a groom of a young cowherd named
Marius. The horses had been sold to do away with the expense of their
keep, so he had introduced a clause in Couillard's and Martin's leases by
which the two farmers bound themselves to each provide a horse once a
month, on whatever day the vicomte chose.
When the day came the Couillards produced a big, raw-boned, yellowish
horse, and the Martins a little, white, long-haired nag; the two horses were
harnessed, and Marius, buried in an old livery of Simon's, brought the
carriage round to the door. Julien, who was in his best clothes, would have

looked a little like his old, elegant self, if his long beard had not made him
look common. He inspected the horses, the carriage, and the little groom,
and thought they looked very well, the only thing of any importance in his
eyes being the new coat-of-arms. The baroness came downstairs on her
husband's arm, got in, and had some cushions put behind her back; then
came Jeanne. She laughed first at the strange pair of horses, and her
laughter increased when she saw Marius with his face buried under his
cockaded hat (which his nose alone prevented from slipping down to his
chin), and his hands lost in his ample sleeves, and the skirts of his coat
coming right down to his feet, which were encased in enormous boots; but
when she saw him obliged to throw his head right back before he could see
anything, and raise his knee at each step as though he were going to take a
river in his stride, and move like a blind man when he had an order given
him, she gave a shout of laughter. The baron turned round, looked for a
moment at the little fellow who stood looking so confused in his big
clothes, and then he too was overcome with laughter, and, hardly able to
speak, called out to his wife:
"Lo-lo-look at Ma-Marius! Does-doesn't he look fun-funny?"
The baroness leaned out of the carriage-window, and, catching sight of
Marius, she was shaken by such a fit of laughter that the carriage moved up
and down on its springs as if it were jolting over some deep ruts.
"What on earth is there to laugh at like that?" said Julien, his face pale with
anger. "You must be perfect idiots, all of you."
Jeanne sat down on the steps, holding her sides and quite unable to contain
herself; the baron followed her example, and, inside the carriage,
convulsive sneezes and a sort of continual clucking intimated that the
baroness was suffocating with laughter. At last Marius' coat began to shake;
no doubt, he understood the cause of all this mirth, and he giggled himself,
beneath his big hat. Julien rushed towards him in a rage; he gave him a box
on the ear which knocked the boy's hat off and sent it rolling onto the grass;
then, turning to the baron, he said, in a voice that trembled with anger:
"I think you ought to be the last one to laugh. Whose fault is it that you are
ruined? We should not be like this if you had not squandered your fortune
and thrown away your money right and left."

All the laughter stopped abruptly, but no one spoke. Jeanne, ready to cry
now, quietly took her place beside her mother. The baron, without a word,
sat down opposite, and Julien got up on the box, after lifting up the crying
boy whose cheek was beginning to swell. The long drive was performed in
silence, for they all felt awkward and unable to converse on ordinary topics.
They could only think of the incident that had just happened, and, rather
than broach such a painful subject, they preferred to sit in dull silence.
They went past a great many farm-houses startling the black fowls and
sending them to the hedges for refuge, and sometimes a yelping dog
followed for a little while and then ran back to his kennel with bristling
hair, turning round every now and then to send another bark after the
carriage. A lad in muddy sabots, was slouching along with his hands in his
pockets, his blouse blown out by the wind and his long lazy legs dragging
one after the other, and as he stood on one side for the carriage to pass, he
awkwardly pulled off his cap. Between each farm lay meadows with other
farms dotted here and there in the distance, and it seemed a long while
before they turned up an avenue of firs which bordered the road. Here the
carriage leant on one side as it passed over the deep ruts, and the baroness
felt frightened and began to give little screams. At the end of the avenue
there was a white gate which Marius jumped down to open, and then they
drove round an immense lawn and drew up before a high, gloomy-looking
house which had all its shutters closed.
The hall-door opened, and an old, semi-paralyzed servant (in a red and
black striped waistcoat, over which was tied an apron) limped sideways
down the steps; after asking the visitors' names he showed them into a large
drawing-room, and drew up the closed Venetian blinds. The furniture was
all covered up, and the clock and candelabra were enveloped in white
cloths; the room smelt moldy, and its damp, cold atmosphere seemed to
chill one to the very heart. The visitors sat down and waited. Footsteps
could be heard on the floor above, hurrying along in an unusual bustle, for
the lady of the house had been taken unawares and was changing her dress
as quickly as possible; a bell rang several times and then they could hear
more footsteps on the stairs. The baroness, feeling thoroughly cold, began
to sneeze frequently; Julien walked up and down the room, Jeanne sat by
her mother, and the baron stood with his back against the marble
mantelpiece.

At last a door opened, and the Vicomte and Vicomtesse de Briseville
appeared. They were a little, thin couple of an uncertain age, both very
formal and rather embarrassed. The vicomtesse wore a flowered silk gown
and a cap trimmed with ribbons, and when she spoke it was in a sharp,
quick voice. Her husband was in a tight frock-coat; his hair looked as if it
had been waxed, and his nose, his eyes, his long teeth and his coat, which
was evidently his best one, all shone as if they had been polished with the
greatest care. He returned his visitors' bow with a bend of the knees.
When the ordinary complimentary phrases had been exchanged no one
knew what to say next, so they all politely expressed their pleasure at
making this new acquaintance and hoped it would be a lasting one; for,
living as they did in the country all the year round, an occasional visit made
an agreable change. The icy air of the drawing-room froze the very marrow
of their bones, and the baroness was seized by a fit of coughing, interrupted
at intervals by a sneeze. The baron rose to go.
"You are not going to leave us already? Pray, stay a little longer," said the
Brisevilles.
But Jeanne followed her father's example in spite of all the signs made her
by Julien, who thought they were leaving too soon. The vicomtesse would
have rung to order the baron's carriage, but the bell was out of order, so the
vicomte went to find a servant. He soon returned, to say that the horses had
been taken out, and the carriage would not be ready for some minutes.
Everyone tried to find some subject of conversation; the rainy winter was
discussed, and Jeanne, who could not prevent herself shivering, try as she
would, asked if their hosts did not find it very dull living alone all the year
round. Such a question astounded the Brisevilles. Their time was always
fully occupied, what with writing long letters to their numerous aristocratic
relations and pompously discussing the most trivial matters, for in all their
useless, petty occupations, they were as formally polite to each other as
they would have been to utter strangers. At last the carriage, with its two ill-
matched steeds, drew up before the door, but Marius was nowhere to be
seen; he had gone for a walk in the fields, thinking he would not be wanted
again until the evening. Julien, in a great rage, left word for him to be sent
after them on foot, and, after a great many bows and compliments, they
started for Les Peuples again.

As soon as they were fairly off, Jeanne and the baron, in spite of the
uncomfortable feeling that Julien's ill-temper had caused, began to laugh
and joke about the Brisevilles' ways and tones. The baron imitated the
husband and Jeanne the wife, and the baroness, feeling a little hurt in her
reverence for the aristocracy, said to them:
"You should not joke in that way. I'm sure the Brisevilles are very well-bred
people, and they belong to excellent families."
They stopped laughing for a time, out of respect for the baroness's feelings,
but every now and then Jeanne would catch her father's eye, and then they
began again. The baron would make a very stiff bow, and say in a solemn
voice:
"Your château at Les Peuples must be very cold, madame, with the sea-
breeze blowing on it all day long."
Then Jeanne put on a very prim look, and said with a smirk, moving her
head all the time like a duck on the water:
"Oh, monsieur, I have plenty to fill up my time. You see we have so many
relations to whom letters must be written, and M. de Briseville leaves all
correspondence to me, as his time is taken up with the religious history of
Normandy that he is writing in collaboration with the Abbé Pelle."
The baroness could not help smiling, but she repeated, in a half-vexed, half-
amused tone:
"It isn't right to laugh at people of our own rank like that."
All at once the carriage came to a standstill, and Julien called out to
someone on the road behind; Jeanne and the baron leant out of the
windows, and saw some singular creature rolling, rather than running,
towards them. Hindered by the floating skirts of his coat, unable to see for
his hat, which kept slipping over his eyes, his sleeves waving like the sails
of a windmill, splashing through the puddles, stumbling over every large
stone in his way, hastening, jumping, covered with mud, Marius was
running after the carriage as fast as his legs could carry him. As soon as he
came up Julien leant down, caught hold of him by the coat collar, and lifted
him up on the box seat; then, dropping the reins, he began to pommel the

boy's hat, which at once slipped down to his shoulders. Inside the hat,
which sounded as if it had been a drum, Marius yelled at the top of his
voice, but it was in vain that he struggled and tried to jump down, for his
master held him firmly with one hand while he beat him with the other.
"Papa! oh, papa!" gasped Jeanne; and the baroness, filled with indignation,
seized her husband's arm, and exclaimed: "Stop him, Jacques, stop him!"
The baron suddenly let down the front window, and, catching hold of the
vicomte's sleeve:
"Are you going to stop beating that child?" he said in a voice that trembled
with anger.
Julien turned round in astonishment.
"But don't you see what a state the little wretch has got his livery into?"
"What does that matter to me?" exclaimed the baron, with his head between
the two. "You sha'n't be so rough with him."
Julien got angry.
"Kindly leave me alone," he said; "it's nothing to do with you;" and he
raised his hand to strike the lad again. The baron caught hold of his son-in-
law's wrist, and flung his uplifted hand heavily down against the woodwork
of the seat, crying:
"If you don't stop that, I'll get out and soon make you."
He spoke in so determined a tone that the vicomte's rage suddenly vanished,
and, shrugging his shoulders, he whipped up the horses, and the carriage
moved on again. All this time Jeanne and her mother had sat still, pale with
fright, and the beating of the baroness's heart could be distinctly heard. At
dinner that evening Julien was more agreeable than usual, and behaved as if
nothing had happened. Jeanne, her father, and Madame Adélaïde easily
forgave, and, touched by his good temper, they joined in his gayety with a
feeling of relief. When Jeanne mentioned the Brisevilles, her husband even
made a joke about them, though he quickly added:
"But one can see directly that they are gentlepeople."

No more visits were paid, as everyone dreaded any reference to Marius, but
they were going to send cards to their neighbors on New Year's day, and
then wait to call on them until spring came, and the weather was warmer.
On Christmas day and New Year's day, the curé, the mayor, and his wife
dined at Les Peuples, and their two visits formed the only break in the
monotonous days. The baron and baroness were to leave the château on the
ninth of January; Jeanne wanted them to stay longer, but Julien did not
second her invitation, so the baron ordered the post-chaise to be sent from
Rouen. The evening before they went away was clear and frosty, so Jeanne
and her father walked down to Yport, for they had not been there since
Jeanne's return from Corsica.
They went across the wood where she had walked on her wedding-day with
him whose companion she was henceforth to be, where she had received his
first kiss, and had caught her first glimpse of that sensual love which was
not fully revealed to her till that day in the valley of Ota when she had
drunk her husband's kisses with the water.
There were no leaves, no climbing plants, in the copse now, only the
rustling of the branches, and that dry, crackling noise that seems to fill
every wood in winter.
They reached the little village and went along the empty, silent streets,
which smelt of fish and of seaweed. The big brown nets were hanging
before the doors, or stretched out on the beach as of old; towards Fécamp
the green rocks at the foot of the cliff could be seen, for the tide was going
out, and all along the beach the big boats lay on their sides looking like
huge fish.
As night drew on, the fishermen, walking heavily in their big sea-boots,
began to come down on the shingle in groups, their necks well wrapped up
with woolen scarfs, and carrying a liter of brandy in one hand, and the boat-
lantern in the other. They busied themselves round the boats, putting on
board, with true Normandy slowness, their nets, their buoys, a big loaf, a jar
of butter, and the bottle of brandy and a glass. Then they pushed off the
boats, which went down the beach with a harsh noise, then rushed through
the surf, balanced themselves on the crest of a wave for a few seconds, and
spread their brown wings and disappeared into the night, with their little

lights shining at the bottom of the masts. The sailors' wives, their big, bony
frames shown off by their thin dresses, stayed until the last fisherman had
gone off, and then went back to the hushed village, where their noisy voices
roused the sleeping echoes of the gloomy streets.
The baron and Jeanne stood watching these men go off into the darkness, as
they went off every night, risking their lives to keep themselves from
starving, and yet gaining so little that they could never afford to eat meat.
"What a terrible, beautiful thing is the ocean!" said the baron. "How many
lives are at this very moment in danger on it, and yet how exquisite it looks
now, with the shadows falling over it! Doesn't it, Jeannette?"
"This is not so pretty as the Mediterranean," she answered with a watery
smile.
"The Mediterranean!" exclaimed the baron scornfully. "Why, the
Mediterranean's nothing but oil or sugared water, while this sea is terrific
with its crests of foam and its wild waves. And think of those men who
have just gone off on it, and who are already out of sight."
Jeanne gave in.
"Yes, perhaps you are right," she said with a sigh, for the word
"Mediterranean" had sent a pang through her heart, and turned her thoughts
to those far-away countries where all her dreams lay buried.
They did not go back through the wood, but walked along the road; they
walked in silence, for both were saddened by the thought of the morrow's
parting. As they passed the farmhouses, they could smell the crushed apples
—that scent of new cider which pervades all Normandy at this time of the
year—or the strong odor of cows and the healthy, warm smell of a dunghill.
The dwelling houses could be distinguished by their little lighted windows,
and these tiny lights, scattered over the country, made Jeanne think of the
loneliness of human creatures, and how everything tends to separate and
tear them away from those they love, and her heart seemed to grow bigger
and more capable of understanding the mysteries of existence.
"Life is not always gay," she said in tones of resignation.

The baron sighed.
"That is true, my child," he replied; "but we cannot help it."
The next day the baron and baroness went away, leaving Jeanne and Julien
alone.

VII

The young couple got into the habit of playing cards; every day after lunch
Jeanne played several games of bezique with her husband, while he smoked
his pipe and drank six or eight glasses of brandy. When they had finished
playing, Jeanne went upstairs to her bedroom, and, sitting by the window,
worked at a petticoat flounce she was embroidering, while the wind and
rain beat against the panes. When her eyes ached she looked out at the
foamy, restless sea, gazed at it for a few minutes, and then took up her work
again.
She had nothing else to do, for Julien had taken the entire management of
the house into his hands, that he might thoroughly satisfy his longing for
authority and his mania for economy. He was exceedingly stingy; he never
gave the servants anything beyond their exact wages, never allowed any
food that was not strictly necessary. Every morning, ever since she had been
at Les Peuples, the baker had made Jeanne a little Normandy cake, but
Julien cut off this expense, and Jeanne had to content herself with toast.
Wishing to avoid all arguments and quarrels, she never made any remark,
but each fresh proof of her husband's avarice hurt her like the prick of a
needle. It seemed so petty, so odious to her, brought up as she had been in a
family where money was never thought of any importance. How often she
had heard her mother say: "Money is made to be spent"; but now Julien
kept saying to her: "Will you never be cured of throwing money away?"
Whenever he could manage to reduce a salary or a bill by a few pence he
would slip the money into his pocket, saying, with a pleased smile:
"Little streams make big rivers."

Jeanne would sometimes find herself dreaming as she used to do before she
was married. She would gradually stop working, and with her hands lying
idle in her lap and her eyes fixed on space, she built castles in the air as if
she were a young girl again. But the voice of Julien, giving an order to old
Simon, would call her back to the realities of life, and she would take up her
work, thinking, "Ah, that is all over and done with now," and a tear would
fall on her fingers as they pushed the needle through the stuff.
Rosalie, who used to be so gay and lively, always singing snatches of songs
as she went about her work, gradually changed also. Her plump round
cheeks had fallen in and lost their brightened color, and her skin was muddy
and dark. Jeanne often asked her if she were ill, but the little maid always
answered with a faint blush, "No, madame," and got away as quickly as she
could. Instead of tripping along as she had always done, she now dragged
herself painfully from room to room, and seemed not even to care how she
looked, for the peddlers in vain spread out their ribbons and corsets and
bottles of scent before her; she never bought anything from them now.
At the end of January, the heavy clouds came across the sea from the north,
and there was a heavy fall of snow. In one night the whole plain was
whitened, and, in the morning the trees looked as if a mantle of frozen foam
had been cast over them.
Julien put on his high boots, and passed his time in the ditch between the
wood and the plain, watching for the migrating birds. Every now and then
his shots would break the frozen silence of the fields, and hordes of black
crows flew from the trees in terror. Jeanne, tired of staying indoors, would
go out on the steps of the house, where, in the stillness of this snow-covered
world, she could hear the bustle of the farms, or the far-away murmur of the
waves and the soft continual rustle of the falling snow.
On one of these cold, white mornings she was sitting by her bedroom fire,
while Rosalie, who looked worse and worse every day, was slowly making
the bed. All at once Jeanne heard a sigh of pain behind her. Without turning
her head, she asked:
"What is the matter with you, Rosalie?"
The maid answered as she always did:

"Nothing, madame," but her voice seemed to die away as she spoke.
Jeanne had left off thinking about her, when she suddenly noticed that she
could not hear the girl moving. She called: "Rosalie."
There was no answer. Then she thought that the maid must have gone
quietly out of the room without her hearing her, and she cried in a louder
tone: "Rosalie!" Again she received no answer, and she was just stretching
out her hand to ring the bell, when she heard a low moan close beside her.
She started up in terror.
Rosalie was sitting on the floor with her back against the bed, her legs
stretched stiffly out, her face livid, and her eyes staring straight before her.
Jeanne rushed to her side.
"Oh, Rosalie! What is the matter? what is it?" she asked in affright.
The maid did not answer a word, but fixed her wild eyes on her mistress
and gasped for breath, as if tortured by some excruciating pain. Then,
stiffening every muscle in her body, and stifling a cry of anguish between
her clenched teeth, she slipped down on her back, and all at once,
something stirred underneath her dress, which clung tightly round her legs.
Jeanne heard a strange, gushing noise, something like the death-rattle of
someone who is suffocating, and then came a long low wail of pain; it was
the first cry of suffering of a child entering the world.
The sound came as a revelation to her, and, suddenly losing her head, she
rushed to the top of the stairs, crying:
"Julien! Julien!"
"What do you want?" he answered, from below.
She gasped out, "It's Rosalie who—who—" but before she could say any
more Julien was rushing up the stairs two at a time; he dashed into the
bedroom, raised the girl's clothes, and there lay a creased, shriveled,
hideous, little atom of humanity, feebly whining and trying to move its
limbs. He got up with an evil look on his face, and pushed his distracted
wife out of the room, saying:
"This is no place for you. Go away and send me Ludivine and old Simon."

Jeanne went down to the kitchen trembling all over, to deliver her husband's
message, and then afraid to go upstairs again, she went into the drawing-
room, where a fire was never lighted, now her parents were away. Soon she
saw Simon run out of the house, and come back five minutes after with
Widow Dentu, the village midwife. Next she heard a noise on the stairs
which sounded as if they were carrying a body, then Julien came to tell her
that she could go back to her room. She went upstairs and sat down again
before her bedroom fire, trembling as if she had just witnessed some terrible
accident.
"How is she?" she asked.
Julien, apparently in a great rage, was walking about the room in a
preoccupied, nervous way. He did not answer his wife for some moments,
but at last he asked, stopping in his walk:
"Well, what do you mean to do with this girl?"
Jeanne looked at her husband as if she did not understand his question.
"What do you mean?" she said. "I don't know; how should I?"
"Well, anyhow, we can't keep that child in the house," he cried, angrily.
Jeanne looked very perplexed, and sat in silence for some time. At last she
said:
"But, my dear, we could put it out to nurse somewhere?"
He hardly let her finish her sentence.
"And who'll pay for it? Will you?"
"But surely the father will take care of it," she said, after another long
silence. "And if he marries Rosalie, everything will be all right."
"The father!" answered Julien, roughly; "the father! Do you know who is
the father? Of course you don't. Very well, then!"
Jeanne began to get troubled: "But he certainly will not forsake the girl; it
would be such a cowardly thing to do. We will ask her his name, and go and
see him and force him to give some account of himself."

Julien had become calmer, and was again walking about the room.
"My dear girl," he replied, "I don't believe she will tell you the man's name,
or me either. Besides, suppose he wouldn't marry her? You must see that we
can't keep a girl and her illegitimate child in our house."
But Jeanne would only repeat, doggedly:
"Then the man must be a villain; but we will find out who he is, and then he
will have us to deal with instead of that poor girl."
Julien got very red.
"But until we know who he is?" he asked.
She did not know what to propose, so she asked Julien what he thought was
the best thing to do. He gave his opinion very promptly.
"Oh, I should give her some money, and let her and her brat go to the
devil."
That made Jeanne very indignant.
"That shall never be done," she declared; "Rosalie is my foster-sister, and
we have grown up together. She has erred, it is true, but I will never turn her
out-of-doors for that, and, if there is no other way out of the difficulty, I will
bring up the child myself."
"And we should have a nice reputation, shouldn't we, with our name and
connections?" burst out Julien. "People would say that we encouraged vice,
and sheltered prostitutes, and respectable people would never come near us.
Why, what can you be thinking of? You must be mad!"
"I will never have Rosalie turned out," she repeated, quietly. "If you will not
keep her here, my mother will take her back again. But we are sure to find
out the name of the father."
At that, he went out of the room, too angry to talk to her any longer, and as
he banged the door after him he cried:
"Women are fools with their absurd notions!"

In the afternoon Jeanne went up to see the invalid. She was lying in bed,
wide awake, and the Widow Dentu was rocking the child in her arms. As
soon as she saw her mistress Rosalie began to sob violently, and when
Jeanne wanted to kiss her, she turned away and hid her face under the bed-
clothes. The nurse interfered and drew down the sheet, and then Rosalie
made no further resistance, though the tears still ran down her cheeks.
The room was very cold, for there was only a small fire in the grate, and the
child was crying. Jeanne did not dare make any reference to the little one,
for fear of causing another burst of tears, but she held Rosalie's hand and
kept repeating mechanically:
"It won't matter; it won't matter."
The poor girl glanced shyly at the nurse from time to time; the child's cries
seemed to pierce her heart, and sobs still escaped from her occasionally,
though she forced herself to swallow her tears. Jeanne kissed her again, and
whispered in her ear: "We'll take good care of it, you may be sure of that,"
and then ran quickly out of the room, for Rosalie's tears were beginning to
flow again.
After that, Jeanne went up every day to see the invalid, and every day
Rosalie burst into tears when her mistress came into the room. The child
was put out to nurse, and Julien would hardly speak to his wife, for he could
not forgive her for refusing to dismiss the maid. One day he returned to the
subject, but Jeanne drew out a letter from her mother in which the baroness
said that if they would not keep Rosalie at Les Peuples she was to be sent
on to Rouen directly.
"Your mother's as great a fool as you are," cried Julien; but he did not say
anything more about sending Rosalie away, and a fortnight later the maid
was able to get up and perform her duties again.
One morning Jeanne made her sit down, and holding both her hands in hers;
"Now, then, Rosalie, tell me all about it," she said, looking her straight in
the face.
Rosalie began to tremble.

"All about what, madame?" she said, timidly.
"Who is the father of your child?" asked Jeanne.
A look of despair came over the maid's face, and she struggled to disengage
her hands from her mistress's grasp, but Jeanne kissed her, in spite of her
struggles, and tried to console her.
"It is true you have been weak," she said, "but you are not the first to whom
such a misfortune has happened, and, if only the father of the child marries
you, no one will think anything more about it; we would employ him, and
he could live here with you."
Rosalie moaned as if she were being tortured, and tried to get her hands free
that she might run away.
"I can quite understand how ashamed you feel," went on Jeanne, "but you
see that I am not angry, and that I speak kindly to you. I wish to know this
man's name for your own good, for I fear, from your grief, that he means to
abandon you, and I want to prevent that. Julien will see him, and we will
make him marry you, and we shall employ you both; we will see that he
makes you happy."
This time Rosalie made so vigorous an effort that she succeeded in
wrenching her hands away from her mistress, and she rushed from the room
as if she were mad.
"I have tried to make Rosalie tell me her seducer's name," said Jeanne to her
husband at dinner that evening, "but I did not succeed in doing so. Try and
see if she will tell you, that we may force the wretch to marry her."
"There, don't let me hear any more about all that," he said, angrily. "You
wanted to keep this girl, and you have done so, but don't bother me about
her."
He seemed still more irritable since Rosalie's confinement than he had been
before. He had got into the habit of shouting at his wife, whenever he spoke
to her, as if he were always angry, while she, on the contrary, spoke softly,
and did everything to avoid a quarrel; but she often cried when she was
alone in her room at night. In spite of his bad temper, Julien had resumed

the marital duties he had so neglected since his wedding tour, and it was
seldom now that he let three nights pass without accompanying his wife to
her room.
Rosalie soon got quite well again, and with better health came better spirits,
but she always seemed frightened and haunted by some strange dread.
Jeanne tried twice more to make her name her seducer, but each time she
ran away, without saying anything. Julien suddenly became better
tempered, and his young wife began to cherish vague hopes, and to regain a
little of her former gayety; but she often felt very unwell, though she never
said anything about it.
For five weeks the crisp, shining snow had lain on the frozen ground; in the
daytime there was not a cloud to be seen, and at night the sky was strewn
with stars. Standing alone in their square courtyards, behind the great
frosted trees, the farms seemed dead beneath their snowy shrouds. Neither
men nor cattle could go out, and the only sign of life about the homesteads
and cottages was the smoke that went straight up from the chimneys into
the frosty air.
The grass, the hedges and the wall of elms seemed killed by the cold. From
time to time the trees cracked, as if the fibers of their branches were
separating beneath the bark, and sometimes a big branch would break off
and fall to the ground, its sap frozen and dried up by the intense cold.
Jeanne thought the severe weather was the cause of her ill-health, and she
longed for the warm spring breezes. Sometimes the very idea of food
disgusted her, and she could eat nothing; at other times she vomited after
every meal, unable to digest the little she did eat. She had violent
palpitations of the heart, and she lived in a constant and intolerable state of
nervous excitement.
One evening, when the thermometer was sinking still lower, Julien shivered
as he left the dinner table (for the dining-room was never sufficiently
heated, so careful was he over the wood), and rubbing his hands together:
"It's too cold to sleep alone to-night, isn't it, darling?" he whispered to his
wife, with one of his old good-tempered laughs.

Jeanne threw her arms round his neck, but she felt so ill, so nervous, and
she had such aching pains that evening, that, with her lips close to his, she
begged him to let her sleep alone.
"I feel so ill to-night," she said, "but I am sure to be better to-morrow."
"Just as you please, my dear," he answered. "If you are ill, you must take
care of yourself." And he began to talk of something else.
Jeanne went to bed early. Julien, for a wonder, ordered a fire to be lighted in
his own room; and when the servant came to tell him that "the fire had
burnt up," he kissed his wife on the forehead and said good-night.
The very walls seemed to feel the cold, and made little cracking noises as if
they were shivering. Jeanne lay shaking with cold; twice she got up to put
more logs on the fire, and to pile her petticoats and dresses on the bed, but
nothing seemed to make her any warmer. There were nervous twitchings in
her legs, which made her toss and turn restlessly from side to side. Her feet
were numbed, her teeth chattered, her hands trembled, her heart beat so
slowly that sometimes it seemed to stop altogether; and she gasped for
breath as if she could not draw the air into her lungs.
As the cold crept higher and higher up her limbs, she was seized with a
terrible fear. She had never felt like this before; life seemed to be gradually
slipping away from her, and she thought each breath she drew would be her
last.
"I am going to die! I am going to die!" she thought; and, in her terror, she
jumped out of bed, and rang for Rosalie.
No one came; she rang again, and again waited for an answer, shuddering
and half-frozen; but she waited in vain. Perhaps the maid was sleeping too
heavily for the bell to arouse her, and, almost beside herself with fear,
Jeanne rushed out onto the landing without putting anything around her, and
with bare feet. She went noiselessly up the dark stairs, felt for Rosalie's
door, opened it, and called "Rosalie!" then went into the room, stumbled
against the bed, passed her hands over it, and found it empty and quite cold,
as if no one had slept in it that night.
"Surely she cannot have gone out in such weather as this," she thought.

Her heart began to beat so violently that it almost suffocated her, and she
went downstairs to rouse Julien, her legs giving way under her as she
walked. She burst open her husband's door, and hurried across the room,
spurred on by the idea that she was going to die and the fear that she would
become unconscious before she could see him again.
Suddenly she stopped with a shriek, for by the light of the dying fire she
saw Rosalie's head on the pillow beside her husband's. At her cry they both
started up, but she had already recovered from the first shock of her
discovery, and fled to her room, while Julien called after her, "Jeanne!
Jeanne!" She felt she could not see him or listen to his excuses and his lies,
and again rushing out of her room she ran downstairs. The staircase was in
total darkness, but filled with the desire of flight, of getting away without
seeing or hearing any more, she never stayed to think that she might fall and
break her limbs on the stone stairs.
On the last step she sat down, unable to think, unable to reason, her head in
a whirl. Julien had jumped out of bed, and was hastily dressing himself. She
heard him moving about, and she started up to escape from him. He came
downstairs, crying: "Jeanne, do listen to me!"
No, she would not listen; he should not degrade her by his touch. She
dashed into the dining-room as if a murderer were pursuing her, looked
round for a hiding-place or some dark corner where she might conceal
herself, and then crouched down under the table. The door opened, and
Julien came in with a light in his hand, still calling, "Jeanne! Jeanne!" She
started off again like a hunted hare, tore into the kitchen, round which she
ran twice like some wild animal at bay, then, as he was getting nearer and
nearer to her, she suddenly flung open the garden door, and rushed out into
the night.
Her bare legs sank into the snow up to her knees, and this icy contact gave
her new strength. Although she had nothing on but her chemise she did not
feel the bitter cold; her mental anguish was too great for the consciousness
of any mere bodily pain to reach her brain, and she ran on and on, looking
as white as the snow-covered earth. She did not stop once to take breath,
but rushed on across wood and plain without knowing or thinking of what
she was doing. Suddenly she found herself at the edge of the cliff. She

instinctively stopped short, and then crouched down in the snow and lay
there with her mind as powerless to think as her body to move.
All at once she began to tremble, as does a sail when caught by the wind.
Her arms, her hands, her feet, shook and twitched convulsively, and
consciousness returned to her. Things that had happened a long time before
came back to her memory; the sail in Lastique's boat with him, their
conversation, the dawn of their love; the christening of the boat; then her
thoughts went still farther back till they reached the night of her arrival
from the convent—the night she had spent in happy dreams. And now, now!
Her life was ruined; she had had all her pleasure; there were no joys, no
happiness, in store for her; and she could see the terrible future with all its
tortures, its deceptions, and despair. Surely it would be better to die now, at
once.
She heard a voice in the distance crying:
"This way! this way! Here are her footmarks!" It was Julien looking for her.
Oh! she could not, she would not, see him again! Never again! From the
abyss before her came the faint sound of the waves as they broke on the
rocks. She stood up to throw herself over the cliff, and in a despairing
farewell to life, she moaned out that last cry of the dying—the word that the
soldier gasps out as he lies wounded to death on the battlefield—"Mother!"
Then the thought of how her mother would sob when she heard of her
daughter's death, and how her father would kneel in agony beside her
mangled corpse, flashed across her mind, and in that one second she
realized all the bitterness of their grief. She fell feebly back on the snow,
and Julien and old Simon came up, with Marius behind them holding a
lantern. They drew her back before they dared attempt to raise her, so near
the edge of the cliff was she; and they did with her what they liked, for she
could not move a muscle. She knew that they carried her indoors, that she
was put to bed, and rubbed with hot flannels, and then she was conscious of
nothing more.
A nightmare—but was it a nightmare?—haunted her. She thought she was
in bed in her own room; it was broad daylight, but she could not get up,
though she did not know why she could not. She heard a noise on the

boards—a scratching, rustling noise—and all at once a little gray mouse ran
over the sheet. Then another one appeared, and another which came running
towards her chest. Jeanne was not frightened; she wanted to take hold of the
little animal, and put out her hand towards it, but she could not catch it.
Then came more mice—ten, twenty, hundreds, thousands, sprang up on all
sides. They ran up the bed-posts, and along the tapestry, and covered the
whole bed. They got under the clothes, and Jeanne could feel them gliding
over her skin, tickling her legs, running up and down her body. She could
see them coming from the foot of the bed to get inside and creep close to
her breast, but when she struggled and stretched out her hands to catch one,
she always clutched the air. Then she got angry, and cried out, and wanted
to run away; she fancied someone held her down, and that strong arms were
thrown around her to prevent her moving, but she could not see anyone. She
had no idea of the time that all this lasted; she only knew that it seemed a
very long while.
At last she became conscious again—conscious that she was tired and
aching, and yet better than she had been. She felt very, very weak. She
looked round, and did not feel at all surprised to see her mother sitting by
her bedside with a stout man whom she did not know. She had forgotten
how old she was, and thought she was a little child again, for her memory
was entirely gone.
"See, she is conscious," said the stout man.
The baroness began to cry, and the big man said:
"Come, come, madame le baronne; I assure you there is no longer any
danger, but you must not talk to her; just let her sleep."
It seemed to Jeanne that she lay for a long time in a doze, which became a
heavy sleep if she tried to think of anything. She had a vague idea that the
past contained something dreadful, and she was content to lie still without
trying to recall anything to her memory. But one day, when she opened her
eyes, she saw Julien standing beside the bed, and the curtain which hid
everything from her was suddenly drawn aside, and she remembered what
had happened.

She threw back the clothes and sprang out of bed to escape from her
husband; but as soon as her feet touched the floor she fell to the ground, for
she was too weak to stand. Julien hastened to her assistance, but when he
attempted to raise her, she shrieked and rolled from side to side to avoid the
contact of his hands. The door opened, and Aunt Lison and the Widow
Dentu hurried in, closely followed by the baron and his wife, the latter
gasping for breath.
They put Jeanne to bed again, and she closed her eyes and pretended to be
asleep that she might think undisturbed. Her mother and aunt busied
themselves around her, saying from time to time:
"Do you know us now, Jeanne, dear?"
She pretended not to hear them, and made no answer; and in the evening
they went away, leaving her to the care of the nurse. She could not sleep all
that night, for she was painfully trying to connect the incidents she could
remember, one with the other; but there seemed to be gaps in her memory
which she could not bridge over. Little by little, however, all the facts came
back to her, and then she tried to decide what she had better do. She must
have been very ill, or her mother and Aunt Lison and the baron would not
have been sent for; but what had Julien said? Did her parents know
everything? And where was Rosalie?
The only thing she could do was to go back to Rouen with her father and
mother; they could all live there together as they used to do, and it would be
just the same as if she had not been married.
The next day she noticed and listened to all that went on around her, but she
did not let anyone see that she understood everything and had recovered her
full senses. Towards evening, when no one but the baroness was in her
room, Jeanne whispered softly:
"Mother, dear!"
She was surprised to hear how changed her own voice was, but the baroness
took her hands, exclaiming:
"My child! my dear little Jeanne! Do you know me, my pet?"

"Yes, mother. But you mustn't cry; I want to talk to you seriously. Did
Julien tell you why I ran out into the snow?"
"Yes, my darling. You have had a very dangerous fever."
"That was not the reason, mamma; I had the fever afterwards. Hasn't he told
you why I tried to run away, and what was the cause of the fever?"
"No, dear."
"It was because I found Rosalie in his bed."
The baroness thought she was still delirious, and tried to soothe her.
"There, there, my darling; lie down and try to go to sleep."
But Jeanne would not be quieted.
"I am not talking nonsense now, mamma dear, though I dare say I have been
lately," she said. "I felt very ill one night, and I got up and went to Julien's
room; there I saw Rosalie lying beside him. My grief nearly drove me mad,
and I ran out into the snow, meaning to throw myself over the cliff."
"Yes, darling, you have been ill; very ill indeed," answered the baroness.
"It wasn't that, mamma. I found Rosalie in Julien's bed, and I will not stay
with him any longer. You shall take me back to Rouen with you."
The doctor had told the baroness to let Jeanne have her own way in
everything, so she answered:
"Very well, my pet."
Jeanne began to lose patience.
"I see you don't believe me," she said pettishly. "Go and find papa; perhaps
he'll manage to understand that I am speaking the truth."
The baroness rose slowly to her feet, dragged herself out of the room with
the aid of two sticks, and came back in a few minutes with the baron. They
sat down by the bedside, and Jeanne began to speak in her weak voice. She

spoke quite coherently, and she told them all about Julien's odd ways, his
harshness, his avarice, and, lastly, his infidelity.
The baron could see that her mind was not wandering, but he hardly knew
what to say or think. He affectionately took her hand, like he used to do
when she was a child and he told her fairy tales to send her to sleep.
"Listen, my dear," he said. "We must not do anything rashly. Don't let us
say anything till we have thought it well over. Will you promise me to try
and bear with your husband until we have decided what is best to be done?"
"Very well," she answered; "but I will not stay here after I get well."
Then she added, in a whisper: "Where is Rosalie now?"
"You shall not see her any more," replied the baron.
But she persisted: "Where is she? I want to know."
He owned that she was still in the house, but he declared she should go at
once.
Directly he left Jeanne's room, his heart full of pity for his child and
indignation against her husband, the baron went to find Julien, and said to
him sternly:
"Monsieur, I have come to ask for an explanation of your behavior to my
daughter. You have not only been false to her, but you have deceived her
with your servant, which makes your conduct doubly infamous."
Julien swore he was innocent of such a thing, and called heaven to witness
his denial. What proof was there? Jeanne was just recovering from brain
fever, and of course her thoughts were still confused. She had rushed out in
the snow one night at the beginning of her illness, in a fit of delirium, and
how could her statement be believed when, on the very night that she said
she had surprised her maid in her husband's bed, she was dashing over the
house nearly naked, and quite unconscious of what she was doing!
Julien got very angry, and threatened the baron with an action if he did not
withdraw his accusation; and the baron, confused by this indignant denial,

began to make excuses and to beg his son-in-law's pardon; but Julien
refused to take his outstretched hand.
Jeanne did not seem vexed when she heard what her husband had said.
"He is telling a lie, papa," she said, quietly; "but we will force him to own
the truth."
For two days she lay silent, turning over all sorts of things in her mind; on
the third morning she asked for Rosalie. The baron refused to let the maid
go up and told Jeanne that she had left. But Jeanne insisted on seeing her,
and said:
"Send someone to fetch her, then."
When the doctor came she was very excited because they would not let her
see the maid, and they told him what was the matter. Jeanne burst into tears
and almost shrieked: "I will see her! I will see her!"
The doctor took her hand and said in a low voice:
"Calm yourself, madame. Any violent emotion might have very serious
results just now, for you are enceinte."
Jeanne's tears ceased directly; even as the doctor spoke she fancied she
could feel a movement within her, and she lay still, paying no attention to
what was being said or done around her. She could not sleep that night; it
seemed so strange to think that within her was another life, and she felt
sorry because it was Julien's child, and full of fears in case it should
resemble its father.
The next morning she sent for the baron.
"Papa, dear," she said, "I have made up my mind to know the whole truth;
especially now. You hear, I will know it, and you know, you must let me do
as I like, because of my condition. Now listen; go and fetch M. le curé; he
must be here to make Rosalie tell the truth. Then, as soon as he is here, you
must send her up to me, and you and mamma must come too; but, whatever
you do, don't let Julien know what is going on."

The priest came about an hour afterwards. He was fatter than ever, and
panted quite as much as the baroness. He sat down in an armchair and
began joking, while he wiped his forehead with his checked handkerchief
from sheer habit.
"Well, Madame la baronne, I don't think we are either of us getting thinner;
in my opinion we make a very handsome pair." Then turning to the invalid,
he said: "Ah, ah! my young lady, I hear we're soon to have a christening,
and that it won't be the christening of a boat either, this time, ha, ha, ha!"
Then he went on in a grave voice, "It will be one more defender for the
country, or," after a short silence, "another good wife and mother like you,
madame," with a bow to the baroness.
The door flew open and there stood Rosalie, crying, struggling, and
refusing to move, while the baron tried to push her in. At last he gave her a
sudden shake, and threw her into the room with a jerk, and she stood in the
middle of the floor, with her face in her hands, sobbing violently. Jeanne
started up as white as a sheet, and her heart could be seen beating under her
thin nightdress. It was some time before she could speak, but at last she
gasped out:
"There—there—is no—need for me to—question you. Your confusion in
my presence—is—is quite sufficient—proof—of your guilt."
She stopped for a few moments for want of breath, and then went on again:
"But I wish to know all. You see that M. le curé is here, so you understand
you will have to answer as if you were at confession."
Rosalie had not moved from where the baron had pushed her; she made no
answer, but her sobs became almost shrieks. The baron, losing all patience
with her, seized her hands, drew them roughly from her face and threw her
on her knees beside the bed, saying:
"Why don't you say something? Answer your mistress."
She crouched down on the ground in the position in which Mary Magdalene
is generally depicted; her cap was on one side, her apron on the floor, and as
soon as her hands were free she again buried her face in them.

"Come, come, my girl," said the curé, "we don't want to do you any harm,
but we must know exactly what has happened. Now listen to what is asked
you and answer truthfully."
Jeanne was leaning over the side of the bed, looking at the girl.
"Is it not true that I found you in Julien's bed?" she asked.
"Yes, madame," moaned out Rosalie through her fingers.
At that the baroness burst into tears also, and the sound of her sobs mingled
with the maid's.
"How long had that gone on?" asked Jeanne, her eyes fixed on the maid.
"Ever since he came here," stammered Rosalie.
"Since he came here," repeated Jeanne, hardly understanding what the
words meant. "Do you mean since—since the spring?"
"Yes, madame."
"Since he first came to the house?"
"Yes, madame."
"But how did it happen? How did he come to say anything to you about it?"
burst out Jeanne, as if she could keep back the questions no longer. "Did he
force you, or did you give yourself to him? How could you do such a
thing?"
"I don't know," answered Rosalie, taking her hands from her face and
speaking as if the words were forced from her by an irresistible desire to
talk and to tell all. "The day he dined 'ere for the first time, 'e came up to
my room. He 'ad 'idden in the garret and I dursn't cry out for fear of what
everyone would say. He got into my bed, and I dunno' how it was or what I
did, but he did just as 'e liked with me. I never said nothin' about it because
I thought he was nice."
"But your—your child? Is it his?" cried Jeanne.

"Yes, madame," answered Rosalie, between her sobs. Then neither said
anything more, and the silence was only broken by the baroness's and
Rosalie's sobs.
The tears rose to Jeanne's eyes, and flowed noiselessly down her cheeks. So
her maid's child had the same father as her own! All her anger had
evaporated and in its place was a dull, gloomy, deep despair. After a short
silence she said in a softer, tearful voice.
"After we returned from—from our wedding tour—when did he begin
again?"
"The—the night you came back," answered the maid, who was now almost
lying on the floor.
Each word rung Jeanne's heart. He had actually left her for this girl the very
night of their return to Les Peuples! That, then, was why he had let her
sleep alone. She had heard enough now; she did not want to know anything
more, and she cried to the girl:
"Go away! go away!"
As Rosalie, overcome by her emotion, did not move, she called to her
father:
"Take her away! Carry her out of the room!"
But the curé, who had said nothing up to now, thought the time had come
for a little discourse.
"You have behaved very wickedly," he said to Rosalie, "very wickedly
indeed, and the good God will not easily forgive you. Think of the
punishment which awaits you if you do not live a better life henceforth.
Now you are young is the time to train yourself in good ways. No doubt
Madame la baronne will do something for you, and we shall be able to find
you a husband—"
He would have gone on like this for a long time had not the baron seized
Rosalie by the shoulders, dragged her to the door and thrown her into the
passage like a bundle of clothes.

When he came back, looking whiter even than his daughter, the curé began
again:
"Well, you know, all the girls round here are the same. It is a very bad state
of things, but it can't be helped, and we must make a little allowance for the
weakness of human nature. They never marry until they are enceintes;
never, madame. One might almost call it a local custom," he added, with a
smile. Then he went on indignantly: "Even the children are the same. Only
last year I found a little boy and girl from my class in the cemetery together.
I told their parents, and what do you think they replied: 'Well, M'sieu l'curé,
we didn't teach it them; we can't help it.' So you see, monsieur, your maid
has only done like the others—"
"The maid!" interrupted the baron, trembling with excitement. "The maid!
What do I care about her? It's Julien's conduct which I think so abominable,
and I shall certainly take my daughter away with me." He walked up and
down the room, getting more and more angry with every step he took. "It is
infamous the way he has deceived my daughter, infamous! He's a wretch, a
villain, and I will tell him so to his face. I'll horsewhip him within an inch
of his life."
The curé was slowly enjoying a pinch of snuff as he sat beside the baroness,
and thinking how he could make peace. "Come now, M. le baron, between
ourselves he has only done like everyone else. I am quite sure you don't
know many husbands who are faithful to their wives, do you now?" And he
added in a sly, good-natured way: "I bet you, yourself, have played your
little games; you can't say conscientiously that you haven't, I know. Why, of
course you have! And who knows but what you have made the
acquaintance of some little maid just like Rosalie. I tell you every man is
the same. And your escapades didn't make your wife unhappy, or lessen
your affection for her; did they?"
The baron stood still in confusion. It was true that he had done the same
himself, and not only once or twice, but as often as he had got the chance;
his wife's presence in the house had never made any difference, when the
servants were pretty. And was he a villain because of that? Then why should
he judge Julien's conduct so severely when he had never thought that any
fault could be found with his own?

Though her tears were hardly dried, the idea of her husband's pranks
brought a slight smile to the baroness's lip, for she was one of those good-
natured, tender-hearted, sentimental women to whom love adventures are
an essential part of existence.
Jeanne lay back exhausted, thinking, with open unseeing eyes, of all this
painful episode. The expression that had wounded her most in Rosalie's
confession was: "I never said anything about it because I thought he was
nice." She, his wife, had also thought him "nice," and that was the sole
reason why she had united herself to him for life, had given up every other
hope, every other project to join her destiny to his. She had plunged into
marriage, into this pit from which there was no escape, into all this misery,
this grief, this despair, simply because, like Rosalie, she had thought him
"nice."
The door was flung violently open and Julien came in, looking perfectly
wild with rage. He had seen Rosalie moaning on the landing, and guessing
that she had been forced to speak, he had come to see what was going on;
but at the sight of the priest he was taken thoroughly aback.
"What is it? What is the matter?" he asked, in a voice which trembled in
spite of his efforts to make it sound calm.
The baron, who had been so violent just before, dared say nothing after the
curé's argument, in case his son-in-law should quote his own example; the
baroness only wept more bitterly than before, and Jeanne raised herself on
her hands and looked steadily at this man who was causing her so much
sorrow. Her breath came and went quickly, but she managed to answer:
"The matter is that we know all about your shameful conduct ever since—
ever since the day you first came here; we know that—that—Rosalie's child
is yours—like—like mine, and that they will be—brothers."
Her grief became so poignant at this thought that she hid herself under the
bedclothes and sobbed bitterly. Julien stood open-mouthed, not knowing
what to say or do. The curé again interposed.
"Come, come, my dear young lady," he said, "you mustn't give way like
that. See now, be reasonable."

He rose, went to the bedside, and laid his cool hand on this despairing
woman's forehead. His simple touch seemed to soothe her wonderfully; she
felt calmer at once, as if the large hand of this country priest, accustomed to
gestures of absolution and sympathy, had borne with it some strange, peace-
giving power.
"Madame, we must always forgive," said the good-natured priest. "You are
borne down by a great grief, but God, in His mercy, has also sent you a
great joy, since He has permitted you to have hopes of becoming a mother.
This child will console you for all your trouble and it is in its name that I
implore, that I adjure, you to forgive M. Julien. It will be a fresh tie between
you, a pledge of your husband's future fidelity. Can you steel your heart
against the father of your unborn child?"
Too weak to feel either anger or resentment, and only conscious of a
crushed, aching, exhausted sensation, she made no answer. Her nerves were
thoroughly unstrung, and she clung to life but by a very slender thread.
The baroness, to whom resentment seemed utterly impossible and whose
mind was simply incapable of bearing any prolonged strain, said in a low
tone:
"Come, Jeanne!"
The curé drew Julien close to the bed and placed his hand in his wife's,
giving it a little tap as if to make the union more complete. Then, dropping
his professional pulpit tone, he said, with a satisfied air:
"There! that's done. Believe me, it is better so."
The two hands, united thus for an instant, loosed their clasp directly. Julien,
not daring to embrace Jeanne, kissed his mother-in-law, then turned on his
heel, took the baron (who, in his heart, was not sorry that everything had
finished so quietly) by the arm, and drew him from the room to go and
smoke a cigar.
Then the tired invalid went to sleep and the baroness and the priest began to
chat in low tones. The abbé talked of what had just occurred and proceeded
to explain his ideas on the subject, while the baroness assented to
everything he said with a nod.

"Very well, then, it's understood," he said, in conclusion. "You give the girl
the farm at Barville and I will undertake to find her a good, honest husband.
Oh, you may be sure that with twenty thousand francs we shall not want
candidates for her hand. We shall have an embarras de choix."
The baroness was smiling happily now, though two tears still lingered on
her cheeks.
"Barville is worth twenty thousand francs, at the very least," she said; "and
you understand that it is to be settled on the child though the parents will
have it as long as they live."
Then the curé shook hands with the baroness, and rose to go.
"Don't get up, Madame la baronne, don't get up," he exclaimed. "I know the
value of a step too well myself."
As he went out he met Aunt Lison coming to see her patient. She did not
notice that anything extraordinary had happened. No one had told her
anything, and, as usual, she had not the slightest idea of what was going on.

VIII

Rosalie had left the house and the time of Jeanne's confinement was
drawing near. The sorrow she had gone through had taken away all pleasure
from the thought of becoming a mother, and she waited for the child's birth
without any impatience or curiosity, her mind entirely filled with her
presentiment of coming evils.
Spring was close at hand. The bare trees still trembled in the cold wind, but,
in the damp ditches, the yellow primroses were already blossoming among
the decaying autumn leaves. The rain-soaked fields, the farm-yards and the
commons exhaled a damp odor, as of fermenting liquor, and little green
leaves peeped out of the brown earth and glistened in the sun.
A big, strongly-built woman had been engaged in Rosalie's place, and she
now supported the baroness in her dreary walks along the avenue, where the

track made by her foot was always damp and muddy.
Jeanne, low-spirited and in constant pain, leant on her father's arm when she
went out, while on her other side walked Aunt Lison, holding her niece's
hand, and thinking nervously, of this mysterious suffering that she would
never know. They would all three walk for hours without speaking a word,
and, while they were out, Julien went all over the country on horseback, for
he had suddenly become very fond of riding.
The baron, his wife, and the vicomte, paid a visit to the Fourvilles (whom
Julien seemed to know very well, though no one at the château knew
exactly how the acquaintance had begun), and another duty call was paid to
the Brisevilles, and those two visits were the only break in their dull,
monotonous life.
One afternoon, about four o'clock, two people on horseback trotted up to
the château. Julien rushed into his wife's room in great excitement:
"Make haste and go down," he exclaimed. "Here are the Fourvilles. They
have come simply to make a neighborly call as they know the condition you
are in. Say I am out but that I shall be in soon. I am just going to change my
coat."
Jeanne went downstairs and found in the drawing-room a gigantic man with
big, red moustaches, and a pale, pretty woman with a sad-looking face,
sentimental eyes and hair of a dead gold that looked as if the sun had never
caressed it. When the fair-haired woman had introduced the big man as her
husband, she said:
"M. de Lamare, whom we have met several times, has told us how unwell
you are, so we thought we would not put off coming to see you any longer.
You see we have come on horseback, so you must look upon this simply as
a neighborly call; besides, I have already had the pleasure of receiving a
visit from your mother and the baron."
She spoke easily in a refined, familiar way, and Jeanne fell in love with her
at once. "In her I might, indeed, find a friend," she thought.
The Comte de Fourville, unlike his wife, seemed as much out of place in a
drawing-room as a bull in a china shop. When he sat down he put his hat on

a chair close by him, and then the problem of what he should do with his
hands presented itself to him. First he rested them on his knees, then on the
arms of his chair, and finally joined them as if in prayer.
Julien came in so changed in appearance that Jeanne stared at him in mute
surprise. He had shaved himself and looked as handsome and charming as
when he was wooing her. His hair, just now so coarse and dull, had been
brushed and sprinkled with perfumed oil till it had recovered its soft shining
waves, and his large eyes, which seemed made to express nothing but love,
had their old winning look in them. He made himself as amiable and
fascinating as he had been before his marriage. He pressed the hairy paw of
the comte, who seemed much relieved by his presence, and kissed the hand
of the comtesse, whose ivory cheek became just tinged with pink.
When the Fourvilles were going away the comtesse said:
"Will you come for a ride on Thursday, vicomte?" And as Julien bowed and
replied, "I shall be very pleased, madame," she turned and took Jeanne's
hand, saying to her, affectionately:
"When you are well again we must all three go for long rides together. We
could make such delightful excursions if you would."
Then she gracefully caught up the skirt of her riding-habit and sprang into
the saddle as lightly as a bird, and her husband, after awkwardly raising his
hat, leapt on his huge horse, feeling and looking at his ease as soon as he
was mounted.
"What charming people!" cried Julien, as soon as they were out of sight.
"We may, indeed, think ourselves lucky to have made their acquaintance."
"The little comtesse is delightful," answered Jeanne, feeling pleased herself
though she hardly knew why. "I am sure I shall like her; but the husband
seems a bear. How did you get to know them?"
"I met them one day at the Brisevilles," he replied, rubbing his hands
together cheerfully. "The husband certainly is a little rough, but he is a true
gentleman. He is passionately fond of shooting."

Nothing else happened until the end of July. Then, one Tuesday evening, as
they were all sitting under the plane-tree beside a little table, on which
stood two liqueur glasses and a decanter of brandy, Jeanne suddenly turned
very white and put both her hands to her side with a cry. A sharp pain had
shot through her and at once died away. In about ten minutes came another
one, hardly so severe but of longer duration than the first. Her father and
husband almost carried her indoors, for the short distance between the
plane-tree and her room seemed miles to her; she could not stifle her
moans, and, overpowered by an intolerable sense of heaviness and weight,
she implored them to let her sit down and rest.
The child was not expected until September but, in case of accident, a horse
was harnessed and old Simon galloped off after the doctor. He came about
midnight and at once recognized the signs of a premature confinement. The
actual pain had a little diminished, but Jeanne felt an awful deathly
faintness, and she thought she was going to die, for Death is sometimes so
close that his icy breath can almost be felt.
The room was full of people. The baroness lay back in an armchair gasping
for breath; the baron ran hither and thither, bringing all manner of things
and completely losing his head; Julien walked up and down looking very
troubled, but really feeling quite calm, and the Widow Dentu, whom
nothing could surprise or startle, stood at the foot of the bed with an
expression suited to the occasion on her face.
Nurse, mid-wife and watcher of the dead, equally ready to welcome the
new-born infant, to receive its first cry, to immerse it in its first bath and to
wrap it in its first covering, or to hear the last word, the last death-rattle, the
last moan of the dying, to clothe them in their last garment, to sponge their
wasted bodies, to draw the sheet about their still faces, the Widow Dentu
had become utterly indifferent to any of the chances accompanying a birth
or a death.
Every now and then Jeanne gave a low moan. For two hours it seemed as if
the child would not be born yet, after all; but about daybreak the pains
recommenced and soon became almost intolerable. As the involuntary cries
of anguish burst through her clenched teeth, Jeanne thought of Rosalie who
had hardly even moaned, and whose bastard child had been born without

any of the torture such as she was suffering. In her wretched, troubled mind
she drew comparisons between her maid and herself, and she cursed God
Whom, until now, she had believed just. She thought in angry astonishment
of how fate favors the wicked, and of the unpardonable lies of those who
hold forth inducements to be upright and good.
Sometimes the agony was so great that she could think of nothing else, her
suffering absorbing all her strength, her reason, her consciousness. In the
intervals of relief her eyes were fixed on Julien, and then she was filled with
a mental anguish as she thought of the day her maid had fallen at the foot of
this very bed with her new-born child—the brother of the infant that was
now causing her such terrible pain. She remembered perfectly every
gesture, every look, every word of her husband as he stood beside the maid,
and now she could see in his movements the same ennui, the same
indifference for her suffering as he had felt for Rosalie's; it was the selfish
carelessness of a man whom the idea of paternity irritates.
She was seized by an excruciating pain, a spasm so agonizing that she
thought, "I am going to die! I am dying!" And her soul was filled with a
furious hatred; she felt she must curse this man who was the cause of all her
agony, and this child which was killing her. She strained every muscle in a
supreme effort to rid herself of this awful burden, and then it felt as if her
whole inside were pouring away from her, and her suffering suddenly
became less.
The nurse and the doctor bent over her and took something away; and she
heard the choking noise she had heard once before, and then the low cry of
pain, the feeble whine of the new-born child filled her ears and seemed to
enter her poor, exhausted body till it reached her very soul; and, in an
unconsciousness movement she tried to hold out her arms.
With the child was born a new joy, a fresh rapture. In one second she had
been delivered from that terrible pain and made happier than she had ever
been before, and she revived in mind and body as she realized, for the first
time, the pleasure of being a mother.
She wanted to see her child. It had not any hair or nails, for it had come
before its time, but when she saw this human larva move its limbs and open
its mouth, and when she touched its wrinkled little face, her heart

overflowed with happiness, and she knew that she would never feel weary
of life again, for her love for the atom she held in her arms would be so
absorbing that it would make her indifferent to everything else.
From that time her child was her chief, her only care, and she idolized it
more, perhaps, because she had been so deceived in her love and
disappointed in her hopes. She insisted on having the cot close to her bed,
and, when she could get up, she sat by the window the whole day rocking
the cradle with her foot. She was even jealous of the wet-nurse, and when
the hungry baby held out its arms and mouth towards the big blue-veined
breast, she felt as if she would like to tear her son from this strong, quiet
peasant woman's arms, and strike and scratch the bosom to which he clung
so eagerly.
She embroidered his fine robes herself, putting into them the most elaborate
work; he was always surrounded by a cloud of lace and wore the
handsomest caps. The only thing she could talk about was the baby's
clothes, and she was always interrupting a conversation to hold up a band,
or bib, or some especially pretty ribbon for admiration, for she took no
notice of what was being said around her as she turned and twisted some
tiny garment about in her hands, and held it up to the light to see better how
it looked.
"Don't you think he will look lovely in that?" she was always asking, and
her mother and the baron smiled at this all-absorbing affection; but Julien
would exclaim, impatiently, "What a nuisance she is with that brat!" for his
habits had been upset and his overweening importance diminished by the
arrival of this noisy, imperious tyrant, and he was half-jealous of the scrap
of humanity who now held the first place in the house. Jeanne could hardly
bear to be away from her baby for an instant, and she even sat watching him
all night through as he lay sleeping in his cradle. These vigils and this
continual anxiety began to tell upon her health. The want of sleep weakened
her and she grew thinner and thinner, until, at last, the doctor ordered the
child to be separated from her.
It was in vain that she employed tears, commands and entreaties. Each night
the baby slept with his nurse, and each night his mother rose from her bed
and went, barefooted, to put her ear to the keyhole and listen if he was

sleeping quietly. Julien found her there one night as he was coming in late
from dining at the Fourvilles, and after that she was locked into her room
every evening to compel her to stay in bed.
The child was to be named Pierre Simon Paul (they were going to call him
Paul) and at the end of August he was christened, the baron being godfather,
and Aunt Lison godmother. At the beginning of September Aunt Lison went
away, and her absence was as unnoticed as her presence had been.
One evening, after dinner, the curé called at the château. There seemed an
air of mystery about him, and, after a few commonplace remarks, he asked
the baron and baroness if he could speak to them in private for a few
moments. They all three walked slowly down the avenue talking eagerly as
they went, while Julien, feeling uneasy and irritated at this secrecy, was left
behind with Jeanne. He offered to accompany the priest when he went
away, and they walked off towards the church where the angelus was
ringing. It was a cool, almost cold, evening, and the others soon went into
the house. They were all beginning to feel a little drowsy when the drawing-
room door was suddenly thrown open and Julien came in looking very
vexed. Without stopping to see whether Jeanne was there or not, he cried to
the baron, as soon as he entered the room:
"Upon my soul you must be mad to go and give twenty thousand francs to
that girl!"
They were all taken too much by surprise to make any answer, and he went
on, too angry to speak distinctly: "I can't understand how you can be such
fools! But there I suppose you will keep on till we haven't a sou left!"
The baron, recovering himself, a little, tried to check his son-in-law:
"Be quiet!" he exclaimed. "Don't you see that your wife is in the room?"
"I don't care if she is," answered Julien, stamping his foot. "Besides, she
ought to know about it. It is depriving her of her rightful inheritance."
Jeanne had listened to her husband in amazement, utterly at a loss to know
what it was all about:
"Whatever is the matter?" she asked.

Then Julien turned to her, expecting her to side with him, as the loss of the
money would affect her also. He told her in a few words how her parents
were trying to arrange a marriage for Rosalie, and how the maid's child was
to have the farm at Barville, which was worth twenty thousand francs at the
very least. And he kept on repeating:
"Your parents must be mad, my dear, raving mad! Twenty thousand francs!
Twenty thousand francs! They can't be in their right senses! Twenty
thousand francs for a bastard!"
Jeanne listened to him quite calmly, astonished herself to find that she felt
neither anger nor sorrow at his meanness, but she was perfectly indifferent
now to everything which did not concern her child. The baron was choking
with anger, and at last he burst out, with a stamp of the foot:
"Really, this is too much! Whose fault is it that this girl has to have a
dowry? You seem to forget who is her child's father; but, no doubt, you
would abandon her altogether if you had your way!"
Julien gazed at the baron for a few moments in silent surprise. Then he went
on more quietly:
"But fifteen hundred francs would have been ample to give her. All the
peasant-girls about here have children before they marry, so what does it
matter who they have them by? And then, setting aside the injustice you
will be doing Jeanne and me, you forget that if you give Rosalie a farm
worth twenty thousand francs everybody will see at once that there must be
a reason for such a gift. You should think a little of what is due to our name
and position."
He spoke in a calm, cool way as if he were sure of his logic and the strength
of his argument. The baron, disconcerted by this fresh view of the matter,
could find nothing to say in reply, and Julien, feeling his advantage, added:
"But fortunately, nothing is settled. I know the man who is going to marry
her and he is an honest fellow with whom everything can yet be
satisfactorily arranged. I will see to the matter myself."
With that he went out of the room, wishing to avoid any further discussion,
and taking the silence with which his words were received to mean

acquiescence.
As soon as the door had closed after his son-in-law, the baron exclaimed:
"Oh, this is more than I can stand!"
Jeanne, catching sight of her father's horrified expression, burst into a clear
laugh which rang out as it used to do whenever she had seen something
very funny:
"Papa, papa!" she cried. "Did you hear the tone in which he said 'twenty
thousand francs!'"
The baroness, whose smiles lay as near the surface as her tears, quivered
with laughter as she saw Jeanne's gayety, and thought of her son-in-law's
furious face, and his indignant exclamations and determined attempt to
prevent this money, which was not his, being given to the girl he had
seduced. Finally the baron caught the contagion and they all three laughed
till they ached as in the happy days of old. When they were a little calmer,
Jeanne said:
"It is very funny, but really I don't seem to mind in the least what he says or
does now. I look upon him quite as a stranger, and I can hardly believe I am
his wife. You see I am able to laugh at his—his want of delicacy."
And the parents and child involuntarily kissed each other, with smiles on
their lips, though the tears were not very far from their eyes.
Two days after this scene, when Julien had gone out for a ride, a tall, young
fellow of about four or five-and-twenty, dressed in a brand-new blue blouse,
which hung in stiff folds, climbed stealthily over the fence, as if he had
been hiding there all the morning, crept along the Couillards' ditch, and
went round to the other side of the château where Jeanne and her father and
mother were sitting under the plane-tree. He took off his cap and
awkwardly bowed as he came towards them, and, when he was within
speaking distance, mumbled:
"Your servant, monsieur le baron, madame and company." Then, as no one
said anything to him he introduced himself as "Desiré Lecoq."
This name failing to explain his presence at the château, the baron asked:

"What do you want?"
The peasant was very disconcerted when he found he had to state his
business. He hesitated, stammered, cast his eyes from the cap he held in his
hands to the château roof and back again, and at last began:
"M'sieu l'curé has said somethin' to me about this business—" then, fearing
to say too much and thus injure his own interests, he stopped short.
"What business?" asked the baron. "I don't know what you mean."
"About your maid—what's her name—Rosalie," said the man in a low
voice.
Jeanne, guessing what he had come about, got up and went away with her
child in her arms.
"Sit down," said the baron, pointing to the chair his daughter had just left.
The peasant took the seat with a "Thank you, kindly," and then waited as if
he had nothing whatever to say. After a few moments, during which no one
spoke, he thought he had better say something, so he looked up to the blue
sky and remarked:
"What fine weather for this time of year to be sure. It'll help on the crops
finely." And then he again relapsed into silence.
The baron began to get impatient.
"Then you are going to marry Rosalie?" he said in a dry tone, going straight
to the point.
At that all the crafty suspicious nature of the Normandy peasant was on the
alert.
"That depends," he answered quickly. "Perhaps I am and perhaps I ain't, that
depends."
All this beating about the bush irritated the baron.
"Can't you give a straightforward answer?" he exclaimed. "Have you come
to say you will marry the girl or not?"

The man looked at his feet as though he expected to find advice there:
"If it's as M'sieu l'curé says," he replied, "I'll have her; but if it's as M'sieu
Julien says, I won't."
"What did M. Julien tell you?"
"M'sieu Julien told me as how I should have fifteen hundred francs; but
M'sieu l'curé told me as how I should 'ave twenty thousand. I'll have her for
twenty thousand, but I won't for fifteen hundred."
The baroness was tickled by the perplexed look on the yokel's face and
began to shake with laughter as she sat in her armchair. Her gayety
surprised the peasant, who looked at her suspiciously out of the corner of
his eye as he waited for an answer.
The baron cut short all this haggling.
"I have told M. le curé that you shall have the farm at Barville, which is
worth twenty thousand francs, for life, and then it is to become the child's.
That is all I have to say on the matter, and I always keep my word. Now is
your answer yes or no?"
A satisfied smile broke over the man's face, and, with a sudden loquacity:
"Oh, then, I don't say no," he replied. "That was the only thing that pulled
me up. When M'sieu l'curé said somethin' to me about it in the first place, I
said yes at once, 'specially as it was to oblige M'sieu l'baron who'd be sure
to pay me back for it, as I says to myself. Ain't it always the way, and
doesn't one good turn always deserve another? But M'sieu Julien comes up
and then it was only fifteen 'undred francs. Then I says to myself, 'I must
find out the rights o' this and so I came 'ere. In coorse I b'lieved your word,
M'sieu l'baron, but I wanted to find out the rights o' the case. Short
reck'nings make long friends, don't they, M'sieu l'baron?"
He would have gone on like this till dinner-time if no one had interrupted
him, so the baron broke in with:
"When will you marry her?"
The question aroused the peasant's suspicions again directly.

"Couldn't I have it put down in writin' first?" he asked in a halting way.
"Why bless my soul, isn't the marriage-contract good enough for you?"
exclaimed the baron, angered by the man's suspicious nature.
"But until I get that I should like it wrote down on paper," persisted the
peasant. "Havin' it down on paper never does no harm."
"Give a plain answer, now at once," said the baron, rising to put an end to
the interview. "If you don't choose to marry the girl, say so. I know
someone else who would be glad of the chance."
The idea of twenty thousand francs slipping from his hands into someone
else's, startled the peasant out of his cautiousness, and he at once decided to
say "yes":
"Agreed, M'sieu l'baron!" he said, holding out his hand as if he were
concluding the purchase of a cow. "It's done, and there's no going back from
the bargain."
The baron took his hand and cried to the cook:
"Ludivine! Bring a bottle of wine."
The wine was drunk and then the peasant went away, feeling a great deal
lighter-hearted than when he had come.
Nothing was said about this visit to Julien. The drawing up of the marriage-
contract was kept a great secret; then the banns were published and Rosalie
was married on the Monday morning. At the church a neighbor stood
behind the bride and bridegroom with a child in her arms as an omen of
good luck, and everyone thought Desiré Lecoq very fortunate. "He was
born with a caul," said the peasants with a smile.
When Julien heard of the marriage he had a violent quarrel with the baron
and baroness and they decided to shorten their visit at Les Peuples. Jeanne
was sorry but she did not grieve as before when her parents went away, for
now all her hopes and thoughts were centered on her son.

IX

Now Jeanne was quite well again she thought she would like to return the
Fourville's visit, and also to call on the Couteliers. Julien had just bought
another carriage at a sale, a phaeton. It only needed one horse, so they could
go out twice a month, now, instead of once, and they used it for the first
time one bright December morning.
After driving for two hours across the Normandy plains they began to go
down to a little valley, whose sloping sides were covered with trees, while
the level ground at the bottom was cultivated. The ploughed fields were
followed by meadows, the meadows by a fen covered with tall reeds, which
waved in the wind like yellow ribbons, and then the road took a sharp turn
and the Château de la Vrillette came in sight. It was built between a wooded
slope on the one side and a large lake on the other, the water stretching from
the château wall to the tall fir-trees which covered the opposite acclivity.
The carriage had to pass over an old draw-bridge and under a vast Louis
XIII. archway before it drew up in front of a handsome building of the same
period as the archway, with brick frames round the windows and slated
turrets. Julien pointed out all the different beauties of the mansion to Jeanne
as if he were thoroughly acquainted with every nook and corner of it.
"Isn't it a superb place?" he exclaimed. "Just look at that archway! On the
other side of the house, which looks on to the lake, there is a magnificent
flight of steps leading right down to the water. Four boats are moored at the
bottom of the steps, two for the comte and two for the comtesse. The lake
ends down there, on the right, where you can see that row of poplars, and
there the river, which runs to Fécamp, rises. The place abounds in wild-
fowl, and the comte passes all his time shooting. Ah! it is indeed a lordly
residence."
The hall door opened and the fair-haired comtesse came to meet her visitors
with a smile on her face. She wore a trailing dress like a châtelaine of the
middle ages, and, exactly suited to the place in which she lived, she looked
like some beautiful Lady of the Lake.
Four out of the eight drawing-room windows looked on to the lake, and the
water looked dull and dismal, overshadowed as it was by the gloomy fir-

trees which covered the opposite slope.
The comtesse took both Jeanne's hands in hers as if she had known her for
ages, placed her in a seat and then drew a low chair beside her for herself,
while Julien, who had regained all his old refinement during the last five
months, smiled and chatted in an easy, familiar way. The comtesse and he
talked about the rides they had had together. She laughed a little at his bad
horsemanship, and called him "The Tottering Knight," and he too laughed,
calling her in return "The Amazon Queen."
A gun went off just under the window, and Jeanne gave a little cry. It was
the comte shooting teal, and his wife called him in. There was the splash of
oars, the grating of a boat against the stone steps and then the comte came
in, followed by two dogs of a reddish hue, which lay down on the carpet
before the door, while the water dripped from their shaggy coats.
The comte seemed more at his ease in his own house, and was delighted to
see the vicomte and Jeanne. He ordered the fire to be made up, and Madeira
and biscuits to be brought.
"Of course you will dine with us," he exclaimed.
Jeanne refused the invitation, thinking of Paul; and as he pressed her to stay
and she still persisted in her refusal, Julien made a movement of
impatience. Then afraid of arousing her husband's quarrelsome temper, she
consented to stay, though the idea of not seeing Paul till the next day was
torture to her.
They spent a delightful afternoon. First of all the visitors were taken to see
the springs which flowed from the foot of a moss-covered rock into a
crystal basin of water which bubbled as if it were boiling, and then they
went in a boat among the dry reeds, where paths of water had been formed
by cutting down the rushes.
The comte rowed (his two dogs sitting each side of him with their noses in
the air) and each vigorous stroke of the oars lifted the boat half out of the
water and sent it rapidly on its way. Jeanne let her hand trail in the water,
enjoying the icy coolness, which seemed to soothe her, and Julien and the
comtesse, well wrapped up in rugs, sat in smiling silence in the stern of the
boat, as if they were too happy to talk.

The evening drew on, and with it the icy, northerly wind came over the
withered reeds. The sun had disappeared behind the firs, and it made one
cold only to look at the crimson sky, covered with tiny, red fantastically-
shaped clouds.
They all went in to the big drawing-room where an enormous fire was
blazing. The room seemed to be filled with an atmosphere of warmth and
comfort, and the comte gayly took up his wife in his strong arms like a
child, and gave her two hearty kisses on her cheeks.
Jeanne could not help smiling at this good-natured giant to whom his
moustaches gave the appearance of an ogre. "What wrong impressions of
people one forms every day," she thought; and, almost involuntarily, she
glanced at Julien. He was standing in the doorway his eyes fixed on the
comte and his face very pale. His expression frightened her and, going up to
him, she asked:
"What is the matter? are you ill?"
"There's nothing the matter with me," he answered, churlishly. "Leave me
alone. I only feel cold."
Dinner was announced and the comte begged permission for his dogs to
come into the dining-room. They came and sat one on each side of their
master, who every minute threw them some scrap of food. The animals
stretched out their heads, and wagged their tails, quivering with pleasure as
he drew their long silky ears through his fingers.
After dinner, when Jeanne and Julien began to say good-bye, the comte
insisted on their staying to see some fishing by torchlight. They and the
comtesse stood on the steps leading down to the lake, while the comte got
into his boat with a servant carrying a lighted torch and a net. The torch cast
strange trembling reflections over the water, its dancing glimmers even
lighting up the firs beyond the reeds; and suddenly, as the boat turned
round, an enormous fantastic shadow was thrown on the background of the
illumined wood. It was the shadow of a man, but the head rose above the
trees and was lost against the dark sky, while the feet seemed to be down in
the lake. This huge creature raised its arms as if it would grasp the stars; the

movement was a rapid one, and the spectators on the steps heard a little
splash.
The boat tacked a little, and the gigantic shadow seemed to run along the
wood, which was lighted up as the torch moved with the boat; then it was
lost in the darkness, then reappeared on the château wall, smaller, but more
distinct; and the loud voice of the comte was heard exclaiming:
"Gilberte, I have caught eight!"
The oars splashed, and the enormous shadow remained standing in the same
place on the wall, but gradually it became thinner and shorter; the head
seemed to sink lower and the body to get narrower, and when M. de
Fourville came up the steps, followed by the servant carrying the torch, it
was reduced to his exact proportions, and faithfully copied all his
movements. In the net he had eight big fish which were still quivering.
As Jeanne and Julien were driving home, well wrapped up in cloaks and
rugs which the Fourvilles had lent them,
"What a good-hearted man that giant is," said Jeanne, almost to herself.
"Yes," answered Julien; "but he makes too much show of his affection,
sometimes, before people."
A week after their visit to the Fourvilles, they called on the Couteliers, who
were supposed to be the highest family in the province, and whose estate
lay near Cany. The new château, built in the reign of Louis XIV, lay in a
magnificent park, entirely surrounded by walls, and the ruins of the old
château could be seen from the higher parts of the grounds.
A liveried servant showed the visitors into a large, handsome room. In the
middle of the floor an enormous Sèvres vase stood on a pedestal, into which
a crystal case had been let containing the king's autograph letter, offering
this gift to the Marquis Léopold Hervé Joseph Germer de Varneville, de
Rollebosc de Coutelier. Jeanne and Julien were looking at this royal present
when the marquis and marquise came in, the latter wearing her hair
powdered.

The marquise thought her rank constrained her to be amiable, and her desire
to appear condescending made her affected. Her husband was a big man,
with white hair brushed straight up all over his head, and a haughtiness in
his voice, in all his movements, in his every attitude which plainly showed
the esteem in which he held himself. They were people who had a strict
etiquette for everything, and whose feelings seemed always stilted, like
their words.
They both talked on without waiting for an answer, smiled with an air of
indifference, and behaved as if they were accomplishing a duty imposed
upon them by their superior birth, in receiving the smaller nobles of the
province with such politeness. Jeanne and Julien tried to make themselves
agreeable, though they felt ill at ease, and when the time came to conclude
their visit they hardly knew how to retire, though they did not want to stay
any longer. However, the marquise, herself, ended the visit naturally and
simply by stopping short the conversation, like a queen ending an audience.
"I don't think we will call on anyone else, unless you want to," said Julien,
as they were going back. "The Fourvilles are quite as many friends as I
want."
And Jeanne agreed with him.
Dark, dreary December passed slowly away. Everyone stayed at home like
the winter before, but Jeanne's thoughts were too full of Paul for her ever to
feel dull. She would hold him in her arms covering him with those
passionate kisses which mothers lavish on their children, then offering the
baby's face to his father:
"Why don't you kiss him?" she would say. "You hardly seem to love him."
Julien would just touch the infant's smooth forehead with his lips, holding
his body as far away as possible, as if he were afraid of the little hands
touching him in their aimless movements. Then he would go quickly out of
the room, almost as though the child disgusted him.
The mayor, the doctor, and the curé came to dinner occasionally, and
sometimes the Fourvilles, who had become very intimate with Jeanne and
her husband. The comte seemed to worship Paul. He nursed the child on his
knees from the time he entered Les Peuples to the time he left, sometimes

holding him the whole afternoon, and it was marvelous to see how
delicately and tenderly he touched him with his huge hands. He would
tickle the child's nose with the ends of his long moustaches, and then
suddenly cover his face with kisses almost as passionate as Jeanne's. It was
the great trouble of his life that he had no children.
March was bright, dry, and almost mild. The Comtesse Gilberte again
proposed that they should all four go for some rides together, and Jeanne, a
little tired of the long weary evenings and the dull, monotonous days, was
only too pleased at the idea and agreed to it at once. It took her a week to
make her riding-habit, and then they commenced their rides.
They always rode two and two, the comtesse and Julien leading the way,
and the comte and Jeanne about a hundred feet behind. The latter couple
talked easily and quietly as they rode along, for, each attracted by the
other's straightforward ways and kindly heart, they had become fast friends.
Julien and the comtesse talked in whispers alternated by noisy bursts of
laughter, and looked in each other's eyes to read there the things their lips
did not utter, and often they would break into a gallop, as if impelled by a
desire to escape alone to some country far away.
Sometimes it seemed as if something irritated Gilberte. Her sharp tones
would be borne on the breeze to the ears of the couple loitering behind, and
the comte would say to Jeanne, with a smile:
"I don't think my wife got out of bed the right side this morning."
One evening, as they were returning home, the comtesse began to spur her
mare, and then pull her in with sudden jerks on the rein.
"Take care, or she'll run away with you," said Julien two or three times.
"So much the worse for me; it's nothing to do with you," she replied, in
such cold, hard tones that the clear words rang out over the fields as if they
were actually floating in the air.
The mare reared, kicked, and foamed at the mouth and the comte cried out
anxiously:
"Do take care what you are doing, Gilberte!"

Then, in a fit of defiance, for she was in one of those obstinate moods that
will brook no word of advice, she brought her whip heavily down between
the animal's ears. The mare reared, beat the air with her fore legs for a
moment, then, with a tremendous bound, set off over the plain at the top of
her speed. First she crossed a meadow, then some ploughed fields, kicking
up the wet heavy soil behind her, and going at such a speed that in a few
moments the others could hardly distinguish the comtesse from her horse.
Julien stood stock still, crying: "Madame! Madame!" The comte gave a
groan, and, bending down over his powerful steed, galloped after his wife.
He encouraged his steed with voice and hand, urged it on with whip and
spur, and it seemed as though he carried the big animal between his legs,
and raised it from the ground at every leap it took. The horse went at an
inconceivable speed, keeping a straight line regardless of all obstacles; and
Jeanne could see the two outlines of the husband and wife diminish and
fade in the distance, till they vanished altogether, like two birds chasing
each other till they are lost to sight beyond the horizon.
Julien walked his horse up to his wife, murmuring angrily: "She is mad to-
day." And they both went off after their friends, who were hidden in a dip in
the plain. In about a quarter of an hour they saw them coming back, and
soon they came up to them.
The comte, looking red, hot and triumphant, was leading his wife's horse.
The comtesse was very pale; her features looked drawn and contracted, and
she leant on her husband's shoulder as if she were going to faint. That day
Jeanne understood, for the first time, how madly the comte loved his wife.
All through the following month the comtesse was merrier than she had
ever been before. She came to Les Peuples as often as she could, and was
always laughing and jumping up to kiss Jeanne. She seemed to have found
some unknown source of happiness, and her husband simply worshiped her
now, following her about with his eyes and seeking every pretext for
touching her hand or her dress.
"We are happier now than we have ever been before," he said, one evening,
to Jeanne. "Gilberte has never been so affectionate as she is now; nothing
seems to vex her or make her angry. Until lately I was never quite sure that
she loved me, but now I know she does."

Julien had changed for the better also; he had become gay and good-
tempered, and their friendship seemed to have brought peace and happiness
to both families.
The spring was exceptionally warm and forward. The sun cast his warm
rays upon the budding trees and flowers from early morn until the sweet,
soft evening. It was one of those favored years when the world seems to
have grown young again, and nature to delight in bringing everything to life
once more.
Jeanne felt a vague excitement in the presence of this reawakening of the
fields and woods. She gave way to a sweet melancholy and spent hours
languidly dreaming. All the tender incidents of her first hours of love came
back to her, not that any renewal of affection for her husband stirred her
heart; that had been completely destroyed; but the soft breeze which fanned
her cheek and the sweet perfume which filled the air seemed to breathe
forth a tender sigh of love which made her pulse beat quicker. She liked to
be alone, and in the warm sunshine, to enjoy these vague, peaceful
sensations which aroused no thoughts.
One morning she was lying thus half-dormant, when suddenly she saw in
her mind that sunlit space in the little wood near Etretat where for the first
time she had felt thrilled by the presence of the man who loved her then,
where he had for the first time timidly hinted at his hopes, and where she
had believed that she was going to realize the radiant future of her dreams.
She thought she should like to make a romantic, superstitious pilgrimage to
the wood, and she felt as if a visit to that sunny spot would in some way
alter the course of her life.
Julien had gone out at daybreak, she did not know whither, so she ordered
the Martins' little white horse, which she sometimes rode, to be saddled, and
set off.
It was one of those calm days when there is not a leaf nor a blade of grass
stirring. The wind seemed dead, and everything looked as though it would
remain motionless until the end of time; even the insects had disappeared. A
burning, steady heat descended from the sun in a golden mist, and Jeanne
walked her horse along, enjoying the stillness, and every now and then
looking up at a tiny white cloud which hung like a snowy fleece in the

midst of the bright blue sky. She went down into the valley leading to the
sea, between the two great arches which are called the gates of Etretat, and
went slowly towards the wood.
The sunlight poured down through the foliage which, as yet, was not very
thick, and Jeanne wandered along the little paths unable to find the spot
where she had sat with Julien. She turned into a long alley and, at the other
end of it, saw two saddle-horses fastened to a tree; she recognized them at
once; they were Gilberte's and Julien's. Tired of being alone and pleased at
this unexpected meeting, she trotted quickly up to them, and when she
reached the two animals, which were waiting quietly as if accustomed to
stand like this, she called aloud. There was no answer.
On the grass, which looked as if someone had rested there, lay a woman's
glove and two whips. Julien and Gilberte had evidently sat down and then
gone farther on, leaving the horses tied to the tree. Jeanne wondered what
they could be doing, and getting off her horse, she leant against the trunk of
a tree and waited for a quarter of an hour or twenty minutes. She stood quite
motionless, and two little birds flew down onto the grass close by her. One
of them hopped round the other, fluttering his outstretched wings, and
chirping and nodding his little head; all at once they coupled. Jeanne
watched them, as surprised as if she had never known of such a thing
before; then she thought: "Oh, of course! It is springtime."
Then came another thought—a suspicion. She looked again at the glove, the
whips and the two horses standing riderless; then she sprang on her horse
with an intense longing to leave this place. She started back to Les Peuples
at a gallop. Her brain was busy reasoning, connecting different incidents
and thinking it all out.
How was it that she had never noticed anything, had never guessed this
before? How was it that Julien's frequent absence from home, his renewed
attention to his toilet, his better temper had told her nothing? Now she
understood Gilberte's nervous irritability, her exaggerated affection for
herself and the bliss in which she had appeared to be living lately, and
which had so pleased the comte.
She pulled up her horse for she wanted to think calmly, and the quick
movement confused her ideas. After the first shock she became almost

indifferent; she felt neither jealousy nor hatred, only contempt. She did not
think about Julien at all, for nothing that he could do would have astonished
her, but the twofold treachery of the comtesse, who had deceived her friend
as well as her husband, hurt her deeply. So everyone was treacherous, and
untrue and faithless! Her eyes filled with tears, for sometimes it is as bitter
to see an illusion destroyed as to witness the death of a friend. She resolved
to say nothing more about her discovery. Her heart would be dead to
everyone but Paul and her parents, but she would bear a smiling face.
When she reached home she caught up her son in her arms, carried him to
her room and pressed her lips to his face again and again, and for a whole
hour she played with and caressed him.
Julien came in to dinner in a very good temper and full of plans for his
wife's pleasure.
"Won't your father and mother come and stay with us this year?" he said.
Jeanne almost forgave him his infidelity, so grateful was she to him for
making this proposal. She longed to see the two people she loved best after
Paul, and she passed the whole evening in writing to them, and urging them
to come as soon as possible.
They wrote to say they would come on the twentieth of May; it was then the
seventh, and Jeanne awaited their arrival with intense impatience. Besides
her natural desire to see her parents, she felt it would be such a relief to
have near her two honest hearts, two simple-minded beings whose life and
every action, thought and desire had always been upright and pure. She felt
she stood alone in her honesty among all this guilt. She had learnt to
dissimulate her feelings, to meet the comtesse with an outstretched hand
and a smiling face, but her sense of desolation increased with her contempt
for her fellow-men.
Every day some village scandal reached her ears which filled her with still
greater disgust and scorn for human frailty. The Couillards' daughter had
just had a child and was therefore going to be married. The Martins' servant,
who was an orphan, a little girl only fifteen years old, who lived near, and a
widow, a lame, poverty-stricken woman who was so horribly dirty that she
had been nicknamed La Crotte, were all pregnant; and Jeanne was

continually hearing of the misconduct of some girl, some married woman
with a family, or of some rich farmer who had been held in general respect.
This warm spring seemed to revive the passions of mankind as it revived
the plants and the flowers; but to Jeanne, whose senses were dead, and
whose wounded heart and romantic soul were alone stirred by the warm
springtide breezes, and who only dreamed of the poetic side of love, these
bestial desires were revolting and hateful. She was angry with Gilberte, not
for having robbed her of her husband, but for having bespattered herself
with this filth. The comtesse was not of the same class as the peasants, who
could not resist their brutal desires; then how could she have fallen into the
same abomination?
The very day that her parents were to arrive, Julien increased his wife's
disgust by telling her laughingly, as though it were something quite natural
and very funny, that the baker having heard a noise in his oven the day
before, which was not baking day, had gone to see what it was, and instead
of finding the stray cat he expected to see, had surprised his wife, "who was
certainly not putting bread into the oven." "The baker closed the mouth of
the oven," went on Julien, "and they would have been suffocated if the
baker's little boy, who had seen his mother go into the oven with the
blacksmith, had not told the neighbors what was going on." He laughed as
he added, "That will give a nice flavor to the bread. It is just like a tale of
La Fontaine's."
For some time after that Jeanne could not touch bread.
When the post-chaise drew up before the door with the baron's smiling face
looking out of the window, Jeanne felt fonder of her parents and more
pleased to see them than she had ever been before; but when she saw her
mother she was overcome with surprise and grief. The baroness looked ten
years older than when she had left Les Peuples six months before. Her
huge, flabby cheeks were suffused with blood, her eyes had a glazed look,
and she could not move a step unless she was supported on either side; she
drew her breath with so much difficulty that only to hear her made everyone
around her draw theirs painfully also.
The baron, who had lived with her and seen her every day, had not noticed
the gradual change in his wife, and if she had complained or said her

breathing and the heavy feeling about her heart were getting worse, he had
answered:
"Oh, no, my dear. You have always been like this."
Jeanne went to her own room and cried bitterly when she had taken her
parents upstairs. Then she went to her father and, throwing herself in his
arms, said, with her eyes still full of tears:
"Oh, how changed mother is! What is the matter with her? Do tell me what
is the matter with her?"
"Do you think she is changed?" asked the baron in surprise. "It must be
your fancy. You know I have been with her all this time, and to me she
seems just the same as she has always been; she is not any worse."
"Your mother is in a bad way," said Julien to his wife that evening. "I don't
think she's good for much now."
Jeanne burst into tears.
"Oh, good gracious!" went on Julien irritably. "I don't say that she is
dangerously ill. You always see so much more than is meant. She is
changed, that's all; it's only natural she should begin to break up at her age."
In a week Jeanne had got accustomed to her mother's altered appearance
and thought no more about it, thrusting her fears from her, as people always
do put aside their fears and cares, with an instinctive and natural, though
selfish dislike of anything unpleasant.
The baroness, unable to walk, only went out for about half an hour every
day. When she had gone once up and down "her" avenue, she could not
move another step and asked to sit down on "her" seat. Some days she
could not walk even to the end of the avenue, and would say:
"Let us stop; my hypertrophy is too much for me to-day."
She never laughed as she used to; things which, the year before, would have
sent her into fits of laughter, only brought a faint smile to her lips now. Her
eyesight was still excellent, and she passed her time in reading Corinne and
Lamartine's Meditations over again, and in going through her "Souvenir-

drawer." She would empty on her knees the old letters, which were so dear
to her heart, place the drawer on a chair beside her, look slowly over each
"relic," and then put it back in its place. When she was quite alone she
kissed some of the letters as she might have kissed the hair of some loved
one who was dead.
Jeanne, coming into the room suddenly, sometimes found her in tears.
"What is the matter, mamma, dear?" she would ask.
"My souvenirs have upset me," the baroness would answer, with a long-
drawn sigh. "They bring to my mind so vividly the happy times which are
all over now, and make me think of people whom I had almost forgotten. I
seem to see them, to hear their voices, and it makes me sad. You will feel
the same, later on."
If the baron came in and found them talking like this, he would say:
"Jeanne, my dear, if you take my advice, you will burn all your letters—
those from your mother, mine, everyone's. There is nothing more painful
than to stir up the memories of one's youth when one is old."
But Jeanne, who had inherited her mother's sentimental instincts, though
she differed from her in nearly everything else, carefully kept all her old
letters to form a "souvenir-box" for her old age, also.
A few days after his arrival, business called the baron away again. The
baroness soon began to get better, and Jeanne, forgetting Julien's infidelity
and Gilberte's treachery, was almost perfectly happy. The weather was
splendid. Mild, starlit nights followed the soft evenings, and dazzling
sunrises commenced the glorious days. The fields were covered with bright,
sweet-smelling flowers, and the vast calm sea glittered in the sun from
morning till night.
One afternoon Jeanne went into the fields with Paul in her arms. She felt an
exquisite gladness as she looked now at her son, now at the flowery
hedgerows, and every minute she pressed her baby closely to her and kissed
him. The earth exhaled a faint perfume, and, as she walked along, she felt as
though her happiness were too great for her. Then she thought of her child's
future. What would he be? Sometimes she hoped he would become a great

and famous man. Sometimes she felt she would rather he remained with
her, passing his life in tender devotion to his mother and unknown to the
world. When she listened to the promptings of her mother's heart, she
wished him to remain simply her adored son; but when she listened to her
reason and her pride she hoped he would make a name and become
something of importance in the world.
She sat down at the edge of a ditch and studied the child's face as if she had
never really looked at it before. It seemed so strange to think that this little
baby would grow up, and walk with manly strides, that these soft cheeks
would become bearded, and the feeble murmur change to a deep-toned
voice.
Someone called her, and, looking up, she saw Marius running towards her.
Thinking he had come to announce some visitor, she got up, feeling vexed
at being disturbed. The boy was running as fast as his legs could carry him.
"Madame!" he cried, when he was near enough to be heard. "Madame la
baronne is very ill."
Jeanne ran quickly towards the house, feeling as if a douche of cold water
had been poured down her spine. There was quite a little crowd standing
under the plane tree, which opened to let her through as she rushed forward.
There, in the midst, lay the baroness on the ground, her head supported by
two pillows, her face black, her eyes closed, and her chest, which for the
last twenty years had heaved so tumultuously, motionless. The child's nurse
was standing there; she took him from his mother's arms, and carried him
away.
"How did it happen? What made her fall?" asked Jeanne, looking up with
haggard eyes. "Send for the doctor immediately."
As she turned she saw the curé; he at once offered his services, and, turning
up his sleeves, began to rub the baroness with Eau de Cologne and vinegar;
but she showed no signs of returning consciousness.
"She ought to be undressed and put to bed," said the priest; and, with his
aid, Joseph Couillard, old Simon and Ludivine tried to raise the baroness.

As they lifted her, her head fell backwards, and her dress, which they were
grasping, gave way under the dead weight of her huge body. They were
obliged to lay her down again, and Jeanne shrieked with horror.
At last an armchair was brought from the drawing-room; the baroness was
placed in it, carried slowly indoors, then upstairs, and laid on the bed. The
cook was undressing her as best she could when the Widow Dentu came in,
as if, like the priest, she had "smelt death," as the servants said. Joseph
Couillard hurried off for the doctor, and the priest was going to fetch the
holy oil, when the nurse whispered in his ear:
"You needn't trouble to go, Monsieur le curé. I have seen too much of death
not to know that she is gone."
Jeanne, in desperation, begged them to tell her what she could do, what
remedies they had better apply. The curé thought that anyhow he might
pronounce an absolution, and for two hours they watched beside the
lifeless, livid body, Jeanne, unable to contain her grief, sobbing aloud as she
knelt beside the bed. When the door opened to admit the doctor, she thought
that with him came safety and consolation and hope, and she rushed to meet
him, trying to tell him, in a voice broken with sobs, all the details of the
catastrophe.
"She was walking—like she does every day—and she seemed quite well,
better even—than usual. She had eaten some soup and two eggs for lunch,
and—quite suddenly, without any warning she fell—and turned black, like
she is now; she has not moved since, and we have—tried everything to
restore her to consciousness—everything—"
She stopped abruptly for she saw the nurse making a sign to the doctor to
intimate that it was all over. Then she refused to understand the gesture, and
went on anxiously:
"Is it anything serious? Do you think there is any danger?"
He answered at last:
"I very much fear that—that life is extinct. Be brave and try to bear up."

For an answer Jeanne opened her arms, and threw herself on her mother's
body. Julien came in. He made no sign of grief or pity, but stood looking
simply vexed; he had been taken too much by surprise to at once assume an
expression of sorrow.
"I expected it," he whispered. "I knew she could not live long."
He drew out his handkerchief, wiped his eyes, knelt down and crossed
himself as he mumbled something, then rose and attempted to raise his
wife. She was clinging to the corpse, almost lying on it as she passionately
kissed it; they had to drag her away for she was nearly mad with grief, and
she was not allowed to go back for an hour.
Then every shadow of hope had vanished, and the room had been arranged
fittingly for its dead occupant. The day was drawing to a close, and Julien
and the priest were standing near one of the windows, talking in whispers.
The Widow Dentu, thoroughly accustomed to death, was already
comfortably dozing in an armchair. The curé went to meet Jeanne as she
came into the room, and taking both her hands in his, he exhorted her to be
brave under this sorrow, and attempted to comfort her with the consolation
of religion. Then he spoke of her dead mother's good life, and offered to
pass the night in prayers beside the body.
But Jeanne refused this offer as well as she could for her tears. She wanted
to be alone, quite alone, with her mother this last night.
"That cannot be," interposed Julien; "we will watch beside her together."
She shook her head, unable to speak for some moments; then she said:
"She was my mother, and I want to watch beside her alone."
"Let her do as she wants," whispered the doctor; "the nurse can stay in the
next room," and Julien and the priest, thinking of their night's rest, gave in.
The Abbé Picot knelt down, prayed for a few moments, then rose and went
out of the room, saying, "She was a saintly woman," in the same tone as he
always said, "Dominus vobiscum."
"Won't you have some dinner?" asked the vicomte in a perfectly ordinary
voice.

Jeanne, not thinking he was speaking to her, made no answer.
"You would feel much better if you would eat something," he went on
again.
"Let someone go for papa, directly," she said as if she had not heard what
he said; and he went out of the room to dispatch a mounted messenger to
Rouen.
Jeanne sank into a sort of stupor, as if she were waiting to give way to her
passion of regret until she should be alone with her mother. The room
became filled with shadows. The Widow Dentu moved noiselessly about,
arranging everything for the night, and at last lighted two candles which she
placed at the head of the bed on a small table covered with a white cloth.
Jeanne seemed unconscious of everything; she was waiting until she should
be alone.
When he had dined, Julien came upstairs again and asked for the second
time:
"Won't you have something to eat?"
His wife shook her head, and he sat down looking more resigned than sad,
and did not say anything more. They all three sat apart from one another;
the nurse dropped off to sleep every now and then, snored for a little while,
then awoke with a start. After some time Julien rose and went over to his
wife.
"Do you still want to be left alone?" he asked.
She eagerly took his hand in hers: "Oh, yes; do leave me," she answered.
He kissed her on the forehead, whispered, "I shall come and see you during
the night," then went away with the Widow Dentu, who wheeled her
armchair into the next room.
Jeanne closed the door and put both windows wide open. A warm breeze,
laden with the sweet smell of the hay, blew into the room, and on the lawn,
which had been mown the day before, she could see the heaps of dry grass
lying in the moonlight. She turned away from the window and went back to
the bed, for the soft, beautiful night seemed to mock her grief.

Her mother was no longer swollen as she had been when she died; she
looked simply asleep, only her sleep was more peaceful than it had ever
been before; the wind made the candles flicker, and the changing shadows
made the dead face look as though it moved and lived again. As Jeanne
gazed at it the memories of her early childhood came crowding into her
mind. She could see again her mother sitting in the convent parlor, holding
out the bag of cakes she had brought for her little girl; she thought of all her
little ways, her affectionate words, the way she used to move, the wrinkles
that came round her eyes when she laughed, the deep sigh she always
heaved when she sat down, and all her little, daily habits, and as she stood
gazing at the dead body she kept repeating, almost mechanically: "She is
dead; she is dead;" until at last she realized all the horror of that word.
The woman who was lying there—mamma—little mother—Madame
Adélaïde, was dead! She would never move, never speak, never laugh,
never say, "Good morning, Jeannette"; never sit opposite her husband at the
dinner table again. She was dead. She would be enclosed in a coffin, placed
beneath the ground, and that would be the end; they would never see her
again. It could not be possible! What! She, her daughter, had now no
mother! Had she indeed lost for ever this dear face, the first she had ever
looked upon, the first she had ever loved, this kindly loving mother, whose
place in her heart could never be filled? And in a few hours even this still,
unconscious face would have vanished, and then there would be nothing
left her but a memory. She fell on her knees in despair, wringing her hands
and pressing her lips to the bed.
"Oh, mother, mother! My darling mother!" she cried, in a broken voice
which was stifled by the bed-covering.
She felt she was going mad; mad, like the night she had fled into the snow.
She rushed to the window to breathe the fresh air which had not passed over
the corpse or the bed on which it lay. The new-mown hay, the trees, the
waste land and the distant sea lay peacefully sleeping in the moonlight, and
the tears welled up into Jeanne's eyes as she looked out into the clear, calm
night. She went back to her seat by the bedside and held her mother's dead
hand in hers, as if she were lying ill instead of dead. Attracted by the lighted
candles, a big, winged insect had entered through the open window and was
flying about the room, dashing against the wall at every moment with a

faint thud. It disturbed Jeanne, and she looked up to see where it was, but
she could only see its shadow moving over the white ceiling.
Its buzzing suddenly ceased, and then, besides the regular ticking of the
clock, Jeanne noticed another fainter rustling noise. It was the ticking of her
mother's watch, which had been forgotten when her dress had been taken
off and thrown at the foot of the bed, and the idea of this little piece of
mechanism still moving while her mother lay dead, sent a fresh pang of
anguish through her heart. She looked at the time. It was hardly half-past
ten, and as she thought of the long night to come, she was seized with a
horrible dread.
She began to think of her own life—of Rosalie, of Gilberte—of all her
illusions which had been, one by one, so cruelly destroyed. Life contained
nothing but misery and pain, misfortune and death; there was nothing true,
nothing honest, nothing but what gave rise to suffering and tears. Repose
and happiness could only be expected in another existence, when the soul
had been delivered from its early trials. Her thoughts turned to the
unfathomable mystery of the soul, but, as she reasoned about it, her poetic
theories were invariably upset by others, just as poetic and just as unreal.
Where was now her mother's soul, the soul which had forsaken this still,
cold body? Perhaps it was far away, floating in space. But had it entirely
vanished like the perfume from a withered flower, or was it wandering like
some invisible bird freed from its cage? Had it returned to God, or was it
scattered among the new germs of creation? It might be very near; perhaps
in this very room, hovering around the inanimate body it had left, and at
this thought Jeanne fancied she felt a breath, as if a spirit had passed by her.
Her blood ran cold with terror; she did not dare turn round to look behind
her, and she sat motionless, her heart beating wildly.
At that moment the invisible insect again commenced its buzzing, noisy
flight, and Jeanne trembled from head to foot at the sound. Then, as she
recognized the noise, she felt a little reassured, and rose and looked around.
Her eyes fell on the escritoire with the sphinxes' heads, the guardian of the
"souvenirs." As she looked at it she thought it would be fulfilling a sacred,
filial duty, which would please her mother as she looked down on her from
another world, to read these letters, as she might have done a holy book
during this last watch.

She knew it was the correspondence of her grandfather and grandmother,
whom she had never known; and it seemed as if her hands would join theirs
across her mother's corpse, and so a sacred chain of affection would be
formed between those who had died so long ago, their daughter who had
but just joined them, and her child who was still on earth.
She opened the escritoire and took out the letters; they had been carefully
tied into ten little packets, which were laid side by side in the lowest
drawer. A refinement of sentimentality prompted her to place them all on
the bed in the baroness's arms; then she began to read.
They were old-fashioned letters with the perfume of another century about
them, such as are treasured up in every family. The first commenced "My
dearie"; another "My little darling"; then came some beginning "My
pet"—"My beloved daughter," then "My dear child"—"My dear
Adélaïde"—"My dear daughter," the commencements varying as the letters
had been addressed to the child, the young girl, and, later on, to the young
wife. They were all full of foolish, loving phrases, and news about a
thousand insignificant, homely events, which, to a stranger, would have
seemed too trivial to mention: "Father has an influenza; Hortense has burnt
her finger; Croquerat, the cat, is dead; the fir tree which stood on the right-
hand side of the gate has been cut down; mother lost her mass book as she
was coming home from church, she thinks someone must have stolen it,"
and they talked about people whom Jeanne had never known, but whose
names were vaguely familiar to her.
She was touched by these simple details which seemed to reveal all her
mother's life and inmost thoughts to her. She looked at the corpse as it lay
there, and suddenly she began to read the letters aloud, as though to console
and gladden the dead heart once more; and a smile of happiness seemed to
light up the face. As she finished reading them, Jeanne threw the letters on
the foot of the bed, resolving to place them all in her mother's coffin.
She untied another packet. These were in another handwriting, and the first
ran thus:

"I cannot live without your kisses. I love you madly."

There was nothing more, not even a signature. Jeanne turned the paper over,
unable to understand it. It was addressed clearly enough to "Madame la
baronne Le Perthuis des Vauds."
She opened the next:

"Come to-night as soon as he has gone out. We shall have at
least one hour together. I adore you."

A third:

"I have passed a night of longing and anguish. I fancied you in
my arms, your mouth quivering beneath mine, your eyes
looking into my eyes. And then I could have dashed myself from
the window, as I thought that, at that very moment, you were
sleeping beside him, at the mercy of his caresses."

Jeanne stopped in amazement. What did it all mean? To whom were these
words of love addressed? She read on, finding in every letter the same
distracted phrases, the same assignations, the same cautions, and, at the end,
always the five words: "Above all, burn this letter." At last she came to an
ordinary note, merely accepting an invitation to dinner; it was signed "Paul
d'Ennemare." Why, that was the man of whom the baron still spoke as
"Poor old Paul," and whose wife had been the baroness's dearest friend!
Then into Jeanne's mind came a suspicion which at once changed to a
certainty—he had been her mother's lover! With a sudden gesture of
loathing, she threw from her all these odious letters, as she would have
shaken off some venomous reptile, and, running to the window, she wept
bitterly. All her strength seemed to have left her; she sank on the ground,
and, hiding her face in the curtains to stifle her moans, she sobbed in an
agony of despair. She would have crouched there the whole night if the
sound of someone moving in the next room had not made her start to her
feet. Perhaps it was her father! And all these letters were lying on the bed
and on the floor! He had only to come in and open one, and he would know
all!
She seized all the old, yellow papers—her grandparents' epistles, the love
letters, those she had not unfolded, those that were still lying in the drawer

—and threw them all into the fireplace. Then she took one of the candles
which were burning on the little table, and set fire to this heap of paper. A
bright flame sprang up at once, lighting up the room, the bed and the corpse
with a bright, flickering light, and casting on the white bed-curtain a dark,
trembling shadow of the rigid face and huge body.
When there was nothing left but a heap of ashes in the bottom of the grate,
Jeanne went and sat by the window, as though now she dare not sit by the
corpse. The tears streamed from her eyes, and, hiding her face in her hands,
she moaned out in heartbroken tones: "Oh, poor mamma! Poor mamma!"
Then a terrible thought came to her: Suppose her mother, by some strange
chance, was not dead; suppose she was only in a trance-like sleep and
should suddenly rise and speak! Would not the knowledge of this horrible
secret lessen her, Jeanne's, love for her mother? Should she be able to kiss
her with the same respect, and regard her with the same esteem as before?
No! She knew it would be impossible; and the thought almost broke her
heart.
The night wore on; the stars were fading, and a cool breeze sprang up. The
moon was slowly sinking towards the sea over which she was shedding her
silver light, and the memory of that other night she had passed at the
window, the night of her return from the convent, came back to Jeanne. Ah!
how far away was that happy time! How changed everything was, and what
a different future lay before her from what she had pictured then! Over the
sky crept a faint, tender tinge of pink, and the brilliant dawn seemed strange
and unnatural to her, as she wondered how such glorious sunrises could
illumine a world in which there was no joy or happiness.
A slight sound startled her, and looking round she saw Julien.
"Well, are you not very tired?" he said.
"No," she answered, feeling glad that her lonely vigil had come to an end.
"Now go and rest," said her husband.
She pressed a long sorrowful kiss on her mother's face; then left the room.

That day passed in attending to those melancholy duties that always
surround a death; the baron came in the evening, and cried a great deal over
his wife. The next day the funeral took place; Jeanne pressed her lips to the
clammy forehead for the last time, drew the sheet once more over the still
face, saw the coffin fastened down, and then went to await the people who
were to attend the funeral.
Gilberte arrived first, and threw herself into Jeanne's arms, sobbing
violently. The carriages began to drive up, and voices were heard in the hall.
The room gradually filled with women with whom Jeanne was not
acquainted; then the Marquise de Coutelier and the Vicomtesse de
Briseville arrived, and went up to her and kissed her. She suddenly
perceived that Aunt Lison was in the room, and she gave her such an
affectionate embrace, that the old maid was nearly overcome. Julien came
in dressed in deep mourning; he seemed very busy, and very pleased that all
these people had come. He whispered some question to his wife about the
arrangements, and added in a low tone:
"It will be a very grand funeral; all the best families are here."
Then he went away again, bowing to the ladies as he passed down the
room.
Aunt Lison and the Comtesse Gilberte stayed with Jeanne while the burial
was taking place. The comtesse repeatedly kissed her, murmuring: "Poor
darling, poor darling," and when the Comte de Fourville came to take his
wife home, he wept as if he had lost his own mother.

X

The next few days were very sad, as they always must be directly after a
death. The absence of the familiar face from its accustomed place makes the
house seem empty, and each time the eye falls on anything the dear, dead
one has had in constant use, a fresh pang of sorrow darts through the heart.
There is the empty chair, the umbrella still standing in the hall, the glass
which the maid has not yet washed. In every room there is something lying

just as it was left for the last time; the scissors, an odd glove, the fingered
book, the numberless other objects, which, insignificant in themselves,
become a source of sharp pain because they recall so vividly the loved one
who has passed away. And the voice rings in one's ears till it seems almost a
reality, but there is no escape from the house haunted by this presence, for
others are suffering also, and all must stay and suffer with each other.
In addition to her natural grief, Jeanne had to bear the pain of her discovery.
She was always thinking of it, and the terrible secret increased her former
sense of desolation tenfold, for now she felt that she could never put her
trust or confidence in anyone again.
The baron soon went away, thinking to find relief from the grief which was
deadening all his faculties in change of air and change of scene, and the
household at Les Peuples resumed its quiet regular life again.
Then Paul fell ill, and Jeanne passed twelve days in an agony of fear, unable
to sleep and scarcely touching food. The boy got well, but there remained
the thought that he might die. What should she do if he did? What would
become of her? Gradually there came a vague longing for another child, and
soon she could think of nothing else; she had always fancied she should like
two children, a boy and a girl, and the idea of having a daughter haunted
her. But since Rosalie had been sent away, she had lived quite apart from
her husband, and at the present moment it seemed utterly impossible to
renew their former relations. Julien's affections were centered elsewhere;
she knew that; and, on her side, the mere thought of having to submit to his
caresses again, made her shudder with disgust.
Still, she would have overcome her repugnance (so tormented was she by
the desire of another child) if she could have seen any way to bring about
the intimacy she desired; but she would have died rather than let her
husband guess what was in her thoughts, and he never seemed to dream of
approaching her now. Perhaps she would have given up the idea had not
each night the vision of a daughter playing with Paul under the plane tree
appeared to her. Sometimes she felt she must get up and join her husband in
his room; twice, in fact, she did glide to his door, but each time she came
back, without having turned the handle, her face burning with shame.

The baron was away, her mother was dead, and she had no one to whom she
could confide this delicate secret. She made up her mind, at last, to tell the
Abbé Picot her difficulty, under the seal of confession. She went to him one
day and found him in his little garden, reading his breviary among the fruit
trees. She talked to him for a few minutes about one thing and another, then,
"Monsieur l'abbé, I want to confess," she said, with a deep blush.
He put on his spectacles to look at her better, for the request astonished him.
"I don't think you can have any very heavy sins on your conscience," he
said, with a smile.
"No, but I want to ask your advice on a subject so—so painful to enter
upon, that I dare not talk about it in an ordinary way," she replied, feeling
very confused.
He put on his priestly air immediately.
"Very well, my daughter, come to the confessional, and I will hear you
there."
But she suddenly felt a scruple at talking of such things in the quietness of
an empty church.
"No, Monsieur le curé—after all—if you will let me—I can tell you here
what I want to say. See, we will go and sit in your little arbor over there."
As they walked slowly over to the arbor she tried to find the words in which
she could best begin her confidence. They sat down, and she commenced,
as if she were confessing, "My father," then hesitated, said again, "My
father," then stopped altogether, too ashamed to continue.
The priest crossed his hands over his stomach and waited for her to go on.
"Well, my daughter," he said, perceiving her embarrassment, "you seem
afraid to say what it is; come now, be brave."
"My father, I want to have another child," she said abruptly, like a coward
throwing himself headlong into the danger he dreads.
The priest, hardly understanding what she meant, made no answer, and she
tried to explain herself, but, in her confusion, her words became more and
more difficult to understand.

"I am quite alone in life now; my father and my husband do not agree; my
mother is dead, and—and— the other day I almost lost my son," she
whispered with a shudder. "What would have become of me if he had
died?"
The priest looked at her in bewilderment. "There, there; come to the point,"
he said.
"I want to have another child," she repeated.
The abbé was used to the coarse pleasantries of the peasants, who did not
mind what they said before him, and he answered, with a sly smile and a
knowing shake of the head: "Well, I don't think there need be much
difficulty about that."
She raised her clear eyes to his and said, hesitatingly:
"But—but—don't you understand that since—since that trouble with—the
—maid—my husband and I live—quite apart."
These words came as a revelation to the priest, accustomed as he was to the
promiscuity and easy morals of the peasants. Then he thought he could
guess what the young wife really wanted, and he looked at her out of the
corner of his eye, pitying her, and sympathizing with her distress.
"Yes, yes, I know exactly what you mean. I can quite understand that you
should find your—your widowhood hard to bear. You are young, healthy,
and it is only natural; very natural." He began to smile, his lively nature
getting the better of him. "Besides, the Church allows these feelings,
sometimes," he went on, gently tapping Jeanne's hands. "What are we told?
That carnal desires may be satisfied lawfully in wedlock only. Well, you are
married, are you not?"
She, in her turn, had not at first understood what his words implied, but
when his meaning dawned on her, her face became crimson, and her eyes
filled with tears.
"Oh! Monsieur le curé, what do you mean? What do you think? I assure you
—I assure—" and she could not continue for her sobs.
Her emotion surprised the abbé, and he tried to console her.

"There, there," he said; "I did not mean to pain you. I was only joking, and
there's no harm in a joke between honest people. But leave it all in my
hands, and I will speak to M. Julien."
She did not know what to say. She wished, now, that she could refuse his
help, for she feared his want of tact would only increase her difficulties, but
she did not dare say anything.
"Thank you, Monsieur le curé," she stammered; and then hurried away.
The next week was passed by Jeanne in an agony of doubts and fears. Then
one evening, Julien watched her all through dinner with an amused smile on
his lips, and evinced towards her a gallantry which was faintly tinged with
irony. After dinner they walked up and down the baroness's avenue, and he
whispered in her ear:
"Then we are going to be friends again?"
She made no answer, and kept her eyes fixed on the ground, where there
was a straight line, hardly so thickly covered with grass as the rest of the
path. It was the line traced by the baroness's foot, which was gradually
being effaced, just as her memory was fading, and, as she looked at it,
Jeanne's heart felt bursting with grief; she seemed so lonely, so separated
from everybody.
"For my part, I am only too pleased," continued Julien. "I should have
proposed it before, but I was afraid of displeasing you."
The sun was setting; it was a mild, soft evening, and Jeanne longed to rest
her head on some loving heart, and there sob out her sorrows. She threw
herself into Julien's arms, her breast heaving, and the tears streaming from
her eyes. He looked at her in surprise, thinking this outburst was occasioned
by the love she still felt for him, and, unable to see her face, he dropped a
condescending kiss upon her hair. Then they went indoors in silence and he
followed her to her room.
To him this renewal of their former relations was a duty, though hardly an
unpleasant one, while she submitted to his embraces as a disgusting, painful
necessity, and resolved to put an end to them for ever, as soon as her object
was accomplished. Soon, however, she found that her husband's caresses

were not like they used to be; they may have been more refined, they
certainly were not so complete. He treated her like a careful lover, instead
of being an easy husband.
"Why do you not give yourself up to me as you used to do?" she whispered
one night, her lips close to his.
"To keep you out of the family way, of course," he answered, with a
chuckle.
She started.
"Don't you wish for any more children, then?" she asked.
His amazement was so great, that, for a moment, he was silent; then:
"Eh? What do you say?" he exclaimed. "Are you in your right senses?
Another child? I should think not, indeed! We've already got one too many,
squalling and costing money, and bothering everybody. Another child! No,
thank you!"
She clasped him in her arms, pressed her lips to his and murmured:
"Oh! I entreat you, make me a mother once more."
"Don't be so foolish," he replied, angrily. "Pray don't let me hear any more
of this nonsense."
She said no more, but she resolved to trick him into giving her the
happiness she desired. She tried to prolong her kisses, and threw her arms
passionately around him, pressing him to her, and pretending a delirium of
love she was very far from feeling. She tried every means to make him lose
control over himself, but she never once succeeded.
Tormented more and more by her desire, driven to extremities, and ready to
do or dare anything to gain her ends, she went again to the Abbé Picot. She
found him just finishing lunch, with his face crimson from indigestion. He
looked up as she came in, and, anxious to hear the result of his mediation:
"Well?" he exclaimed.

"My husband does not want any more children," she answered at once
without any of the hesitation or shame-faced timidity she had shown before.
The abbé got very interested, and turned towards her, ready to hear once
more of those secrets of wedded life, the revelation of which made the task
of confessing so pleasant to him.
"How is that?" he asked.
In spite of her determination to tell him all, Jeanne hardly knew how to
explain herself.
"He—he refuses—to make me a mother."
The priest understood at once; it was not the first time he had heard of such
things, but he asked for all the details, and enjoyed them as a hungry man
would a feast. When he had heard all, he reflected for a few moments, then
said in the calm, matter-of-fact tone he might have used if he had been
speaking of the best way to insure a good harvest.
"My dear child, the only thing you can do is to make your husband believe
you are pregnant; then he will cease his precautions, and you will become
so in reality."
Jeanne blushed to the roots of her hair, but, determined to be ready for
every emergency, she argued:
"But—but suppose he should not believe me?"
The curé knew too well the ins and outs of human nature not to have an
answer for that.
"Tell everybody you are enceinte. When he sees that everyone else believes
it, he will soon believe it himself. You will be doing no wrong," he added,
to quiet his conscience for advising this deception; "the Church does not
permit any connection between man and woman, except for the purpose of
procreation."
Jeanne followed the priest's artful device, and, a fortnight later, told Julien
she thought she was enceinte. He started up.

"It isn't possible! You can't be!"
She gave him her reasons for thinking so.
"Bah!" he answered. "You wait a little while."
Every morning he asked, "Well?" but she always replied: "No, not yet; I am
very much mistaken if I am not enceinte."
He also began to think so, and his surprise was only equaled by his
annoyance.
"Well, I can't understand it," was all he could say. "I'll be hanged if I know
how it can have happened."
At the end of a month she began to tell people the news, but she said
nothing about it to the Comtesse Gilberte, for she felt an old feeling of
delicacy in mentioning it to her. At the very first suspicion of his wife's
pregnancy, Julien had ceased to touch her, then, angrily thinking, "Well, at
any rate, this brat wasn't wanted," he made up his mind to make the best of
it, and recommenced his visits to his wife's room. Everything happened as
the priest had predicted, and Jeanne found she would a second time become
a mother. Then, in a transport of joy, she took a vow of eternal chastity as a
token of her rapturous gratitude to the distant divinity she adored, and
thenceforth closed her door to her husband.
She again felt almost happy. She could hardly believe that it was barely two
months since her mother had died, and that only such a short time before
she had thought herself inconsolable. Now her wounded heart was nearly
healed, and her grief had disappeared, while in its place was merely a vague
melancholy, like the shadow of a great sorrow resting over her life. It
seemed impossible that any other catastrophe could happen now; her
children would grow up and surround her old age with their affection, and
her husband could go his way while she went hers.
Towards the end of September the Abbé Picot came to the château, in a new
cassock which had only one week's stains upon it, to introduce his
successor, the Abbé Tolbiac. The latter was small, thin, and very young,
with hollow, black-encircled eyes which betokened the depth and violence
of his feelings, and a decisive way of speaking as if there could be no

appeal from his opinion. The Abbé Picot had been appointed doyen of
Goderville. Jeanne felt very sad at the thought of his departure; he was
connected, in her thoughts, with all the chief events of her life, for he had
married her, christened Paul, and buried the baroness. She liked him
because he was always good-tempered and unaffected, and she could not
imagine Etouvent without the Abbé Picot's fat figure trotting past the farms.
He himself did not seem very rejoiced at his advancement.
"I have been here eighteen years, Madame la Comtesse," he said, "and it
grieves me to go to another place. Oh! this living is not worth much, I
know, and as for the people—well, the men have no more religion than they
ought to have, the women are not so moral as they might be, and the girls
never dream of being married until it is too late for them to wear a wreath
of orange blossoms; still, I love the place."
The new curé had been fidgeting impatiently during this speech, and his
face had turned very red.
"I shall soon have all that changed," he said, abruptly, as soon as the other
priest had finished speaking; and he looked like an angry child in his worn
but spotless cassock, so thin and small was he.
The Abbé Picot looked at him sideways, as he always did when anything
amused him.
"Listen, l'abbé," he said. "You will have to chain up your parishioners if you
want to prevent that sort of thing; and I don't believe even that would be any
good."
"We shall see," answered the little priest in a cutting tone.
The old curé smiled and slowly took a pinch of snuff.
"Age and experience will alter your views, l'abbé; if they don't you will
only estrange the few good Churchmen you have. When I see a girl come to
mass with a waist bigger than it ought to be, I say to myself—'Well, she is
going to give me another soul to look after;'—and I try to marry her. You
can't prevent them going wrong, but you can find out the father of the child
and prevent him forsaking the mother. Marry them, l'abbé, marry them, and
don't trouble yourself about anything else."

"We will not argue on this point, for we should never agree," answered the
new curé, a little roughly; and the Abbé Picot again began to express his
regret at leaving the village, and the sea which he could see from the
vicarage windows, and the little funnel-shaped valleys, where he went to
read his breviary and where he could see the boats in the distance. Then the
two priests rose to go, and the Abbé Picot kissed Jeanne, who nearly cried
when she said good-bye.
A week afterwards, the Abbé Tolbiac called again. He spoke of the reforms
he was bringing about as if he were a prince taking possession of his
kingdom. He begged the vicomtesse to communicate on all the days
appointed by the Church, and to attend mass regularly on Sundays.
"You and I are at the head of the parish," he said, "and we ought to rule it,
and always set it a good example; but, if we wish to have any influence, we
must be united. If the Church and the château support each other, the
cottage will fear and obey us."
Jeanne's religion was simply a matter of sentiment; she had merely the
dreamy faith that a woman never quite loses, and if she performed any
religious duties at all it was only because she had been so used to them at
the convent, for the baron's carping philosophy had long ago overthrown all
her convictions. The Abbé Picot had always been contented with the little
she did do, and never chid her for not confessing or attending mass oftener;
but when the Abbé Tolbiac did not see her at church on the Sunday, he
hastened to the château to question and reprimand her. She did not wish to
quarrel with the curé, so she promised to be more attentive to the services,
inwardly resolving to go regularly only for a few weeks, out of good nature.
Little by little, however, she fell into the habit of frequenting the church,
and, in a short time, she was entirely under the influence of the delicate-
looking, strong-willed priest. His zeal and enthusiasm appealed to her love
of everything pertaining to mysticism, and he seemed to make the chord of
religious poetry, which she possessed in common with every woman,
vibrate within her. His austerity, his contempt for every luxury and
sensuality, his disdain for the things that usually occupy the thoughts of
men, his love of God, his youthful, intolerant inexperience, his scathing
words, his inflexible will made Jeanne compare him, in her mind, to the

early martyrs; and she, who had already suffered so much, whose eyes had
been so rudely opened to the deceptions of life, let herself be completely
ruled by the rigid fanaticism of this boy who was the minister of Heaven.
He led her to the feet of Christ the Consoler, teaching her how the holy joys
of religion could alleviate all her sorrows, and, as she knelt in the
confessional she humbled herself and felt little and weak before this priest,
who looked about fifteen years old.
Soon he was detested by the whole country-side. With no pity for his own
weaknesses, he showed a violent intolerance for those of others. The thing
above all others that roused his anger and indignation was—love. He
denounced it from the pulpit in crude, ecclesiastical terms, thundering out
terrible judgments against concupiscence over the heads of his rustic
audience; and, as the pictures he portrayed in his fury persistently haunted
his mind, he trembled with rage and stamped his foot in anger. The grown-
up girls and the young fellows cast side-long glances at each other across
the aisle; and the old peasants, who liked to joke about such matters,
expressed their disapproval of the little curé's intolerance as they walked
back to their farms after service with their wives and sons.
The whole country was in an uproar. The priest's severity and the harsh
penances he inflicted at confession were rumored about, and, as he
obstinately refused to grant absolution to the girls whose chastity was not
immaculate, smiles accompanied the whispers. When, at the holy festivals,
several of the youths and girls stayed in their seats instead of going to
communicate with the others, most of the congregation laughed outright as
they looked at them. He began to watch for lovers like a keeper on the look-
out for poachers, and on moonlight nights he hunted up the couples along
the ditches, behind the barns and among the long grass on the hill-sides.
One night he came upon two who did not cease their love-making even
before him; they were strolling along a ditch filled with stones, with their
arms round one another, kissing each other as they walked.
"Will you stop that, you vagabonds?" cried the abbé.
"You mind yer own bus'ness, M'sieu l'curé," replied the lad, turning round.
"This ain't nothin' to do with you."

The abbé picked up some stones and threw them at the couple as he might
have done at stray dogs, and they both ran off, laughing. The next Sunday
the priest mentioned them by name before the whole congregation. All the
young fellows soon ceased to attend mass.
The curé dined at the château every Thursday, but he very often went there
on other days to talk to his penitente. Jeanne became as ardent and as
enthusiastic as he as she discussed the mysteries of a future existence, and
grew familiar with all the old and complicated arguments employed in
religious controversy. They would both walk along the baroness's avenue
talking of Christ and the Apostles, of the Virgin Mary and of the Fathers of
the Church as if they had really known them. Sometimes they stopped their
walk to ask each other profound questions, and then Jeanne would wander
off into sentimental arguments, and the curé would reason like a lawyer
possessed with the mania of proving the possibility of squaring the circle.
Julien treated the new curé with great respect. "That's the sort of a priest I
like," he was continually saying. "Half-measures don't do for him," and he
zealously set a good example by frequently confessing and communicating.
Hardly a day passed now without the vicomte going to the Fourvilles, either
to shoot with the comte, who could not do without him, or to ride with the
comtesse regardless of rain and bad weather.
"They are riding-mad," remarked the comte; "but the exercise does my wife
good."
The baron returned to Les Peuples about the middle of November. He
seemed a different man, he had aged so much and was so low-spirited; he
was fonder than ever of his daughter, as if the last few months of
melancholy solitude had caused in him an imperative need of affection and
tenderness. Jeanne told him nothing about her new ideas, her intimacy with
the Abbé Tolbiac, or her religious enthusiasm, but the first time he saw the
priest, he felt an invincible dislike for him, and when his daughter asked
him in the evening: "Well, what do you think of him?"
"He is like an inquisitor!" he answered. "He seems to me a very dangerous
man."

When the peasants told him about the young priest's harshness and bigotry
and the sort of war of persecution he waged against natural laws and
instincts, his dislike changed to a violent hatred. He, the baron, belonged to
the school of philosophers who worship nature; to him it seemed something
touching, when he saw two animals unite, and he was always ready to fall
on his knees before the sort of pantheistic God he worshiped; but he hated
the catholic conception of a God, Who has petty schemes, and gives way to
tyrannical anger and indulges in mean revenge; a God, in fact, Who seemed
less to him than that boundless omnipotent nature, which is at once life,
light, earth, thought, plant, rock, man, air, animal, planet, god and insect,
that nature which produces all things in such bountiful profusion, fitting
each atom to the place it is to occupy in space, be that position close to or
far from the suns which heat the worlds. Nature contained the germ of
everything, and she brought forth life and thought, as trees bear flowers and
fruit.
To the baron, therefore, reproduction was a great law of Nature, and to be
respected as the sacred and divine act which accomplished the constant,
though unexpressed will of this Universal Being; and he at once began a
campaign against this priest who opposed the laws of creation. It grieved
Jeanne to the heart, and she prayed to the Lord, and implored her father not
to run counter to the curé, but the baron always answered:
"It is everyone's right and duty to fight against such men, for they are not
like human creatures. They are not human," he repeated, shaking his long
white hair. "They understand nothing of life, and their conduct is entirely
influenced by their harmful dreams, which are contrary to Nature." And he
pronounced "contrary to Nature" as if he were uttering a curse.
The priest had at once recognized in him an enemy, and, as he wished to
remain master of the château and its young mistress, he temporized, feeling
sure of victory in the end. By chance he had discovered the liaison between
Julien and Gilberte, and his one idea was to break it off by no matter what
means. He came to see Jeanne one day towards the end of the wet, mild
winter, and, after a long talk on the mystery of life, he asked her to unite
with him in fighting against and destroying the wickedness which was in
her own family, and so save two souls which were in danger. She asked him
what he meant.

"The hour has not come for me to reveal all to you," he replied; "but I will
see you again soon," and with that he abruptly left her.
He came again in a few days, and spoke in vague terms of a disgraceful
connection between people whose conduct ought to be irreproachable. It
was the duty, he said, of those who were aware of what was going on, to use
every means to put an end to it. He used all sorts of lofty arguments, and
then, taking Jeanne's hand, adjured her to open her eyes, to understand and
to help him.
This time Jeanne saw what he meant, but terrified at the thought of all the
trouble that might be brought to her home, which was now so peaceful, she
pretended not to know to what he was alluding. Then he hesitated no longer,
but spoke in terms there could be no misunderstanding.
"I am going to perform a very painful duty, Madame la comtesse, but I
cannot leave it undone. The position I hold forbids me to leave you in
ignorance of the sin you can prevent. Learn that your husband cherishes a
criminal affection for Madame de Fourville."
Jeanne only bent her head in feeble resignation.
"What do you intend to do?" asked the priest.
"What do you wish me to do, Monsieur l'abbé?" she murmured.
"Throw yourself in the way as an obstacle to this guilty love," he answered,
violently.
She began to cry, and said in a broken voice:
"But he has deceived me before with a servant; he wouldn't listen to me; he
doesn't love me now; he ill-treats me if I manifest any desire that does not
please him, so what can I do?"
The curé did not make any direct answer to this appeal.
"Then you bow before this sin! You submit to it!" he exclaimed. "You
consent to and tolerate adultery under your own roof! The crime is being
perpetrated before your eyes, and you refuse to see it! Are you a Christian
woman? Are you a wife and a mother?"

"What would you have me do?" she sobbed.
"Anything rather than allow this sin to continue," he replied. "Anything, I
tell you. Leave him. Flee from this house which has been defiled."
"But I have no money, Monsieur l'abbé," she replied. "And I am not brave
now like I used to be. Besides, how can I leave without any proofs of what
you are saying? I have not the right to do so."
The priest rose to his feet, quivering with indignation.
"You are listening to the dictates of your cowardice, madame. I thought you
were a different woman, but you are unworthy of God's mercy."
She fell on her knees:
"Oh! Do not abandon me, I implore you. Advise me what to do."
"Open M. de Fourville's eyes," he said, shortly. "It is his duty to end this
liaison."
She was seized with terror at this advice.
"But he would kill them, Monsieur l'abbé! And should I be the one to tell
him? Oh, not that! Never, never!"
He raised his hand as if to curse her, his whole soul stirred with anger.
"Live on in your shame and in your wickedness, for you are more guilty
than they are. You are the wife who condones her husband's sin! My place
is no longer here."
He turned to go, trembling all over with wrath. She followed him
distractedly, ready to give in, and beginning to promise; but he would not
listen to her and strode rapidly along, furiously shaking his big blue
umbrella which was nearly as high as himself. He saw Julien standing near
the gate superintending the pruning of some trees, so he turned off to the
left to reach the road by way of the Couillards' farm, and as he walked he
kept saying to Jeanne:
"Leave me, madame. I have nothing further to say to you."

In the middle of the yard, and right in his path, some children were standing
around the kennel of the dog Mirza, their attention concentrated on
something which the baron was also carefully considering as he stood in
their midst with his hands behind his back, looking like a schoolmaster.
"Do come and see me again, Monsieur l'abbé," pleaded Jeanne. "If you will
return in a few days, I shall be able to tell you then what I think is the best
course to take, and we can talk it over together."
By that time they had almost reached the group of children (which the
baron had left, to avoid meeting and speaking to his enemy, the priest) and
the curé went to see what it was that was interesting them so deeply. It was
the dog whelping; five little pups were already crawling round the mother,
who gently licked them as she lay on her side before the kennel, and just as
the curé looked over the children's heads, a sixth appeared. When they saw
it, all the boys and girls clapped their hands, crying:
"There's another! There's another!"
To them it was simply a perfectly pure and natural amusement, and they
watched these pups being born as they might have watched the apples
falling from a tree.
The Abbé Tolbiac stood still for a moment in horrified surprise, then, giving
way to his passion, he raised his umbrella and began to rain down blows on
the children's heads. The startled urchins ran off as fast as they could go,
and the abbé found himself left alone with the dog, which was painfully
trying to rise. Before she could stand up, he knocked her back again, and
began to hit her with all his strength. The animal moaned pitifully as she
writhed under these blows from which there was no escape (for she was
chained up) and at last the priest's umbrella broke. Then, unable to beat the
dog any longer, he jumped on her, and stamped and crushed her under-foot
in a perfect frenzy of anger. Another pup was born beneath his feet before
he dispatched the mother with a last furious kick, and then the mangled
body lay quivering in the midst of the whining pups, which were
awkwardly groping for their mother's teats. Jeanne had escaped, but the
baron returned and, almost as enraged as the priest, suddenly seized the
abbé by the throat, and giving him a blow which knocked his hat off,
carried him to the fence and threw him out into the road.

When he turned round, M. le Perthuis saw his daughter kneeling in the
midst of the pups, sobbing as she picked them up and put them in her skirt.
He strode up to her gesticulating wildly.
"There!" he exclaimed. "What do you think of that surpliced wretch, now?"
The noise had brought the farmpeople to the spot, and they all stood round,
gazing at the remains of the dog.
"Could one have believed that a man would be so cruel as that!" said
Couillard's wife.
Jeanne picked up the pups, saying she would bring them up by hand; she
tried to give them some milk, but three out of seven died the next day. Then
old Simon went all over the neighborhood trying to find a foster-mother for
the others; he could not get a dog, but he brought back a cat, asserting that
she would do as well. Three more pups were killed, and the seventh was
given to the cat, who took to it directly, and lay down on her side to suckle
it. That it might not exhaust its foster-mother the pup was weaned a
fortnight later, and Jeanne undertook to feed it herself with a feeding-bottle;
she had named it Toto, but the baron rechristened it, and called it Massacre.
The priest did not go to see Jeanne again. The next Sunday he hurled curses
and threats against the château, denouncing it as a plague-spot which ought
to be removed, and going on to anathematize the baron (who laughed at
him) and to make veiled, half-timid allusions to Julien's latest amour. The
vicomte was very vexed at this, but he did not dare say anything for fear of
giving rise to a scandal; and the priest continued to call down vengeance on
their heads, and to foretell the downfall of God's enemies in every sermon.
At last, Julien wrote a decided, though respectful, letter to the archbishop,
and the Abbé Tolbiac, finding himself threatened with disgrace, ceased his
denunciations. He began to take long solitary walks; often he was to be met
striding along the roads with an ardent, excited look on his face. Gilberte
and Julien were always seeing him when they were out riding, sometimes in
the distance, on the other side of a common, or on the edge of the cliff,
sometimes close at hand, reading his breviary in a narrow valley they were
just about to pass through; they always turned another way to avoid passing
him. Spring had come, enflaming their hearts with fresh desires, and urging
them to seek each other's embraces in any secluded spot to which their rides

might lead them; but the leaves were only budding, the grass was still damp
from the rains of winter, and they could not, as in the height of summer,
hide themselves amidst the undergrowth of the woods. Lately, they had
generally sheltered their caresses within a movable shepherd's hut which
had been left since autumn, on the very top of the Vaucotte hill. It stood all
alone on the edge of the precipitous descent to the valley, five hundred
yards above the cliff. There they felt quite secure, for they overlooked the
whole of the surrounding country, and they fastened their horses to the
shafts to wait until their masters were satiated with love.
One evening as they were leaving the hut, they saw the Abbé Tolbiac sitting
on the hill-side, nearly hidden by the rushes.
"We must leave our horses in that ravine, another time," said Julien; "in
case they should tell our whereabouts," and thenceforth they always tied
their horses up in a kind of recess in the valley, which was hidden by
bushes.
Another evening, they were both returning to La Vrillette where the comte
was expecting Julien to dinner, when they met the curé coming out of the
château. He bowed, without looking them in the face, and stood on one side
to let them pass. For the moment his visit made them uneasy, but their
anxiety was soon dispelled.

Jeanne was sitting by the fire reading, one windy afternoon at the beginning
of May, when she suddenly saw the Comte de Fourville running towards the
château at such a rate as to make her fear he was the bearer of bad news.
She hastened downstairs to meet him, and when she saw him close, she
thought he must have gone mad. He had on his shooting-jacket and a big fur
cap, that he generally only wore on his own grounds, and he was so pale
that his red moustaches (which, as a rule, hardly showed against his ruddy
face) looked the color of flame. His eyes were haggard and stared vacantly
or rolled from side to side.
"My wife is here, isn't she?" he gasped.

"No," answered Jeanne, too frightened to think of what she was saying; "I
have not seen her at all to-day."
The comte dropped into a chair, as if his legs had no longer strength to
support him, and, taking off his cap, he mechanically passed his
handkerchief several times across his forehead; then he started to his feet,
and went towards Jeanne with outstretched hands, and mouth opened to
speak and tell her of his terrible grief. But suddenly he stopped short, and
fixing his eyes on her, murmured, as if he were delirious: "But it is your
husband—you also—" and breaking off abruptly, he rushed out towards the
sea.
Jeanne ran after him, calling him and imploring him to stop. "He knows
all!" she thought, in terror. "What will he do? Oh, pray heaven he may not
find them."
He did not listen to her, and evidently knowing whither to direct his steps,
ran straight on without any hesitation as to the path he should take. Already
he had leapt across the ditch, and was rapidly striding across the reeds
towards the cliff. Finding she could not catch him up, Jeanne stood on the
slope beyond the wood, and watched him as long as he was in sight; then,
when she could see him no longer, she went indoors again, tortured with
fear and anxiety.
When he reached the edge of the cliff, the comte turned to the right, and
again began to run. The sea was very rough, and one after the other the
heavy clouds came up and poured their contents on the land. A whistling
moaning wind swept over the grass, laying low the young barley, and
carrying the great, white seagulls inland like sprays of foam. The rain,
which came in gusts, beat in the comte's face and drenched his cheeks and
moustaches, and the tumult of the elements seemed to fill his heart as well
as his ears. There, straight before him in the distance, lay the Vaucotte
valley, and between it and him stood a solitary shepherd's hut, with two
horses tied to the shafts. (What fear could there be of anyone seeing them
on such a day as this?)
As soon as he caught sight of the animals, the comte threw himself flat on
the ground, and dragged himself along on his hands and knees, his hairy cap
and mud-stained clothes making him look like some monstrous animal. He

crawled to the lonely hut, and, in case its occupants should see him through
the cracks in the planks he hid himself beneath it. The horses had seen him
and were pawing the ground. He slowly cut the reins by which they were
fastened with a knife that he held open in his hand, and, as a fresh gust of
wind swept by, the two animals cantered off, their backs stung by the hail
which lashed against the sloping roof of the shepherd's cot, and made the
frail abode tremble on its wheels.
Then the comte rose to his knees, put his eye to the slit at the bottom of the
door, and remained perfectly motionless while he watched and waited.
Some time passed thus, and then he suddenly leapt to his feet, covered with
mire from head to foot. Furiously he fastened the bolt, which secured the
shelter on the outside, and seizing the shafts, he shook the hut as if he
would have broken it to atoms. After a moment he began to drag it along—
exerting the strength of a bull, and bending nearly double in his tremendous
effort—and it was towards the almost perpendicular slope to the valley that
he hurried the cottage and its human occupants who were desperately
shouting and trying to burst open the door, in their ignorance of what had
happened.
At the extreme edge of the slope, the comte let go of the hut, and it at once
begun to run down towards the valley. At first it moved but slowly, but, its
speed increasing as it went, it moved quicker and quicker, until soon it was
rushing down the hill at a tremendous rate. Its shafts bumped along the
ground and it leaped over and dashed against the obstacles in its path, as if
it had been endowed with life; it bounded over the head of an old beggar
who was crouching in a ditch, and, as it passed, the man heard frightful
cries issuing from within it. All at once one of the wheels was torn off, and
the hut turned over on its side. That however, did not stop it, and now it
rolled over and over like a ball, or like some house uprooted from its
foundations and hurled from the summit of a mountain. It rolled on and on
until it reached the edge of the last ravine; there it took a final leap, and
after describing a curve, fell to the earth, and smashed like an egg-shell.
Directly it had dashed upon the rocks at the bottom of the valley, the old
beggar, who had seen it falling, began to make his way down through the
brambles. He did not go straight to the shattered hut, but, like the cautious
rustic that he was, went to announce the accident at the nearest farm-house.

The farm people ran to the spot the beggar pointed out, and beneath the
fragments of the hut, found two bruised and mangled corpses. The man's
forehead was split open, and his face crushed; the woman's jaw was almost
separated from her head, and their broken limbs were as soft as if there had
not been a bone beneath the flesh. Still the farmers could recognize them,
and they began to make all sorts of conjectures as to the cause of the
accident.
"What could they have been doin' in the cabin?" said a woman.
The old beggar replied that apparently they had taken refuge from the
weather, and that the high wind had overturned the hut, and blown it down
the precipice. He added that he himself was going to take shelter in it when
he saw the horses fastened to the shafts and concluded that the place was
already occupied.
"If it hadn't been for that I should have been where they are now," he said
with an air of self-congratulation.
"Perhaps it would have been all the better if you had been," said some one.
"Why would it have been better?" exclaimed the beggar in a great rage.
"'Cause I'm poor and they're rich? Look at them now!" he said, pointing to
the two corpses with his hooked stick, as he stood trembling and ragged,
with the water dripping from him, and his battered hat, his matted beard, his
long unkempt hair, making him look terribly dirty and miserable. "We're all
equal when we're dead."
The group had grown bigger, and the peasants stood round with a
frightened, cowardly look on their faces. After a discussion as to what they
had better do, it was finally decided to carry the bodies back to their homes,
in the hope of getting a reward. Two carts were got ready, and then a fresh
difficulty arose; some thought it would be quite enough to place straw at the
bottom of the carts, and others thought it would look better to put
mattresses.
"But the mattresses would be soaked with blood," cried the woman who had
spoken before. "They'd have to be washed with eau de javelle."

"The château people'll pay for that," said a jolly-faced farmer. "They can't
expect to get things for nothing."
That decided the matter, and the two carts set off, one to the right, the other
to the left, jolting and shaking the remains of these two beings who had so
often been clasped in each other's arms, but who would never meet again.
When the comte had seen the hut set off on its terrible journey, he had fled
away through the rain and the wind, and had run on and on across the
country like a madman. He ran for several hours, heedless of which way his
steps were taking him, and, at nightfall, he found himself at his own
château. The servants were anxiously awaiting his return, and hastened to
tell him that the two horses had just returned riderless, for Julien's had
followed the other one.
M. de Fourville staggered back. "Some accident must have happened to my
wife and the vicomte," he said in broken tones. "Let everyone go and look
for them."
He started off again, himself, as though he were going to seek them, but, as
soon as he was out of sight, he hid behind a bush, and watched the road
along which the woman he still loved so dearly would be brought dead or
dying, or perhaps maimed and disfigured for life. In a little while a cart
passed by, bearing a strange load; it drew up before the château-gates, then
passed through them. Yes, he knew it was she; but the dread of hearing the
horrible truth forced him to stay in his hiding-place, and he crouched down
like a hare, trembling at the faintest rustle.
He waited for an hour—perhaps two—and yet the cart did not come back
again. He was persuaded that his wife was dying, and the thought of seeing
her, of meeting her eyes was such a torture to him, that, seized with a
sudden fear of being discovered and compelled to witness her death, he
again set off running, and did not stop till he was hidden in the midst of a
wood. Then he thought that perhaps she needed help and that there was no
one to take care of her as he could, and he sped back in mad haste.
As he was going into the house, he met his gardener.
"Well?" he cried, excitedly.

The man dared not answer the truth.
"Is she dead?" almost yelled M. de Fourville.
"Yes, Monsieur le comte," stammered the servant.
The comte experienced an intense relief at the answer; all his agitation left
him, and he went quietly and firmly up the steps.
In the meantime, the other cart had arrived at Les Peuples. Jeanne saw it in
the distance, and guessing that a corpse lay upon the mattress, understood at
once what had happened; the shock was so great that she fell to the ground
unconscious. When she came to herself again she found her father
supporting her head, and bathing her forehead with vinegar.
"Do you know—?" he asked hesitatingly.
"Yes, father," she whispered, trying to rise; but she was in such pain that she
was forced to sink back again.
That evening she gave birth to a dead child—a girl.
She did not see or hear anything of Julien's funeral, for she was delirious
when he was buried. In a few days she was conscious of Aunt Lison's
presence in her room, and, in the midst of the feverish nightmares by which
she was haunted, she strove to recall when, and under what circumstances,
the old maid had last left Les Peuples. But even in her lucid moments she
could not remember, and she could only feel sure she had seen her since the
baroness's death.

XI

Jeanne was confined to her room for three months and everyone despaired
of her life, but very, very gradually health and strength returned to her. Her
father and Aunt Lison had come to live at the château, and they nursed her
day and night. The shock she had sustained had entirely upset her nervous
system; she started at the least noise, and the slightest emotion caused her to

go off into long swoons. She had never asked the details of Julien's death.
Why should she? Did she not already know enough? Everyone except
herself thought it had been an accident, and she never revealed to anyone
the terrible secret of her husband's adultery, and of the comte's sudden,
fearful visit the day of the catastrophe.
Her soul was filled with the sweet, tender memories of the few, short hours
of bliss she owed to her husband, and she always pictured him to herself as
he had been when they were betrothed, and when she had adored him in the
only moments of sensual passion of her life. She forgot all his faults and
harshness; even his infidelity seemed more pardonable now that death stood
between him and her. She felt a sort of vague gratitude to this man who had
clasped her in his arms, and she forgave him the sorrows he had caused her,
and dwelt only on the happy moments they had passed together.
As time wore on and month followed month, covering her grief and
memories with the dust of forgetfulness, Jeanne devoted herself entirely to
her son. The child became the idol, the one engrossing thought, of the three
beings over whom he ruled like any despot; there was even a sort of
jealousy between his three slaves, for Jeanne grudged the hearty kisses he
gave the baron when the latter rode him on his knees, and Aunt Lison, who
was neglected by this baby, as she had always been by everyone, and was
regarded as a servant by this master who could not talk yet, would go to her
room and cry as she compared the few kisses, which she had so much
difficulty in obtaining, with the embraces the child so freely lavished on his
mother and grandfather.
Two peaceful, uneventful years were passed thus in devoted attention to the
child; then, at the beginning of the third winter, it was arranged that they
should all go to Rouen until the spring. But they had hardly arrived at the
damp, old house before Paul had such a severe attack of bronchitis, that
pleurisy was feared. His distracted mother was convinced that no other air
but that of Les Peuples agreed with him, and they all went back there as
soon as he was well.
Then came a series of quiet, monotonous years. Jeanne, her father, and Aunt
Lison spent all their time with the child, and were continually going into
raptures over the way he lisped, or with his funny sayings and doings.

Jeanne lovingly called him "Paulet," and, when he tried to repeat the word,
he made them all laugh by pronouncing it "Poulet," for he could not speak
plainly. The nickname "Poulet" clung to him, and henceforth he was never
called anything else. He grew very quickly, and one of the chief
amusements of his "three mothers," as the baron called them, was to
measure his height. On the wainscoting, by the drawing-room door, was a
series of marks made with a penknife, showing how much the boy had
grown every month, and these marks, which were called "Poulet's ladder,"
were of great importance in everyone's eyes.
Then there came a very unexpected addition to the important personages of
the household—the dog Massacre, which Jeanne had neglected since all her
attention had been centered in her son. Ludivine fed him, and he lived quite
alone, and always on the chain, in an old barrel in front of the stables. Paul
noticed him one morning, and at once wanted to go and kiss him. The dog
made a great fuss over the child, who cried when he was taken away, so
Massacre was unchained, and henceforth lived in the house. He became
Paul's inseparable friend and companion; they played together, and lay
down side by side on the carpet to go to sleep, and soon Massacre shared
the bed of his playfellow, who would not let the dog leave him. Jeanne
lamented sometimes over the fleas, and Aunt Lison felt angry with the dog
for absorbing so much of the child's affection, affection for which she
longed, and which, it seemed to her, this animal had stolen.
At long intervals visits were exchanged with the Brisevilles and the
Couteliers, but the mayor and the doctor were the only regular visitors at
the château.
The brutal way in which the priest had killed the dog, and the suspicions he
had instilled into her mind about the time of Julien's and Gilberte's horrible
death, had roused Jeanne's indignation against the God who could have
such ministers, and she had entirely ceased to attend church. From time to
time the abbé inveighed in outspoken terms against the château, which, he
said, was inhabited by the Spirit of Evil, the Spirit of Everlasting Rebellion,
the Spirit of Errors and of Lies, the Spirit of Iniquity, the Spirit of
Corruption and Impurity; it was by all these names that he alluded to the
baron.

The church was deserted, and when the curé happened to walk past any
fields in which the ploughmen were at work, the men never ceased their
task to speak to him, or turned to touch their hats. He acquired the
reputation of being a wizard because he cast out the devil from a woman
who was possessed, and the peasants believed he knew words to dispel
charms. He laid his hands on cows that gave thin milk, discovered the
whereabouts of things which had been lost by means of a mysterious
incantation, and devoted his narrow mind to the study of all the
ecclesiastical books in which he could find accounts of the devil's
apparitions upon earth, or descriptions of his resources and stratagems, and
the various ways in which he manifested his power and exercised his
influence.
Believing himself specially called to combat this invisible, harmful Power,
the priest had learnt all the forms given in religious manuals to exorcise the
devil. He fancied Satan lurked in every shadow, and the phrase Sieut leo
rugiens circuit, quærens quem devoret was continually on his lips. People
began to be afraid of his strange power; even his fellow-clergy (ignorant
country priests to whom Beelzebub was an article of their faith, and who,
perplexed by the minute directions for the rites to be observed in case of
any manifestations of the Evil One's power, at last confounded religion with
magic) regarded the Abbé Tolbiac as somewhat of a wizard, and respected
him as much for the supernatural power he was supposed to possess as for
the irreproachable austerity of his life.
The curé never bowed to Jeanne if he chanced to meet her, and such a state
of things worried and grieved Aunt Lison, who could not understand how
anyone could systematically stay away from church. Everyone took it for
granted that she was religious and confessed and communicated at proper
intervals, and no one ever tried to find out what her views on religion really
were. Whenever she was quite alone with Paul, Lison talked to him, in
whispers, about the good God. The child listened to her with a faint degree
of interest when she related the miracles which had been performed in the
old times, and, when she told him he must love the good God, very, very
dearly, he sometimes asked:
"Where is he, auntie?"

She would point upwards and answer: "Up there, above the sky, Poulet; but
you must not say anything about it," for she feared the baron would be
angry if he knew what she was teaching the boy. One day, however, Poulet
startled her by asserting: "The good God is everywhere except in church,"
and she found he had been talking to his grandfather about what she had
told him.
Paul was now ten years old; his mother looked forty. He was strong, noisy,
and boldly climbed the trees, but his education had, so far, been very
neglected. He disliked lessons, would never settle down to them, and, if
ever the baron managed to keep him reading a little longer than usual,
Jeanne would interfere, saying:
"Let him go and play, now. He is so young to be tired with books."
In her eyes he was still an infant, and she hardly noticed that he walked,
ran, and talked like a man in miniature. She lived in constant anxiety lest he
should fall down, or get too cold or too hot, or overload his stomach, or not
eat as much as his growth demanded.
When the boy was twelve years old a great difficulty arose about his first
communion. Lise went to Jeanne's room one morning, and pointed out to
her that the child could not be permitted to go any longer without religious
instruction, and without performing the simplest sacred duties. She called
every argument to her aid, and gave a thousand reasons for the necessity of
what she was urging, dwelling chiefly upon the danger of scandal. The idea
worried Jeanne, and, unable to give a decided answer, she replied that Paul
could very well go on as he was for a little longer. A month after this
discussion with Lise, Jeanne called on the Vicomtesse de Briseville.
"I suppose it will be Paul's first communion this year," said the vicomtesse,
in the course of conversation.
"Yes, madame," answered Jeanne, taken unawares.
These few words had the effect of deciding her, and, without saying
anything about it to her father, she asked Lise to take the child to the
catechism class. Everything went on smoothly for a month; then Poulet
came back, one evening, with a sore throat, and the next day he began to
cough. His frightened mother questioned him as to the cause of his cold and

he told her that he had not behaved very well in class, so the curé had sent
him to wait at the door of the church, where there was a draught from the
porch, until the end of the lesson. After that Jeanne kept him at home, and
taught him his catechism herself; but the Abbé Tolbiac refused to admit him
to communion, in spite of all Lison's entreaties, alleging, as his reason, that
the boy had not been properly prepared.
The following year he refused him again, and the baron was so exasperated
that he said plainly there was no need for Paul to believe in such foolery as
this absurd symbol of transubstantiation, to become a good and honest man.
So it was resolved to bring the boy up in the Christian faith, but not in the
Catholic Church, and that he should decide his religion for himself when he
reached his majority.
A short time afterwards, Jeanne called on the Brisevilles and received no
visit in return. Knowing how punctilious they were in all matters of
etiquette, she felt very much surprised at the omission, until the Marquise
de Coutelier haughtily told her the reason of this neglect. Aware that her
husband's rank and wealth made her the queen of the Normandy aristocracy,
the marquise ruled in queen-like fashion, showing herself gracious or severe
as occasions demanded. She never hesitated to speak as she thought, and
reproved, or congratulated, or corrected whenever she thought fit. When
Jeanne called on her she addressed a few icy words to her visitor, then said
in a cold tone: "Society divides itself naturally into two classes: those who
believe in God, and those who do not. The former, however lowly they may
be, are our friends and equals; with the latter we can have nothing to do."
Jeanne felt that she was being attacked, and replied:
"But cannot one believe in God without constantly attending church?"
"No, madame. Believers go to pray to God in his church, as they would go
to visit their friends at their houses."
"God is everywhere, madame, and not only in the churches," answered
Jeanne, feeling very hurt. "I believe in his goodness and mercy from the
bottom of my heart, but when there are certain priests between him and me,
I can no longer realize his presence."

"The priest is the standard-bearer of the church, madame," said the
marquise, rising, "and, whoever does not follow that flag is as much our
enemy as the church's."
Jeanne had risen also. "You believe in the God of a sect, madame," she
replied, quivering with indignation. "I believe in the God whom every
upright man reveres," and, with a bow, she left the marquise.
Among themselves the peasants also blamed Jeanne for not sending Poulet
to his first communion. They themselves did not go to mass, and never took
the sacrament, or at least, only at Easter when the Church formally
commanded it; but when it came to the children, that was a different matter,
and not one of them would have dared to bring a child up outside the
common faith, for, after all, "Religion is Religion."
Jeanne was quite conscious of the disapproval with which everyone
regarded her conduct, but such inconsistency only roused her indignation,
and she scorned the people who could thus quiet their consciences so easily,
and hide the cowardly fears which lurked at the bottom of their hearts under
the mask of righteousness.
The baron undertook to direct Paul's studies, and began to instruct him in
Latin. The boy's mother had but one word to say on the subject, "Whatever
you do, don't tire him," and, while lessons were going on, she would
anxiously hang round the door of the school-room, which her father had
forbidden her to enter, because, at every moment, she interrupted his
teaching to ask: "You're sure your feet are not cold, Poulet?" or "Your head
does not ache, does it, Poulet?" or to admonish the master with: "Don't
make him talk so much, he will have a sore throat."
As soon as lessons were over the boy went into the garden with his mother
and aunt. They were all three very fond of gardening, and took great
pleasure and interest in planting and pruning, in watching the seeds they
had sown come up and blossom, and in cutting flowers for nosegays. Paul
devoted himself chiefly to raising salad plants. He had the entire care of
four big beds in the kitchen garden, and there he cultivated lettuce, endive,
cos-lettuce, mustardcress, and every other known kind of salad. He dug,
watered, weeded, and planted, and made his two mothers work like day
laborers, and for hours together they knelt on the borders, soiling their

hands and dresses as they planted the seedlings in the holes they made with
their forefingers in the mold.
Poulet was almost fifteen; he had grown wonderfully, and the highest mark
on the drawing-room wall was over five feet from the ground, but in mind
he was still an ignorant, foolish child, for he had no opportunity of
expanding his intellect, confined as he was to the society of these two
women and the good-tempered old man who was so far behind the times. At
last one evening the baron said it was time for the boy to go to college. Aunt
Lison withdrew into a dark corner in horror at the idea, and Jeanne began to
sob.
"Why does he want to know so much?" she replied. "We will bring him up
to be a gentleman farmer, to devote himself to the cultivation of his
property, as so many noblemen do, and he will pass his life happily in this
house, where we have lived before him and where we shall die. What more
can he want?"
The baron shook his head.
"What answer will you make if he comes to you a few years hence, and
says: 'I am nothing, and I know nothing through your selfish love. I feel
incapable of working or of becoming anyone now, and yet I know I was not
intended to lead the dull, pleasureless life to which your short-sighted
affection has condemned me.'"
Jeanne turned to her son with the tears rolling down her cheeks.
"Oh, Poulet, you will never reproach me for having loved you too much,
will you?"
"No, mamma," promised the boy in surprise.
"You swear you will not?"
"Yes, mamma."
"You want to stay here, don't you?"
"Yes, mamma."

"Jeanne, you have no right to dispose of his life in that way," said the baron,
sternly. "Such conduct is cowardly—almost criminal. You are sacrificing
your child to your own personal happiness."
Jeanne hid her face in her hands, while her sobs came in quick succession.
"I have been so unhappy—so unhappy," she murmured, through her tears.
"And now my son has brought peace and rest into my life, you want to take
him from me. What will become of me—if I am left—all alone now?"
Her father went and sat down by her side. "And am I no one, Jeanne?" he
asked, taking her in his arms. She threw her arms round his neck, and kissed
him fondly. Then in a voice still choked with tears and sobs:
"Yes, perhaps you are right papa, dear," she answered; "and I was foolish;
but I have had so much sorrow. I am quite willing for him to go to college
now."
Then Poulet, who hardly understood what was going to be done with him,
began to cry too, and his three mothers kissed and coaxed him and told him
to be brave. They all went up to bed with heavy hearts, and even the baron
wept when he was alone in his own room, though he had controlled his
emotion downstairs. It was resolved to send Paul to the college at Havre at
the beginning of the next term, and during the summer he was more spoilt
than ever. His mother moaned as she thought of the approaching separation
and she got ready as many clothes for the boy as if he had been about to
start on a ten years' journey.
One October morning, after a sleepless night, the baron, Jeanne, and Aunt
Lison went away with Poulet in the landau. They had already paid a visit to
fix upon the bed he was to have in the dormitory and the seat he was to
occupy in class, and this time Jeanne and Aunt Lison passed the whole day
in unpacking his things and arranging them in the little chest of drawers. As
the latter would not contain the quarter of what she had brought, Jeanne
went to the head master to ask if the boy could not have another. The
steward was sent for, and he said that so much linen and so many clothes
were simply in the way, instead of being of any use, and that the rules of the
house forbade him to allow another chest of drawers, so Jeanne made up
her mind to hire a room in a little hotel close by, and to ask the landlord

himself to take Poulet all he wanted, directly the child found himself in
need of anything.
They all went on the pier for the rest of the afternoon and watched the ships
entering and leaving the harbor; then, at nightfall, they went to a restaurant
for dinner. But they were too unhappy to eat, and the dishes were placed
before them and removed almost untouched as they sat looking at each
other with tearful eyes. After dinner they walked slowly back to the college.
Boys of all ages were arriving on every side, some accompanied by their
parents, others by servants. A great many were crying, and the big, dim
courtyard was filled with the sound of tears.
When the time came to say good-bye, Jeanne and Poulet clung to each other
as if they could not part, while Aunt Lison stood, quite forgotten, in the
background, with her face buried in her handkerchief. The baron felt he too
was giving way, so he hastened the farewells, and took his daughter from
the college. The landau was waiting at the door, and they drove back to Les
Peuples in a silence that was only broken by an occasional sob.
Jeanne wept the whole of the following day, and the next she ordered the
phaeton and drove over to Havre. Poulet seemed to have got over the
separation already; It was the first time he had ever had any companions of
his own age, and, as he sat beside his mother, he fidgeted on his chair and
longed to run out and play. Every other day Jeanne went to see him, and on
Sundays took him out. She felt as though she had not energy enough to
leave the college between the recreation hours, so she waited in the parloir
while the classes were going on until Poulet could come to her again. At last
the head master asked her to go up and see him, and begged her not to come
so often. She did not take any notice of his request, and he warned her that
if she still persisted in preventing her son from enjoying his play hours, and
in interrupting his work, he would be obliged to dismiss him from the
college. He also sent a note to the baron, to the same effect, and thenceforth
Jeanne was always kept in sight at Les Peuples, like a prisoner. She lived in
a constant state of nervous anxiety, and looked forward to the holidays with
more impatience than her son. She began to take long walks about the
country, with Massacre as her only companion, and would stay out of doors
all day long, dreamily musing. Sometimes she sat on the cliff the whole
afternoon watching the sea; sometimes she walked, across the wood, to

Yport, thinking, as she went, of how she had walked there when she was
young, and of the long, long years which had elapsed since she had
bounded along these very paths, a hopeful, happy girl.
Every time she saw her son, it seemed to Jeanne as if ten years had passed
since she had seen him last; for every month he became more of a man, and
every month she became more aged. Her father looked like her brother, and
Aunt Lison (who had been quite faded when she was twenty-five, and had
never seemed to get older since) might have been taken for her elder sister.
Poulet did not study very hard; he spent two years in the fourth form,
managed to get through the third in one twelvemonth, then spent two more
in the second, and was nearly twenty when he reached the rhetoric class. He
had grown into a tall, fair youth, with whiskered cheeks and a budding
moustache. He came over to Les Peuples every Sunday now, instead of his
mother going to see him; and as he had been taking riding lessons for some
time past, he hired a horse and accomplished the journey from Havre in two
hours.
Every Sunday Jeanne started out early in the morning to go and meet him
on the road, and with her went Aunt Lison and the baron, who was
beginning to stoop, and who walked like a little old man, with his hands
clasped behind his back as if to prevent himself from pitching forward on
his face. The three walked slowly along, sometimes sitting down by the
wayside to rest, and all the while straining their eyes to catch the first
glimpse of the rider. As soon as he appeared, looking like a black speck on
the white road, they waved their handkerchiefs, and he at once put his horse
at a gallop, and came up like a whirlwind, frightening his mother and Aunt
Lison, and making his grandfather exclaim, "Bravo!" in the admiration of
impotent old age.
Although Paul was a head taller than his mother, she always treated him as
if he were a child and still asked him, as in former years, "Your feet are not
cold, are they, Poulet?" If he went out of doors, after lunch, to smoke a
cigarette, she opened the window to cry: "Oh, don't go out without a hat,
you will catch cold in your head"; and when, at night, he mounted his horse
to return, she could hardly contain herself for nervousness, and entreated
her son not to be reckless.

"Do not ride too quickly, Poulet, dear," she would say. "Think of your poor
mother, who would go mad if anything happened to you, and be careful."
One Saturday morning she received a letter from Paul to say he should not
come to Les Peuples as usual, the following day, as he had been invited to a
party some of his college friends had got up. The whole of Sunday Jeanne
was tortured by a presentiment of evil, and when Thursday came, she was
unable to bear her suspense any longer, and went over to Havre.
Paul seemed changed, though she could hardly tell in what way. He seemed
more spirited, and his words and tones were more manly.
"By the way, mamma, we are going on another excursion and I sha'n't come
to Les Peuples next Sunday, as you have come to see me to-day," he said,
all at once, as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
Jeanne felt as much surprised and stunned as if he had told her he was going
to America; then, when she was again able to speak:
"Oh, Poulet," she exclaimed, "what is the matter with you? Tell me what is
going on."
He laughed and gave her a kiss.
"Why, nothing at all, mamma. I am only going to enjoy myself with some
friends, as everyone does at my age."
She made no reply, but when she was alone in the carriage, her head was
filled with new and strange ideas. She had not recognized her Poulet, her
little Poulet, as of old; she perceived for the first time that he was grown up,
that he was no longer hers, that henceforth he was going to live his own life,
independently of the old people. To her he seemed to have changed entirely
in a day. What! Was this strong, bearded, firm-willed lad her son, her little
child who used to make her help him plant his lettuces?
Paul only came to Les Peuples at very long intervals for the next three
months, and even when he was there, it was only too plain that he longed to
get away again as soon as possible, and that, each evening, he tried to leave
an hour earlier. Jeanne imagined all sorts of things, while the baron tried to

console her by saying: "There, let him alone, the boy is twenty years old,
you know."
One morning, a shabbily dressed old man who spoke with a German accent
asked for "Matame la vicomtesse." He was shown in, and, after a great
many ceremonious bows, pulled out a dirty pocketbook, saying:
"I have a leetle paper for you," and then unfolded, and held out a greasy
scrap of paper.
Jeanne read it over twice, looked at the Jew, read it over again, then asked:
"What does it mean?"
"I vill tell you," replied the man obsequiously. "Your son wanted a leetle
money, and, as I know what a goot mother you are, I lent him joost a leetle
to go on vith."
Jeanne was trembling. "But why did he not come to me for it?"
The Jew entered into a long explanation about a gambling debt which had
had to be paid on a certain morning before midday, that no one would lend
Paul anything as he was not yet of age, and that his "honor would have been
compromised," if he, the Jew, had not "rendered this little service" to the
young man. Jeanne wanted to send for the baron, but her emotion seemed to
have taken all the strength from her limbs, and she could not rise from her
seat.
"Would you be kind enough to ring?" she said to the money-lender, at last.
He feared some trick, and hesitated for a moment.
"If I inconvenience you, I vill call again," he stammered.
She answered him by a shake of the head, and when he had rung they
waited in silence for the baron. The latter at once understood it all. The bill
was for fifteen hundred francs. He paid the Jew a thousand, saying to him:
"Don't let me see you here again," and the man thanked him, bowed, and
went away.

Jeanne and the baron at once went over to Havre, but when they arrived at
the college they learnt that Paul had not been there for a month. The
principal had received four letters, apparently from Jeanne, the first telling
him that his pupil was ill, the others to say how he was getting on, and each
letter was accompanied by a doctor's certificate; of course they were all
forged. Jeanne and her father looked at each other in dismay when they
heard this news, and the principal feeling very sorry for them took them to a
magistrate that the police might be set to find the young man.
Jeanne and the baron slept at an hotel that night, and the next day Paul was
discovered at the house of a fast woman. His mother and grandfather took
him back with them to Les Peuples and the whole of the way not a word
was exchanged. Jeanne hid her face in her handkerchief and cried, and Paul
looked out of the window with an air of indifference.
Before the end of the week they found out that, during the last three
months, Paul had contracted debts to the amount of fifteen thousand francs,
but the creditors had not gone to his relations about the money, because
they knew the boy would soon be of age. Poulet was asked for no
explanation and received no reproof, as his relations hoped to reform him
by kindness. He was pampered and caressed in every way; the choicest
dishes were prepared for him, and, as it was springtime, a boat was hired for
him at Yport, in spite of Jeanne's nervousness, that he might go sailing
whenever he liked; the only thing that was denied him was a horse, for fear
he should ride to Havre. He became very irritable and passionate and lived
a perfectly aimless life. The baron grieved over his neglected studies, and
even Jeanne, much as she dreaded to be parted from him again, began to
wonder what was to be done with him.
One evening he did not come home. It was found, on inquiry, that he had
gone out in a boat with two sailors, and his distracted mother hurried down
to Yport, without stopping even to put anything over her head. On the beach
she found a few men awaiting the return of the boat, and out on the sea was
a little swaying light, which was drawing nearer and nearer to the shore.
The boat came in, but Paul was not on board; he had ordered the men to
take him to Havre, and had landed there.

The police sought him in vain; he was nowhere to be found, and the woman
who had hidden him once before had sold all her furniture, paid her rent,
and disappeared also, without leaving any trace behind her. In Paul's room
at Les Peuples two letters were found from this creature (who seemed
madly in love with him) saying that she had obtained the necessary money
for a journey to England. The three inmates of the château lived on, gloomy
and despairing, through all this mental torture. Jeanne's hair, which had
been gray before, was now quite white, and she sometimes asked herself
what she could have done, that Fate should so mercilessly pursue her. One
day she received the following letter from the Abbé Tolbiac:

"Madame: The hand of God has been laid heavily upon you. You
refused to give your son to him, and he has delivered him over
to a prostitute; will you not profit by this lesson from heaven?
God's mercy is infinite, and perhaps he will pardon you if you
throw yourself at his feet. I am his humble servant, and I will
open his door to you when you come and knock."

Jeanne sat for a long time with this letter lying open on her knees. Perhaps,
after all, the priest's words were true; and all her religious doubts and
uncertainties returned to harass her mind. Was it possible that God could be
vindictive and jealous like men? But if he was not jealous, he would no
longer be feared and loved, and, no doubt, it was that we might the better
know him, that he manifested himself to men, as influenced by the same
feeling as themselves. Then she felt the fear, the cowardly dread, which
urges those who hesitate and doubt to seek the safety of the Church, and
one evening, when it was dark, she stealthily ran to the vicarage, and knelt
at the foot of the fragile-looking priest to solicit absolution. He only
promised her a semi-pardon, as God could not shower all his favors on a
house which sheltered such a man as the baron. "Still, you will soon receive
a proof of the divine mercy," said the priest.
Two days later, Jeanne did indeed receive a letter from her son, and in the
excess of her grief, she looked upon it as the forerunner of the consolation
promised by the abbé. The letter ran thus:

"My Dear Mother: Do not be uneasy about me. I am at
London, and in money. We have not a sou, and some days we

have to go without anything to eat. She who is with me, and
whom I love with all my heart, has spent all she had (some five
thousand francs) that she might remain with me, and you will, of
course, understand that I am bound in honor to discharge my
debt to her at the very first opportunity. I shall soon be of age,
but it would be very good of you if you would advance me
fifteen thousand francs of what I inherit from papa; it would
relieve me from great embarrassments.
"Good-bye, mother dear; I hope soon to see you again, but in the
meantime, I send much love to grandfather, Aunt Lison and
yourself. Your son,

"Vicomte Paul de Lamare."

Then he had not forgotten her, for he had written to her! She did not stop to
think that it was simply to ask her for money; he had not any and some
should be sent him; what did money matter? He had written to her!
She ran to show the letter to the baron, the tears streaming from her eyes.
Aunt Lison was called, and, word by word, they read over this letter which
spoke of their loved one, and lingered over every sentence. Jeanne,
transported from the deepest despair to a kind of intoxication of joy, began
to take Paul's part.
"Now he has written, he will come back," she said. "I am sure he will come
back."
"Still he left us for this creature," said the baron, who was calm enough to
reason; "and he must love her better than he does us, since he did not
hesitate in his choice between her and his home."
The words sent a pang of anguish through Jeanne's heart, and within her
sprang up the fierce, deadly hatred of a jealous mother against the woman
who had robbed her of her son. Until then her every thought had been, for
Paul, and she had hardly realized that this creature was the cause of all his
errors; but the baron's argument had suddenly brought this rival who
possessed such fatal influence vividly to her mind, and she felt that between
this woman and herself there must be a determined, bitter warfare. With that

thought came another one as terrible—that she would rather lose her son
than share him with this other; and all her joy and delight vanished.
The fifteen thousand francs were sent, and for five months nothing more
was heard of Paul. At the end of that time a lawyer came to the château to
see about his inheritance. Jeanne and the baron acceded to all his demands
without any dispute, even giving up the money to which the mother had a
right for her lifetime, and when he returned to Paris, Paul found himself the
possessor of a hundred and twenty thousand francs. During the next six
months only four short letters were received from him, giving news of his
doings in a few, concise sentences, and ending with formal protestations of
affection.
"I am not idle," he said. "I have obtained a post in connection with the
Stock Exchange, and I hope some day to see my dear relations at Les
Peuples."
He never mentioned his mistress, but his silence was more significant than
if he had written four pages about her; and, in these icy letters, Jeanne could
perceive the influence of this unknown woman who was, by instinct, the
implacable enemy of every mother.
Ponder as they would, the three lonely beings at the château could think of
no means by which they might rescue Paul from his present life. They
would have gone to Paris, but they knew that would be no good.
"We must let his passion wear itself out," said the baron; "sooner or later he
will return to us of his own accord." And the mournful days dragged on.
Jeanne and Lison got into the habit of going to church together without
letting the baron know; and a long time passed without any news from Paul.
Then, one morning they received a desperate letter which terrified them.

"My Dear Mother: I am lost; I shall have no resource left but to
blow out my brains if you do not help me. A speculation which
held out every hope of success has turned the wrong way, and I
owe eighty-five thousand francs. It means dishonor, ruin, the
destruction of all my future if I do not pay, and, I say again,
rather than survive the disgrace, I will blow my brains out. I

should, perhaps, have done so already, had it not been for the
brave and hopeful words of a woman, whose name I never
mention to you, but who is the good genius of my life.

"I send you my very best love, dear mother. Goodbye, perhaps
for ever.

"Paul."

Enclosed in the letter was a bundle of business papers giving the details of
this unfortunate speculation. The baron answered by return post that they
would help as much as they could. Then he went to Havre to get legal
advice, mortgaged some property and forwarded the money to Paul. The
young man wrote back three letters full of hearty thanks, and said they
might expect him almost immediately. But he did not come, and another
year passed away.
Jeanne and the baron were on the point of starting for Paris, to find him and
make one last effort to persuade him to return, when they received a few
lines saying he was again in London, starting a steamboat company which
was to trade under the name of "Paul Delamare & Co." "I am sure to get a
living out of it," he wrote, "and perhaps it will make my fortune, At any rate
I risk nothing, and you must at once see the advantages of the scheme.
When I see you again, I shall be well up in the world; there is nothing like
trade for making money, nowadays."
Three months later, the company went into liquidation, and the manager
was prosecuted for falsifying the books. When the news reached Les
Peuples, Jeanne had a hysterical fit which lasted several hours. The baron
went to Havre, made every inquiry, saw lawyers and attorneys, and found
that the Delamare Company had failed for two hundred and fifty thousand
francs. He again mortgaged his property, and borrowed a large sum on Les
Peuples and the two adjoining farms. One evening he was going through
some final formalities in a lawyer's office, when he suddenly fell to the
ground in an apoplectic fit. A mounted messenger was at once dispatched to
Jeanne, but her father died before she could arrive. The shock was so great
that it seemed to stun Jeanne and she could not realize her loss. The body
was taken back to Les Peuples, but the Abbé Tolbiac refused to allow it to

be interred with any sacred rites, in spite of all the entreaties of the two
women, so the burial took place at night without any ceremony whatever.
Then Jeanne fell into a state of such utter depression that she took no
interest in anything, and seemed unable to comprehend the simplest things.
Paul, who was still in hiding in England, heard of his grandfather's death
through the liquidators of the company, and wrote to say he should have
come before, but he had only just heard the sad news. He concluded: "Now
you have rescued me from my difficulties, mother dear, I shall return to
France, and shall at once, come to see you."
Towards the end of that winter Aunt Lison, who was now sixty-eight, had a
severe attack of bronchitis. It turned to inflammation of the lungs, and the
old maid quietly expired.
"I will ask the good God to take pity on you, my poor little Jeanne," were
the last words she uttered.
Jeanne followed her to the grave, saw the earth fall on the coffin, and then
sank to the ground, longing for death to take her also that she might cease to
think and to suffer. As she fell a big, strong peasant woman caught her in
her arms and carried her away as if she had been a child; she took her back
to the château, and Jeanne let herself be put to bed by this stranger, who
handled her so tenderly and firmly, and at once fell asleep, for she had spent
the last five nights watching beside the old maid, and she was thoroughly
exhausted by sorrow and fatigue. It was the middle of the night when she
again opened her eyes. A night-lamp was burning on the mantelpiece, and,
in the armchair, lay a woman asleep. Jeanne did not know who it was, and,
leaning over the side of the bed, she tried to make out her features by the
glimmering light of the night-lamp. She fancied she had seen this face
before, but she could not remember when or where.
The woman was quietly sleeping, her head drooping on one shoulder, her
cap lying on the ground and her big hands hanging on each side of the
armchair. She was a strong, square-built peasant of about forty or forty-five,
with a red face and hair that was turning gray. Jeanne was sure she had seen
her before, but she had not the least idea whether it was a long time ago or
quite recently, and it worried her to find she could not remember. She softly
got out of bed, and went on tiptoe to see the sleeping woman nearer. She

recognized her as the peasant who had caught her in her arms in the
cemetery, and had afterwards put her to bed; but surely she had known her
in former times, under other circumstances. And yet perhaps the face was
only familiar to her because she had seen it that day in the cemetery. Still
how was it that the woman was sleeping here?
Just then the stranger opened her eyes and saw Jeanne standing beside her.
She started up, and they stood face to face, so close together that they
touched each other.
"How is it that you're out of bed?" said the peasant; "you'll make yourself
ill, getting up at this time of night. Go back to bed again."
"Who are you?" asked Jeanne.
The woman made no answer, but picked Jeanne up and carried her back to
bed as easily as if she had been a baby. She gently laid her down, and, as
she bent over her, she suddenly began to cover her cheeks, her hair, her eyes
with violent kisses, while the tears streamed from her eyes.
"My poor mistress! Mam'zelle Jeanne, my poor mistress! Don't you know
me?" she sobbed.
"Rosalie, my lass!" cried Jeanne, throwing her arms round the woman's
neck and kissing her; and, clasped in each other's arms they mingled their
tears and sobs together.
Rosalie dried her eyes the first. "Come now," she said, "you must be good
and not catch cold."
She picked up the clothes, tucked up the bed and put the pillow back under
the head of her former mistress, who lay choking with emotion as the
memories of days that were past and gone rushed back to her mind.
"How is it you have come back, my poor girl?" she asked.
"Do you think I was going to leave you to live all alone now?" answered
Rosalie.
"Light a candle and let me look at you," went on Jeanne.

Rosalie placed a light on the table by the bedside, and for a long time they
gazed at each other in silence.
"I should never have known you again," murmured Jeanne, holding out her
hand to her old servant. "You have altered very much, though not so much
as I have."
"Yes, you have changed, Madame Jeanne, and more than you ought to have
done," answered Rosalie, as she looked at this thin, faded, white-haired
woman, whom she had left young and beautiful; "but you must remember
it's twenty-four years since we have seen one another."
"Well, have you been happy?" asked Jeanne after a long pause.
"Oh, yes—yes, madame. I haven't had much to grumble at; I've been
happier than you—that's certain. The only thing that I've always regretted is
that I didn't stop here—" She broke off abruptly, finding she had
unthinkingly touched upon the very subject she wished to avoid.
"Well, you know, Rosalie, one cannot have everything one wants," replied
Jeanne gently; "and now you too are a widow, are you not?" Then her voice
trembled, as she went on, "Have you any—any other children?"
"No, madame."
"And what is your—your son? Are you satisfied with him?"
"Yes, madame; he's a good lad, and a hard-working one. He married about
six months ago, and he is going to have the farm now I have come back to
you."
"Then you will not leave me again?" murmured Jeanne.
"No fear, madame," answered Rosalie in a rough tone. "I've arranged all
about that."
And for some time nothing more was said.
Jeanne could not help comparing Rosalie's life with her own, but she had
become quite resigned to the cruelty and injustice of Fate, and she felt no

bitterness as she thought of the difference between her maid's peaceful
existence and her own.
"Was your husband kind to you?"
"Oh, yes, madame; he was a good, industrious fellow, and managed to put
by a good deal. He died of consumption."
Jeanne sat up in bed. "Tell me all about your life, and everything that has
happened to you," she said. "I feel as if it would do me good to hear it."
Rosalie drew up a chair, sat down, and began to talk about herself, her
house, her friends, entering into all the little details in which country people
delight, laughing sometimes over things which made her think of the happy
times that were over, and gradually raising her voice as she went on, like a
woman accustomed to command, she wound up by saying:
"Oh, I'm well off now; I needn't be afraid of anything. But I owe it all to
you," she added in a lower, faltering voice; "and now I've come back I'm
not going to take any wages. No! I won't! So, if you don't choose to have
me on those terms, I shall go away again."
"But you do not mean to serve me for nothing?" said Jeanne.
"Yes, I do, madame. Money! You give me money! Why, I've almost as
much as you have yourself. Do you know how much you will have after all
these loans and mortgages have been cleared off, and you have paid all the
interest you have let run on and increase? You don't know, do you? Well,
then, let me tell you that you haven't ten thousand livres a year; not ten
thousand. But I'm going to put everything straight, and pretty soon, too."
She had again raised her voice, for the thought of the ruin which hung over
the house, and the way in which the interest money had been neglected and
allowed to accumulate roused her anger and indignation. A faint, sad smile
which passed over her mistress's face angered her still more, and she cried:
"You ought not to laugh at it, madame. People are good for nothing without
money."
Jeanne took both the servant's hands in hers.

"I have never had any luck," she said slowly, as if she could think of
nothing else. "Everything has gone the wrong way with me. My whole life
has been ruined by a cruel Fate."
"You must not talk like that, madame," said Rosalie, shaking her head. "You
made an unhappy marriage, that's all. But people oughtn't to marry before
they know anything about their future husbands."
They went on talking about themselves and their past loves like two old
friends, and when the day dawned they had not yet told all they had to say.

XII

In less than a week Rosalie had everything and everybody in the château
under her control, and even Jeanne yielded a passive obedience to the
servant, who scolded her or soothed her as if she had been a sick child. She
was very weak now, and her legs dragged along as the baroness's used to
do; the maid supported her when she went out and their conversation was
always about bygone times, of which Jeanne talked with tears in her eyes,
and Rosalie in the calm quiet way of an impassive peasant.
The old servant returned several times to the question of the interest that
was owing, and demanded the papers which Jeanne, ignorant of all business
matters, had hidden away that Rosalie might not know of Paul's misdoings.
Next Rosalie went over to Fécamp each day for a week to get everything
explained to her by a lawyer whom she knew; then one evening after she
had put her mistress to bed she sat down beside her and said abruptly:
"Now you're in bed, madame, we will have a little talk."
She told Jeanne exactly how matters stood, and that when every claim had
been settled she, Jeanne, would have about seven or eight thousand francs a
year; not a penny more.
"Well, Rosalie," answered Jeanne, "I know I shall not live to be very old,
and I shall have enough until I die."

"Very likely you will, madame," replied Rosalie, getting angry; "but how
about M. Paul? Don't you mean to leave him anything?"
Jeanne shuddered. "Pray, don't ever speak to me about him; I cannot bear to
think of him."
"Yes, but I want to talk to you about him, because you don't look at things
in the right light, Madame Jeanne. He may be doing all sorts of foolish
things now, but he won't always behave the same. He'll marry and then he'll
want money to educate his children and to bring them up properly. Now
listen to what I am going to say; you must sell Les Peuples—"
But Jeanne started up in bed.
"Sell Les Peuples! How can you think of such a thing? No! I will never sell
the château!"
Rosalie was not in the least put out.
"But I say you will, madame, simply because you must."
Then she explained her plans and her calculations. She had already found a
purchaser for Les Peuples and the two adjoining farms, and when they had
been sold Jeanne would still have four farms at Saint Léonard, which, freed
from the mortgages, would bring in about eight thousand three hundred
francs a year. Out of this income thirteen hundred francs would have to go
for the keeping up and repairing of the property; two thousand would be put
by for unforeseen expenses, and Jeanne would have five thousand francs to
live upon.
"Everything else is gone, so there's an end of it," said Rosalie. "But, in
future, I shall keep the money and M. Paul sha'n't have another penny off
you. He'd take your last farthing."
"But if he has not anything to eat?" murmured Jeanne, who was quietly
weeping.
"He can come to us if he's hungry; there'll always be victuals and a bed for
him. He'd never have got into trouble if you hadn't given him any money
the first time he asked for some."

"But he was in debt; he would have been dishonored."
"And don't you think he'll get into debt just the same when you've no more
money to give him? You have paid his debts up to now, so well and good;
but you won't pay any more, I can tell you. And now, good-night, madame."
And away she went.
The idea of selling Les Peuples and leaving the house where she had passed
all her life threw Jeanne into a state of extreme agitation, and she lay awake
the whole night. "I shall never be able to go away from here," she said,
when Rosalie came into the room next morning.
"You'll have to, all the same, madame," answered the maid with rising
temper. "The lawyer is coming presently with the man who wants to buy the
château, and, if you don't sell it, you won't have a blade of grass to call your
own in four years' time."
"Oh, I cannot! I cannot!" moaned Jeanne.
But an hour afterwards came a letter from Paul asking for ten thousand
francs. What was to be done? Jeanne did not know, and, in her distress, she
consulted Rosalie, who shrugged her shoulders, and observed:
"What did I tell you, madame? Oh, you'd both of you have been in a nice
muddle if I hadn't come back."
Then, by her advice, Jeanne wrote back:

"My Dear Son: I cannot help you any more; you have ruined
me, and I am even obliged to sell Les Peuples. But I shall
always have a home for you whenever you choose to return to
your poor old mother, who has suffered so cruelly through you.

Jeanne."

The lawyer came with M. Jeoffrin, who was a retired sugar baker, and
Jeanne herself received them, and invited them to go all over the house and
grounds. Then a month after this visit, she signed the deed of sale, and

bought, at the same time, a little villa in the hamlet of Batteville, standing
on the Montivilliers high-road, near Goderville.
After she had signed the deeds she went out to the baroness's avenue, and
walked up and down, heart-broken and miserable while she bade tearful,
despairing farewells to the trees, the worm-eaten bench under the plane tree,
the wood, the old elm trunk, against which she had leant so many times, and
the hillock, where she had so often sat, and whence she had watched the
Comte de Fourville running towards the sea on the awful day of Julien's
death. She stayed out until the evening, and at last Rosalie went to look for
her and brought her in. A tall peasant of about twenty-five was waiting at
the door. He greeted Jeanne in a friendly way, as if he had known her a long
while:
"Good-day, Madame Jeanne, how are you? Mother told me I was to come
and help with the moving, and I wanted to know what you meant to take
with you, so that I could move it a little at a time without it hindering the
farm work."
He was Rosalie's son—Julien's son and Paul's brother. Jeanne's heart almost
stood still as she looked at him, and yet she would have liked to kiss the
young fellow. She gazed at him, trying to find any likeness to her husband
or her son. He was robust and ruddy-cheeked and had his mother's fair hair
and blue eyes, but there was something in his face which reminded Jeanne
of Julien, though she could not discover where the resemblance lay.
"I should be very much obliged if you could show me the things now,"
continued the lad.
But she did not know herself yet what she should be able to take, her new
house was so small, and she asked him to come again in a week's time.
For some time the removal occupied Jeanne's thoughts, and made a change,
though a sad one, in her dull, hopeless life. She went from room to room,
seeking the pieces of furniture which were associated in her mind with
various events in her life, for the furniture among which we live becomes,
in time, part of our lives—almost of ourselves—and, as it gets old, and we
look at its faded colors, its frayed coverings, its tattered linings, we are
reminded of the prominent dates and events of our existence by these time-

worn objects which have been the mute companions of our happy and of
our sad moments alike.
As agitated as if the decisions she were making had been of the last
importance, Jeanne chose, one by one, the things she should take with her,
often hesitating and altering her mind at every moment, as she stood unable
to decide the respective merits of two armchairs, or of some old escritoire
and a still older worktable. She opened and searched every drawer, and tried
to connect every object with something that had happened in bygone days,
and when at last she made up her mind and said: "Yes, I shall take this," the
article she had decided upon was taken downstairs and put into the dining-
room. She wished to keep the whole of her bedroom furniture, the bed, the
tapestry, the clock—everything, and she also took a few of the drawing-
room chairs, choosing those with the designs she had always liked ever
since she could remember—the fox and the stork, the fox and the crow, the
ant and the grasshopper, and the solitary heron.
One day, as she was wandering all over this house she should so soon have
to leave, Jeanne went up into the garret. She was amazed when she opened
the door; there lay articles of furniture of every description, some broken,
others only soiled, others again stored away simply because fresh things
had been bought and put in their places. She recognized a hundred little
odds and ends which used to be downstairs and had disappeared without her
noticing their absence—things of no value which she had often used,
insignificant little articles, which had stood fifteen years beneath her eyes
and had never attracted her attention, but which now—suddenly discovered
in the lumber-room, lying side by side with other things older still and
which she could quite distinctly remember seeing when she first returned
from the convent—became as precious in her eyes as if they had been
valued friends that had been a long time absent from her. They appeared to
her under a new light, and as she looked at them she felt as she might have
done if any very reserved acquaintances had suddenly begun to talk and to
reveal thoughts and feelings she had never dreamed they possessed.
As she went from one thing to another, and remembered little incidents in
connection with them, her heart felt as if it would break. "Why, this is the
china cup I cracked a few days before I was married, and here is mamma's

little lantern, and the cane papa broke trying to open the wooden gate the
rain had swollen."
Besides all these familiar objects there were a great many things she had
never seen before, which had belonged to her grandparents or her great-
grandparents. Covered with dust they looked like sad, forsaken exiles from
another century, their history and adventures for ever lost, for there was no
one living now who had known those who had chosen, bought and
treasured them, or who had seen the hands which had so often touched them
or the eyes which had found such pleasure in looking at them. Jeanne
touched them, and turned them about, her fingers leaving their traces on the
thick dust; and she stayed for a long, long time amidst these old things, in
the garret which was dimly lighted by a little skylight.
She tried to find other things with associations to them, and very carefully
she examined some three-legged chairs, a copper warming-pan, a dented
foot-warmer (which she thought she remembered) and all the other worn-
out household utensils. Then she put all the things she thought she should
like to take away together, and going downstairs, sent Rosalie up to fetch
them. The latter indignantly refused to bring down "such rubbish," but
Jeanne, though she hardly ever showed any will of her own, now would
have her own way this time, and the servant had to obey.
One morning young Denis Lecoq (Julien's son) came, with his cart, to take
way the first lot of things, and Rosalie went off with him to look after the
unloading, and to see that the furniture was put into the right rooms.
When she was alone Jeanne began to visit every room in the château, and to
kiss in a transport of passionate sorrow and regret everything that she was
forced to leave behind her—the big white birds in the drawing-room
tapestry, the old candlesticks, anything and everything that came in her way.
She went from room to room, half mad with grief, and the tears streaming
from her eyes, and, when she had gone all over the house, she went out to
"say good-bye" to the sea. It was the end of September, and the dull
yellowish waves stretched away as far as the eye could reach, under the
lowering gray sky which hung over the world. For a long, long while,
Jeanne stood on the cliff, her thoughts running on all her sorrows and
troubles, and it was not till night drew on that she went indoors. In that day

she had gone through as much suffering as she had ever passed through in
her greatest griefs.
Rosalie had returned enchanted with the new house, "which was much
livelier than this big barn of a place that was not even on a main road," but
her mistress wept the whole evening.
Now they knew the château was sold the farmers showed Jeanne barely the
respect that was due to her, and, though they hardly knew why, among
themselves they always spoke of her as "that lunatic." Perhaps, with their
brute-like instinct, they perceived her unhealthy and increasing
sentimentality, her morbid reveries, and the disordered and pitiful state of
her mind which so much sorrow and affliction had unhinged.
Happening to go through the stables the day before she was to leave Les
Peuples, Jeanne came upon Massacre, whose existence she had entirely
forgotten. Long past the age at which dogs generally die, he had become
blind and paralyzed, and dragged out his life on a bed of straw, whither
Ludivine, who never forgot him, brought him his food. Jeanne took him up
in her arms, kissed him and carried him into the house; he could hardly
creep along, his legs were so stiff, and he barked like a child's wooden toy-
dog.
At length the last day dawned. Jeanne had passed the night in Julien's old
room, as all the furniture had been moved out of hers, and when she rose
she felt as tired and exhausted as if she had just been running a long
distance.
In the court-yard stood the gig in which Rosalie and her mistress were to
go, and a cart on which the remainder of the furniture and the trunks were
already loaded. Ludivine and old Simon were to stay at the château until its
new owner arrived, and then, too old to stay in service any longer, they
were going to their friends to live on their savings and the pensions Jeanne
had given them. Marius had married and left the château long ago.
About eight o'clock a fine, cold rain, which the wind drove in slanting lines,
began to fall, and the furniture on the cart had to be covered over with
tarpaulins. Some steaming cups of coffee stood on the kitchen-table, and
Jeanne sat down and slowly drank hers up; then rising:

"Let us go," she said.
She began to put on her hat and shawl, while Rosalie put on her goloshes. A
great lump rose in her throat, and she whispered:
"Rosalie, do you remember how it rained the day we left Rouen to come
here?"
She broke off abruptly, pressed her hands to her heart, and fell backwards in
a sort of fit. For more than an hour she lay as if she were dead, then, when
she at length recovered consciousness, she went into violent hysterics.
Gradually she became calmer, but this attack had left her so weak that she
could not rise to her feet. Rosalie, fearing another attack if they did not get
her away at once, went for her son, and between them, they carried her to
the gig, and placed her on the leather-covered seat. Rosalie got up beside
her, wrapped up her legs, threw a thick cloak over her shoulders, then,
opening an umbrella over her head, cried:
"Make haste, and let's get off, Denis."
The young man climbed up by his mother, sat down with one leg right
outside the gig, for want of room, and started off his horse at a quick jerky
trot, which shook the two women from side to side. As they turned the
corner of the village, they saw someone walking up and down the road; it
was the Abbé Tolbiac, apparently waiting to see their departure. He was
holding up his cassock with one hand to keep it out of the wet, regardless of
showing his thin legs which were encased in black stockings, and his huge,
muddy boots. When he saw the carriage coming he stopped, and stood on
one side to let it pass. Jeanne looked down to avoid meeting his eyes, while
Rosalie, who had heard all about him, furiously muttered: "You brute, you
brute!" and seizing her son's hand, "Give him a cut with the whip!" she
exclaimed. The young man did not do that, but he urged on his horse and
then, just as they were passing the Abbé, suddenly let the wheel of the gig
drop into a deep rut. There was a splash, and, in an instant, the priest was
covered with mud from head to foot. Rosalie laughed all over her face, and
turning round, she shook her fist at the abbé as he stood wiping himself
down with his big handkerchief.

"Oh, we have forgotten Massacre!" suddenly cried Jeanne. Denis pulled up,
gave Rosalie the reins to hold, and jumped down to run and fetch the dog.
Then in a few minutes he came back with the big, shapeless animal in his
arms and placed him in the gig between the two women.

XIII

After a two hours' drive the gig drew up before a little brick house,
standing by the high road in the middle of an orchard planted with pear-
trees. Four lattice-work arbors covered with honeysuckle and clematis stood
at the four corners of the garden, which was planted with vegetables, and
laid out in little beds with narrow paths bordered with fruit-trees running
between them, and both garden and orchard were entirely surrounded by a
thickset hedge which divided them from a field belonging to the next farm.
About thirty yards lower down the road was a forge, and that was the only
dwelling within a mile. All around lay fields and plains with farms scattered
here and there, half-hidden by the four double rows of big trees which
surrounded them.
Jeanne wanted to rest as soon as they arrived, but Rosalie, wishing to keep
her from thinking, would not let her do so. The carpenter from Goderville
had come to help them put the place in order, and they all began to arrange
the furniture which was already there without waiting for the last cart-load
which was coming on. The arrangement of the rooms took a long time, for
everyone's ideas and opinions had to be consulted, and then the cart from
Les Peuples arrived, and had to be unloaded in the rain. When night fell the
house was in a state of utter disorder, and all the rooms were full of things
piled anyhow one on top of the other. Jeanne was tired out and fell asleep as
soon as her head touched the pillow.
The next few days there was so much to do that she had no time to fret; in
fact, she even found a certain pleasure in making her new home pretty, for
all the time she was working she thought that her son would one day come
and live there. The tapestry from her bedroom at Les Peuples was hung in
the dining-room, which was also to serve as drawing-room, and Jeanne took

especial pains over the arrangement of one of the rooms on the first floor,
which in her own mind she had already named "Poulet's room;" she was to
have the other one on that floor, and Rosalie was to sleep upstairs next to
the box-room. The little house thus tastefully arranged, looked pretty when
it was all finished, and at first Jeanne was pleased with it though she was
haunted by the feeling that there was something missing though she could
not tell what.
One morning a clerk came over from the attorney at Fécamp with the three
thousand six hundred francs, the price at which an upholsterer had valued
the furniture left at Les Peuples. Jeanne felt a thrill of pleasure as she took
the money, for she had not expected to get so much, and as soon as the man
had gone she put on her hat and hurried off to Goderville to send Paul this
unlooked-for sum as quickly as possible. But as she was hastening along the
road she met Rosalie coming back from market; the maid suspected that
something had happened though she did not at once guess the truth. She
soon found it out, however, for Jeanne could not hide anything from her,
and placing her basket on the ground to give way to her wrath at her ease,
she put her hands on her hips and scolded Jeanne at the top of her voice;
then she took hold of her mistress with her right hand and her basket with
her left and walked on again towards the house in a great passion. As soon
as they were indoors Rosalie ordered the money to be given into her care,
and Jeanne gave it her with the exception of the six hundred francs which
she said nothing about; but this trick was soon detected and Jeanne had to
give it all up. However, Rosalie consented to these odd hundreds being sent
to the young man, who in a few days wrote to thank his mother for the
money. "It was a most welcome present, mother dear," he said, "for we were
reduced to utter want."
Time went on but Jeanne could not get accustomed to her new home. It
seemed as if she could not breathe freely at Batteville, and she felt more
alone and forsaken than ever. She would often walk as far as the village of
Verneuil and come back through Trois-Mares, but as soon as she was home
she started up to go out again as if she had forgotten to go to the very place
to which she had meant to walk. The same thing happened time after time
and she could not understand where it was she longed to go; one evening,
however, she unconsciously uttered a sentence which at once revealed to

her the secret of her restlessness. "Oh! how I long to see the ocean," she
said as she sat down to dinner.
The sea! That was what she missed. The sea with its salt breezes, its never-
ceasing roar, its tempests, its strong odors; the sea, near which she had lived
for five and twenty years, which had always felt near her and which,
unconsciously, she had come to love like a human being.
Massacre, too, was very uneasy. The very evening of his arrival at the new
house he had installed himself under the kitchen-dresser and no one could
get him to move out. There he lay all day long, never stirring, except to turn
himself over with a smothered grunt, until it was dark; then he got up and
dragged himself towards the garden door, grazing himself against the wall
as he went. After he had stayed out of doors a few minutes he came in again
and sat down before the stove which was still warm, and as soon as Jeanne
and Rosalie had gone to bed he began to howl. The whole night long he
howled, in a pitiful, deplorable way, sometimes ceasing for an hour only to
recommence in a still more doleful tone. A barrel was put outside the house
and he was tied up to it, but he howled just the same out of doors as in, and
as he was old and almost dying, he was brought back to the kitchen again.
It was impossible for Jeanne to sleep, for the whole night she could hear the
old dog moaning and scratching as he tried to get used to this new house
which he found so different from his old home. Nothing would quiet him;
his eyes were dim and it seemed as if the knowledge of his infirmity made
him keep still while everyone else was awake and downstairs, and at night
he wandered restlessly about until daybreak, as if he only dared to move in
the darkness which makes all beings sightless for the time. It was an intense
relief to everyone when one morning he was found dead.
Winter wore on, and Jeanne gave way more and more to an insuperable
hopelessness; it was no longer a keen, heartrending grief that she felt, but a
dull, gloomy melancholy. There was nothing to rouse her from it, no one
came to see her, and the road which passed before her door was almost
deserted. Sometimes a gig passed by driven by a red-faced man whose
blouse, blown out by the wind, looked like a blue balloon, and sometimes a
cart crawled past, or a peasant and his wife could be seen coming from the
distance, growing larger and larger as they approached the house and then

diminishing again when they had passed it, till they looked like two insects
at the end of the long white line which stretched as far as the eye could
reach, rising and falling with the undulation of the earth. When the grass
again sprang up a little girl passed the gate every morning with two thin
cows which browsed along the side of the road, and in the evening she
returned, taking, as in the morning, one step every ten minutes as she
followed the animals.
Every night Jeanne dreamt that she was again at Les Peuples. She thought
she was there with her father and mother and Aunt Lison as in the old times.
Again she accomplished the old, forgotten duties and supported Madame
Adélaïde as she walked in her avenue; and each time she awoke she burst
into tears.
Paul was continually in her thoughts and she wondered what he was doing,
if he were well and if he ever thought of her. She revolved all these painful
thoughts in her mind as she walked along the low-lying roads between the
farms, and what was more torture to her than anything else was the fierce
jealousy of the woman who had deprived her of her son. It was this hatred
alone which restrained her from taking any steps towards finding Paul and
trying to see him. She could imagine her son's mistress confronting her at
the door and asking, "What is your business here, madame?" and her self-
respect would not permit her to run the risk of such an encounter. In the
haughty pride of a chaste and spotless woman, who had never stooped to
listen to temptation, she became still more bitter against the base and
cowardly actions to which sensual love will drive a man who is not strong
enough to throw off its degrading chains. The whole of humanity seemed to
her unclean as she thought of the obscene secrets of the senses, of the
caresses which debase as they are given and received, and of all the
mysteries which surround the attraction of the sexes.

Another spring and summer passed away, and when the autumn came again
with its rainy days, its dull, gray skies, its heavy clouds, Jeanne felt so
weary of the life she was leading that she determined to make a supreme
attempt to regain possession of her Poulet. Surely the young man's passion
must have cooled by this time, and she wrote him a touching, pitiful letter:

"My Dear Child—I am coming to entreat you to return to me.
Think how I am left, lonely, aged and ill, the whole year with
only a servant. I am living now in a little house by the roadside
and it is very miserable for me, but if you were here everything
would seem different. You are all I have in the world, and I have
not seen you for seven years. You will never know how unhappy
I have been and how my every thought was centered in you. You
were my life, my soul, my only hope, my only love, and you are
away from me, you have forsaken me.

"Oh! come back, my darling Poulet, come back, and let me hold
you in my arms again; come back to your old mother who so
longs to see you.

Jeanne."

A few days later came the following reply:

"My Dear Mother—I should only be too glad to come and see
you, but I have not a penny; send me some money and I will
come. I had myself been thinking of coming to speak to you
about a plan which, if carried out, would permit me to do as you
desire.

"I shall never be able to repay the disinterested affection of the
woman who has shared all my troubles, but I can at least make a
public recognition of her faithful love and devotion. Her
behavior is all you could desire; she is well-educated and well-
read and you cannot imagine what a comfort she has been to me.
I should be a brute if I did not make her some recompense, and I
ask your permission to marry her. Then we could all live

together in your new house, and you would forgive my follies. I
am convinced that you would give your consent at once, if you
knew her; I assure you she is very lady-like and quiet, and I
know you would like her. As for me, I could not live without
her.

"I shall await your reply with every impatience, dear mother. We
both send you much love.—Your son,

"Vicomte Paul de Lamare."

Jeanne was thunderstruck. As she sat with the letter on her knees, she could
see so plainly through the designs of this woman who had not once let Paul
return to his friends, but had always kept him at her side while she patiently
waited until his mother should give in and consent to anything and
everything in the irresistible desire of having her son with her again; and it
was with bitter pain that she thought of how Paul obstinately persisted in
preferring this creature to herself. "He does not love me, he does not love
me," she murmured over and over again.
"He wants to marry her now," she said, when Rosalie came in.
The servant started.
"Oh! madame, you surely will not consent to it. M. Paul can't bring that
hussy here."
All the pride in Jeanne's nature rose in revolt at the thought, and though she
was bowed down with grief, she replied decidedly:
"No, Rosalie, never. But since he won't come here I will go to him, and we
will see which of us two will have the greater influence over him."
She wrote to Paul at once, telling him that she was coming to Paris, and
would see him anywhere but at the house where he was living with that
wretch. Then while she awaited his reply, she began to make all her
preparations for the journey, and Rosalie commenced to pack her mistress's
linen and clothes in an old trunk.

"You haven't a single thing to put on," exclaimed the servant, as she was
folding up an old, badly-made dress. "I won't have you go with such
clothes; you'd be a disgrace to everyone, and the Paris ladies would think
you were a servant."
Jeanne let her have her own way, and they both went to Goderville and
chose some green, checked stuff, which they left with the dressmaker to be
made up. Then they went to see Me. Roussel the lawyer, who went to Paris
for a fortnight every year, to obtain a few directions, for it was twenty-eight
years since Jeanne had been to the capital. He gave them a great deal of
advice about crossing the roads and the way to avoid being robbed, saying
that the safest plan was to carry only just as much money as was necessary
in the pockets and to sew the rest in the lining of the dress; then he talked
for a long time about the restaurants where the charges were moderate, and
mentioned two or three to which ladies could go, and he recommended
Jeanne to stay at the Hôtel de Normandie, which was near the railway
station. He always stayed there himself, and she could say he had sent her.
There had been a railway between Paris and Havre for the last six years, but
Jeanne had never seen one of these steam-engines of which everyone was
talking, and which were revolutionizing the whole country.
The day passed on, but still there came no answer from Paul. Every
morning, for a fortnight, Jeanne had gone along the road to meet the
postman, and had asked, in a voice which she could not keep steady:
"You have nothing for me to-day, Père Malandain?" And the answer was
always the same: "No nothing yet, ma bonne dame."
Fully persuaded that it was that woman who was preventing Paul from
answering, Jeanne determined not to wait any longer, but to start at once.
She wanted to take Rosalie with her, but the maid would not go because of
increasing the expense of the journey, and she only allowed her mistress to
take three hundred francs with her.
"If you want any more money," she said, "write to me, and I'll tell the
lawyer to forward you some; but if I give you any more now, Monsieur Paul
will have it all."

Then one December morning, Denis Lecoq's gig came to take them both to
the railway station, for Rosalie was going to accompany her mistress as far
as that. When they reached the station, they found out first how much the
tickets were, then, when the trunk had been labeled and the ticket bought,
they stood watching the rails, both too much occupied in wondering what
the train would be like to think of the sad cause of this journey. At last a
distant whistle made them look round, and they saw a large, black machine
approaching, which came up with a terrible noise, dragging after it a long
chain of little rolling houses. A porter opened the door of one of these little
huts, and Jeanne kissed Rosalie and got in.
"Au revoir, madame. I hope you will have a pleasant journey, and will soon
be back again."
"Au revoir, Rosalie."
There was another whistle, and the string of carriages moved slowly off,
gradually going faster and faster, till they reached a terrific speed. In
Jeanne's compartment there were only two other passengers, who were both
asleep, and she sat and watched the fields and farms and villages rush past.
She was frightened at the speed at which she was going, and the feeling
came over her that she was entering a new phase of life, and was being
hurried towards a very different world from that in which she had spent her
peaceful girlhood and her monotonous life.
It was evening when she reached Paris. A porter took her trunk, and she
followed closely at his heels, sometimes almost running for fear of losing
sight of him, and feeling frightened as she was pushed about by the swaying
crowd through which she did not know how to pass.
"I was recommended here by Me. Roussel," she hastened to say when she
was in the hôtel office.
The landlady, a big, stolid-looking woman, was sitting at the desk.
"Who is Me. Roussel?" she asked.
"The lawyer from Goderville, who stays here every year," replied Jeanne, in
surprise.

"Very likely he does," responded the big woman, "but I don't know him. Do
you want a room?"
"Yes, madame."
A waiter shouldered the luggage and led the way upstairs.
Jeanne followed, feeling very low-spirited and depressed, and sitting down
at a little table, she ordered some soup and the wing of a chicken to be sent
up to her, for she had had nothing to eat since day-break. She thought of
how she had passed through this same town on her return from her wedding
tour, as she ate her supper by the miserable light of one candle, and of how
Julien had then first shown himself in his true character. But then she was
young and brave and hopeful; now she felt old and timid; and the least thing
worried and frightened her.
When she had finished her supper, she went to the window and watched the
crowded street. She would have liked to go out if she had dared, but she
thought she should be sure to lose herself, so she went to bed. But she had
hardly yet got over the bustle of the journey, and that, and the noise and the
sensation of being in a strange place, kept her awake. The hours passed on,
and the noises outside gradually ceased, but still she could not sleep, for she
was accustomed to the sound, peaceful sleep of the country, which is so
different from the semi-repose of a great city. Here she was conscious of a
sort of restlessness all around her; the murmur of voices reached her ears,
and every now and then a board creaked, a door shut, or a bell rang. She
was just dozing off, about two o'clock in the morning, when a woman
suddenly began to scream in a neighboring room. Jeanne started up in bed,
and next she thought she heard a man laughing. As dawn approached she
became more and more anxious to see Paul, and as soon as it was light, she
got up and dressed.
He lived in the Rue du Sauvage, and she meant to follow Rosalie's advice
about spending as little as possible, and walk there. It was a fine day,
though the wind was keen, and there were a great many people hurrying
along the pavements. Jeanne walked along the street as quickly as she
could. When she reached the other end, she was to turn to the right, then to
the left; then she would come to a square, where she was to ask again. She
could not find the square, and a baker from whom she inquired the way

gave her different directions altogether. She started on again, missed the
way, wandered about, and in trying to follow other directions, lost herself
entirely. She walked on and on, and was just going to hail a cab when she
saw the Seine. Then she decided to walk along the quays, and in about an
hour she reached the dark, dirty lane called Rue du Sauvage.
When she came to the number she was seeking, she was so excited that she
stood before the door unable to move another step. Poulet was there, in that
house! Her hands and knees trembled violently, and it was some moments
before she could enter and walk along the passage to the doorkeeper's box.
"Will you go and tell M. Paul de Lamare that an old lady friend of his
mother's, is waiting to see him?" she said, slipping a piece of money into
the man's hand.
"He does not live here now, madame," answered the doorkeeper.
She started.
"Ah! Where—where is he living now?" she gasped.
"I do not know."
She felt stunned, and it was some time before she could speak again.
"When did he leave?" she asked at last, controlling herself by a violent
effort.
The man was quite ready to tell her all he knew.
"About a fortnight ago," he replied. "They just walked out of the house one
evening and didn't come back. They owed all over the neighborhood, so
you may guess they didn't leave any address."
Tongues of flame were dancing before Jeanne's eyes, as if a gun were being
fired off close to her face; but she wanted to find Poulet, and that kept her
up and made her stand opposite the doorkeeper, as if she were calmly
thinking.
"Then he did not say anything when he left?"
"No, nothing at all; they went away to get out of paying their debts."

"But he will have to send for his letters."
"He'll send a good many times before he gets them, then; besides, they
didn't have ten in a twelvemonth, though I took them up one two days
before they left."
That must have been the one she sent.
"Listen," she said, hastily. "I am his mother, and I have come to look for
him. Here are ten francs for yourself. If you hear anything from or about
him, let me know at once at the Hôtel de Normandie, Rue du Havre, and
you shall be well paid for your trouble."
"You may depend upon me, madame," answered the doorkeeper; and
Jeanne went away.
She hastened along the streets as if she were bent on an important mission,
but she was not looking or caring whither she was going. She walked close
to the walls, pushed and buffeted by errand boys and porters; crossed the
roads, regardless of the vehicles and the shouts of the drivers; stumbled
against the curbstones, which she did not see; and hurried on and on,
unconscious of everything and everyone. At last she found herself in some
gardens, and, feeling too weary to walk any further, she dropped on a seat.
She sat there a long while, apparently unaware that the tears were running
down her cheeks, and that passersby stopped to look at her. At last the bitter
cold made her rise to go, but her legs would hardly carry her, so weak and
exhausted was she. She would have liked some soup, but she dared not go
into a restaurant, for she knew people could see she was in trouble, and it
made her feel timid and ashamed. When she passed an eating-place she
would stop a moment at the door, look inside, and see all the people sitting
at the tables eating, and then go on again, saying to herself: "I will go into
the next one"; but when she came to the next her courage always failed her
again. In the end she went into a baker's shop, and bought a little crescent-
shaped roll, which she ate as she went along. She was very thirsty, but she
did not know where to go to get anything to drink, so she went without.
She passed under an arch, and found herself in some more gardens with
arcades running all round them, and she recognized the Palais Royal. Her
walk in the sun had made her warm again, so she sat down for another hour

or two. A crowd of people flowed into the gardens—an elegant crowd
composed of beautiful women and wealthy men, who only lived for dress
and pleasure, and who chatted and smiled and bowed as they sauntered
along. Feeling ill at ease amidst this brilliant throng, Jeanne rose to go
away; but suddenly the thought struck her that perhaps she might meet Paul
here, and she began to walk from end to end of the gardens, with hasty,
furtive steps, carefully scanning every face she met.
Soon she saw that people turned to look and laugh at her, and she hurried
away, thinking it was her odd appearance and her green-checked dress,
which Rosalie had chosen and had made up, that attracted everyone's
attention and smiles. She hardly dared ask her way, but she did at last
venture, and when she had reached her hotel, she passed the rest of the day
sitting on a chair at the foot of the bed. In the evening she dined off some
soup and a little meat, like the day before, and then undressed and went to
bed, performing all the duties of her toilet quite mechanically, from sheer
habit.
The next morning she went to the police office to see if she could get any
help there towards the discovery of her son's whereabouts. They told her
they could not promise her anything, but that they would attend to the
matter. After she had left the police office, she wandered about the streets,
in the hopes of meeting her child, and she felt more friendless and forsaken
among the busy crowds than she did in the midst of the lovely fields.
When she returned to the hotel in the evening, she was told that a man from
M. Paul had asked for her, and was coming again the next day. All the blood
in her body seemed to suddenly rush to her heart and she could not close
her eyes all night. Perhaps it was Paul himself! Yes, it must be so, although
his appearance did not tally with the description the hotel people had given
of the man who had called, and when, about nine o'clock in the morning,
there came a knock at her door, she cried, "Come in!" expecting her son to
rush into her arms held open to receive him.
But it was a stranger who entered—a stranger who began to apologize for
disturbing her and to explain that he had come about some money Paul
owed him. As he spoke she felt herself beginning to cry, and she tried to
hide her tears from the man by wiping them away with the end of her finger

as soon as they reached the corners of her eyes. The man had heard of her
arrival from the concierge at the Rue du Sauvage, and as he could not find
Paul he had come to his mother. He held out a paper which Jeanne
mechanically took; she saw "90 francs" written on it, and she drew out the
money and paid the man. She did not go out at all that day, and the next
morning more creditors appeared. She gave them all the money she had left,
except twenty francs, and wrote and told Rosalie how she was placed.
Until her servant's answer came she passed the days in wandering aimlessly
about the streets. She did not know what to do or how to kill the long,
miserable hours; there was no one who knew of her troubles, or to whom
she could go for sympathy, and her one desire was to get away from this
city and to return to her little house beside the lonely road, where, a few
days before, she had felt she could not bear to live because it was so dull
and lonely. Now she was sure she could live nowhere else but in that little
home where all her mournful habits had taken root.
At last, one evening, she found a letter from Rosalie awaiting her with two
hundred francs enclosed.

"Come back as soon as possible, Madame Jeanne," wrote the
maid, "for I shall send you nothing more. As for M. Paul, I will
go and fetch him myself the next time we hear anything from
him.—With best respects, your servant,

Rosalie."

And Jeanne started back to Batteville one bitterly cold, snowy morning.

XIV

After her return from Paris, Jeanne would not go out or take any interest in
anything. She rose at the same hour every morning, looked out of the
window to see what sort of day it was, then went downstairs and sat before
the fire in the dining-room. She stayed there the whole day, sitting perfectly

still with her eyes fixed on the flames while she thought of all the sorrows
she had passed through. The little room grew darker and darker, but she
never moved, except to put more wood on the fire, and when Rosalie
brought in the lamp she cried:
"Come, Madame Jeanne, you must stir about a bit, or you won't be able to
eat any dinner again this evening."
Often she was worried by thoughts which she could not dismiss from her
mind, and she allowed herself to be tormented by the veriest trifles, for the
most insignificant matters appeared of the greatest importance to her
diseased mind. She lived in the memories of the past, and she would think
for hours together of her girlhood and her wedding tour in Corsica. The
wild scenery that she had long forgotten suddenly appeared before her in
the fire, and she could recall every detail, every event, every face connected
with the island. She could always see the features of Jean Ravoli, the guide,
and sometimes she fancied she could even hear his voice.
At other times she thought of the peaceful years of Paul's childhood—of
how he used to make her tend the salad plants, and of how she and Aunt
Lison used to kneel on the ground, each trying to outdo the other in giving
pleasure to the boy, and in rearing the greater number of plants.
Her lips would form the words, "Poulet, my little Poulet," as if she were
talking to him, and she would cease to muse, and try for hours to write in
the air the letters which formed her son's name, with her outstretched finger.
Slowly she traced them before the fire, fancying she could see them, and,
thinking she had made a mistake, she began the word over and over again,
forcing herself to write the whole name though her arm trembled with
fatigue. At last she would become so nervous that she mixed up the letters,
and formed other words, and had to give it up.
She had all the manias and fancies which beset those who lead a solitary
life, and it irritated her to the last degree to see the slightest change in the
arrangement of the furniture. Rosalie often made her go out with her along
the road, but after twenty minutes or so Jeanne would say: "I cannot walk
any further, Rosalie," and would sit down by the roadside. Soon movement
of any kind became distasteful to her, and she stayed in bed as late as she
could. Ever since a child she had always been in the habit of jumping out of

bed as soon as she had drunk her cafe au lait. She was particularly fond of
her morning coffee, and she would have missed it more than anything. She
always waited for Rosalie to bring it with an impatience that had a touch of
sensuality in it, and as soon as the cup was placed on the bedside table she
sat up, and emptied it, somewhat greedily. Then she at once drew back the
bedclothes and began to dress. But gradually she fell into the habit of
dreaming for a few moments after she had placed the empty cup back in the
saucer, and from that she soon began to lie down again, and at last she
stayed in bed every day until Rosalie came back in a temper and dressed her
almost by force.
She had no longer the slightest will of her own. Whenever her servant asked
her advice, or put any question to her, or wanted to know her opinion, she
always answered: "Do as you like, Rosalie." So firmly did she believe
herself pursued by a persistent ill luck that she became as great a fatalist as
an Oriental, and she was so accustomed to seeing her dreams unfulfilled,
and her hopes disappointed, that she did not dare undertake anything fresh,
and hesitated for days before she commenced the simplest task, so
persuaded was she that whatever she touched would be sure to go wrong.
"I don't think anyone could have had more misfortune than I have had all
my life," she was always saying.
"How would it be if you had to work for your bread, and if you were
obliged to get up every morning at six o'clock to go and do a hard day's
work?" Rosalie would exclaim. "That's what a great many people have to
do, and then when they get too old to work, they die of want."
"But my son has forsaken me, and I am all alone," Jeanne would reply.
That enraged Rosalie.
"And what if he has? How about those whose children enlist, or settle in
America?" (America, in her eyes, was a shadowy country whither people
went to make their fortune, and whence they never returned). "Children
always leave their parents sooner or later; old and young people aren't
meant to stay together. And then, what if he were dead?" she would finish
up with savagely, and her mistress could say nothing after that.

Jeanne got a little stronger when the first warm days of spring came, but she
only took advantage of her better health to bury herself still deeper in her
gloomy thoughts.
She went up to the garret one morning to look for something, and, while she
was there, happened to open a box full of old almanacs. It seemed as if she
had found the past years themselves, and she was filled with emotion as she
looked at the pile of cards. They were of all sizes, big and little, and she
took them every one down to the dining-room and began to lay them out on
the table in the right order of years. Suddenly she picked up the very first
one—the one she had taken with her from the convent to Les Peuples. For a
long time she gazed at it with its dates which she had crossed out the day
she had left Rouen, and she began to shed slow, bitter tears—the weak,
pitiful tears of an aged woman—as she looked at these cards spread out
before her on the table, and which represented all her wretched life.
Then the thought struck her that by means of these almanacs she could
recall all that she had ever done, and giving way to the idea, she at once
devoted herself to the task of retracing the past. She pinned all the cards,
which had grown yellow with age, up on the tapestry, and then passed hours
before one or other of them, thinking, "What did I do in that month?"
She had put a mark beside all the important dates in her life, and
sometimes, by means of linking together and adding one to the other, all the
little circumstances which had preceded and followed a great event, she
succeeded in remembering a whole month. By dint of concentrated
attention, and efforts of will and of memory, she retraced nearly the whole
of her first two years at Les Peuples, recalling without much difficulty this
far-away period of her life, for it seemed to stand out in relief. But the
following years were shrouded in a sort of mist and seemed to run one into
the other, and sometimes she pored over an almanac for hours without being
able to remember whether it was even in that year that such and such a
thing had happened. She would go slowly round the dining-room looking at
these images of past years, which, to her, were as pictures of an ascent to
Calvary, until one of them arrested her attention and then she would sit
gazing at it all the rest of the day, absorbed in her recollections.

Soon the sap began to rise in the trees; the seeds were springing up, the
leaves were budding and the air was filled with the faint, sweet smell of the
apple blossoms which made the orchards a glowing mass of pink. As
summer approached Jeanne became very restless. She could not keep still;
she went in and out twenty times a day, and, as she rambled along past the
farms, she worked herself into a perfect state of fever.
A daisy half hidden in the grass, a sunbeam falling through the leaves, or
the reflection of the sky in a splash of water in a rut was enough to agitate
and affect her, for their sight brought back a kind of echo of the emotions
she had felt when, as a young girl, she had wandered dreamily through the
fields; and though now there was nothing to which she could look forward,
the soft yet exhilarating air sent the same thrill through her as when all her
life had lain before her. But this pleasure was not unalloyed with pain, and
it seemed as if the universal joy of the awakening world could now only
impart a delight which was half sorrow to her grief-crushed soul and
withered heart. Everything around her seemed to have changed. Surely the
sun was hardly so warm as in her youth, the sky so deep a blue, the grass so
fresh a green, and the flowers, paler and less sweet, could no longer arouse
within her the exquisite ecstasies of delight as of old. Still she could enjoy
the beauty around her, so much that sometimes she found herself dreaming
and hoping again; for, however cruel Fate may be, is it possible to give way
to utter despair when the sun shines and the sky is blue?
She went for long walks, urged on and on by her inward excitement, and
sometimes she would suddenly stop and sit down by the roadside to think of
her troubles. Why had she not been loved like other women? Why had even
the simple pleasure of an uneventful existence been refused her?
Sometimes, again forgetting for a moment that she was old, that there was
no longer any pleasure in store for her, and that, with the exception of a few
more lonely years, her life was over and done, she would build all sorts of
castles in the air and make plans for such a happy future, just as she had
done when she was sixteen. Then suddenly remembering the bitter reality
she would get up again, feeling as if a heavy load had fallen upon her, and
return home, murmuring:
"Oh, you old fool! You old fool!"

Now Rosalie was always saying to her:
"Do keep still, madame. What on earth makes you want to run about so?"
"I can't help it," Jeanne would reply sadly. "I am like Massacre was before
he died."
One morning Rosalie went into her mistress's room earlier than usual.
"Make haste and drink up your coffee," she said as she placed the cup on
the table. "Denis is waiting to take us to Les Peuples. I have to go over there
on business."
Jeanne was so excited that she thought she would have fainted, and, as she
dressed herself with trembling fingers, she could hardly believe she was
going to see her dear home once more.
Overhead was a bright, blue sky, and, as they went along, Denis's pony
would every now and then break into a gallop. When they reached
Etouvent, Jeanne could hardly breathe, her heart beat so quickly, and when
she saw the brick pillars beside the château gate, she exclaimed, "Oh," two
or three times in a low voice, as if she were in the presence of something
which stirred her very soul, and she could not help herself.
They put up the horse at the Couillards' farm, and, when Rosalie and her
son went to attend to their business, the farmer asked Jeanne if she would
like to go over the château, as the owner was away, and gave her the key.
She went off alone, and when she found herself opposite the old manor she
stood still to look at it. The outside had not been touched since she had left.
All the shutters were closed, and the sunbeams were dancing on the gray
walls of the big, weather-beaten building. A little piece of wood fell on her
dress, she looked up and saw that it had fallen from the plane tree, and she
went up to the big tree and stroked its pale, smooth bark as if it had been
alive. Her foot touched a piece of rotten wood lying in the grass; it was the
last fragment of the seat on which she had so often sat with her loved ones
—the seat which had been put up the very day of Julien's first visit to the
château.

Then she went to the hall-door. She had some difficulty in opening it as the
key was rusty and would not turn, but at last the lock gave way, and the
door itself only required a slight push before it swung back. The first thing
Jeanne did was to run up to her own room. It had been hung with a light
paper and she hardly knew it again, but when she opened one of the
windows and looked out, she was moved almost to tears as she saw again
the scene she loved so well—the thicket, the elms, the common, and the sea
covered with brown sails which, at this distance, looked as if they were
motionless.
Then she went all over the big, empty house. She stopped to look at a little
hole in the plaster which the baron had made with his cane, for he used to
make a few thrusts at the wall whenever he passed this spot, in memory of
the fencing bouts he had had in his youth. In her mother's bedroom she
found a small gold-headed pin stuck in the wall behind the door, in a dark
corner near the bed. She had stuck it there a long while ago (she
remembered it now), and had looked everywhere for it since, but it had
never been found; and she kissed it and took it with her as a priceless relic.
She went into every room, recognizing the almost invisible spots and marks
on the hangings which had not been changed and again noting the odd
forms and faces which the imagination so often traces in the designs of the
furniture coverings, the carvings of mantelpieces and the shadows on soiled
ceilings. She walked through the vast, silent château as noiselessly as if she
were in a cemetery; all her life was interred there.
She went down to the drawing-room. The closed shutters made it very dark,
and it was a few moments before she could distinguish anything; then, as
her eyes became accustomed to the darkness, she gradually made out the
tapestry with the big, white birds on it. Two armchairs stood before the
fireplace, looking as if they had just been vacated, and the very smell of the
room—a smell that had always been peculiar to it, as each human being has
his, a smell which could be perceived at once, and yet was vague like all the
faint perfumes of old rooms—brought the memories crowding to Jeanne's
mind.
Her breath came quickly as she stood with her eyes fixed on the two chairs,
inhaling this perfume of the past; and, all at once, in a sudden hallucination

occasioned by her thoughts, she fancied she saw—she did see—her father
and mother with their feet on the fender as she had so often seen them
before. She drew back in terror, stumbling against the door-frame, and
clung to it for support, still keeping her eyes fixed on the armchairs. The
vision disappeared and for some minutes she stood horror-stricken; then she
slowly regained possession of herself and turned to fly, afraid that she was
going mad. Her eyes fell on the wainscoting against which she was leaning
and she saw Poulet's ladder. There were all the faint marks traced on the
wall at unequal intervals and the figures which had been cut with a penknife
to indicate the month, and the child's age and growth. In some places there
was the baron's big writing, in others her own, in others again Aunt Lison's,
which was a little shaky. She could see the boy standing there now, with his
fair hair, and his little forehead pressed against the wall to have his height
measured, while the baron exclaimed: "Jeanne, he has grown half an inch in
six weeks," and she began to kiss the wainscoting in a frenzy of love for the
very wood.
Then she heard Rosalie's voice outside, calling: "Madame Jeanne! Madame
Jeanne! lunch is waiting," and she went out with her head in a whirl. She
felt unable to understand anything that was said to her. She ate what was
placed before her, listened to what was being said without realizing the
sense of the words, answered the farmers' wives when they inquired after
her health, passively received their kisses and kissed the cheeks which were
offered to her, and then got into the chaise again.
When she could no longer see the high roof of the château through the trees,
something within her seemed to break, and she felt that she had just said
good-bye to her old home for ever.
They went straight back to Batteville, and as she was going indoors Jeanne
saw something white under the door; it was a letter which the postman had
slipped there during their absence. She at once recognized Paul's
handwriting and tore open the envelope in an agony of anxiety. He wrote:

"My Dear Mother: I have not written before because I did not
want to bring you to Paris on a fruitless errand, for I have
always been meaning to come and see you myself. At the
present moment I am in great trouble and difficulty. My wife

gave birth to a little girl three days ago, and now she is dying
and I have not a penny. I do not know what to do with the child;
the doorkeeper is trying to nourish it with a feeding-bottle as
best she can, but I fear I shall lose it. Could not you take it? I
cannot send it to a wet nurse as I have not any money, and I do
not know which way to turn. Pray answer by return post.

"Your loving son,

"Paul."

Jeanne dropped on a chair with hardly enough strength left to call Rosalie.
The maid came and they read the letter over again together, and then sat
looking at each other in silence.
"I'll go and fetch the child myself, madame," said Rosalie at last. "We can't
leave it to die."
"Very well, my girl, go," answered Jeanne.
"Put on your hat, madame," said the maid, after a pause, "and we will go
and see the lawyer at Goderville. If that woman is going to die, M. Paul
must marry her for the sake of the child."
Jeanne put on her hat without a word. Her heart was overflowing with joy,
but she would not have allowed anyone to see it for the world, for it was
one of those detestable joys in which people can revel in their hearts, but of
which they are all the same ashamed; her son's mistress was going to die.
The lawyer gave Rosalie detailed instructions which the servant made him
repeat two or three times; then, when she was sure she knew exactly what to
do, she said:
"Don't you fear; I'll see it's all right now." And she started for Paris that very
night.
Jeanne passed two days in such an agony of mind that she could fix her
thoughts on nothing. The third morning she received a line from Rosalie
merely saying she was coming back by that evening's train; nothing more;
and in the afternoon, about three o'clock, Jeanne sent round to a neighbor to

ask him if he would drive her to the Beuzeville railway station to meet her
servant.
She stood on the platform looking down the rails (which seemed to get
closer together right away as far off as she could see), and turning every
now and then to look at the clock. Ten minutes more—five minutes—two—
and at last the train was due, though as yet she could see no signs of it.
Then, all at once, she saw a cloud of white smoke, and underneath it a black
speck which got rapidly larger and larger. The big engine came into the
station, snorting and slackening its speed, and Jeanne looked eagerly into
every window as the carriages went past her.
The doors opened and several people got out—peasants in blouses, farmers'
wives with baskets on their arms, a few bourgeois in soft hats—and at last
Rosalie appeared, carrying what looked like a bundle of linen in her arms.
Jeanne would have stepped forward to meet her, but all strength seemed to
have left her legs and she feared she would fall if she moved. The maid saw
her and came up in her ordinary, calm way.
"Good-day, madame; here I am again, though I've had some bother to get
along."
"Well?" gasped Jeanne.
"Well," answered Rosalie, "she died last night. They were married and
here's the baby," and she held out the child which could not be seen for its
wraps. Jeanne mechanically took it, and they left the station and got into the
carriage which was waiting.
"M. Paul is coming directly after the funeral. I suppose he'll be here to-
morrow, by this train."
"Paul—" murmured Jeanne, and then stopped without saying anything
more.
The sun was sinking towards the horizon, bathing in a glow of light the
green fields which were flecked here and there with golden colewort
flowers or blood-red poppies, and over the quiet country fell an infinite
peace.

The peasant who was driving the chaise kept clicking his tongue to urge on
his horse which trotted swiftly along, and Jeanne looked straight up into the
sky which the circling flight of the swallows seemed to cut asunder.
All at once she became conscious of a soft warmth which was making itself
felt through her skirts; it was the heat from the tiny being sleeping on her
knees, and it moved her strangely. She suddenly drew back the covering
from the child she had not yet seen, that she might look at her son's
daughter; as the light fell on its face the little creature opened its blue eyes,
and moved its lips, and then Jeanne hugged it closely to her, and, raising it
in her arms, began to cover it with passionate kisses.
"Come, come, Madame Jeanne, have done," said Rosalie, in sharp, though
good-tempered tones; "you'll make the child cry."
Then she added, as if in reply to her own thoughts:
"After all, life is never so jolly or so miserable as people seem to think."

HAUTOT SENIOR
AND
HAUTOT JUNIOR
PART I

In front of the building, half farm-house, half manor-house, one of those
rural habitations of a mixed character which were all but seigneurial, and
which are at the present time occupied by large cultivators, the dogs lashed
beside the apple-trees in the orchard near the house, kept barking and
howling at the sight of the shooting-bags carried by the gamekeepers and
the boys. In the spacious dining-room kitchen, Hautot Senior and Hautot
Junior, M. Bermont, the tax-collector, and M. Mondaru, the notary were
taking a pick and drinking a glass before going out to shoot, for it was the
opening day.
Hautot Senior, proud of all his possessions, talked boastfully beforehand of
the game which his guests were going to find on his lands. He was a big
Norman, one of those powerful, sanguineous, bony men, who lift wagon-
loads of apples on their shoulders. Half-peasant, half-gentleman, rich,
respected, influential, invested with authority he made his son César go as
far as the third form at school, so that he might be an educated man, and
there he had brought his studies to a stop for fear of his becoming a fine
gentleman and paying no attention to the land.
César Hautot, almost as tall as his father, but thinner, was a good son,
docile, content with everything, full of admiration, respect, and deference,
for the wishes and opinions of his sire.
M. Bermont, the tax-collector, a stout little man, who showed on his red
cheeks a thin network of violet veins resembling the tributaries and the
winding courses of rivers on maps, asked:
"And hares—are there any hares on it?"

Hautot Senior answered:
"As much as you like, especially in the Puysatier lands."
"Which direction are we to begin at?" asked the notary, a jolly notary fat
and pale, big paunched too, and strapped up in an entirely new hunting-
costume bought at Rouen.
"Well, that way, through these grounds. We will drive the partridges into the
plain, and we will beat there again."
And Hautot Senior rose up. They all followed his example, took their guns
out of the corners, examined the locks, stamped with their feet in order to
feel themselves firmer in their boots which were rather hard, not having as
yet been rendered flexible by the heat of the blood. Then they went out; and
the dogs, standing erect at the ends of their lashes, gave vent to piercing
howls while beating the air with their paws.
They set forth for the lands referred to. They consisted of a little glen, or
rather a long undulating stretch of inferior soil, which had on that account
remained uncultivated, furrowed with mountain-torrents, covered with
ferns, an excellent preserve for game.
The sportsmen took up their positions at some distance from each other,
Hautot Senior posting himself at the right, Hautot Junior at the left, and the
two guests in the middle. The keeper and those who carried the game-bags
followed. It was the solemn moment when the first shot it awaited, when
the heart beats a little, while the nervous finger keeps feeling at the gun-
lock every second.
Suddenly the shot went off. Hautot Senior had fired. They all stopped, and
saw a partridge breaking off from a covey which was rushing along at a
single flight to fall down into a ravine under a thick growth of brushwood.
The sportsman, becoming excited, rushed forward with rapid strides,
thrusting aside the briers which stood in his path, and he disappeared in his
turn into the thicket, in quest of his game.
Almost at the same instant, a second shot was heard.

"Ha! ha! the rascal!" exclaimed M. Bermont, "he will unearth a hare down
there."
They all waited, with their eyes riveted on the heap of branches through
which their gaze failed to penetrate.
The notary, making a speaking-trumpet of his hands, shouted:
"Have you got them?"
Hautot Senior made no response.
Then César, turning towards the keeper, said to him:
"Just go, and assist him, Joseph. We must keep walking in a straight line.
We'll wait."
And Joseph, an old stump of a man, lean and knotty, all whose joints
formed protuberances, proceeded at an easy pace down the ravine,
searching at every opening through which a passage could be effected with
the cautiousness of a fox. Then, suddenly, he cried:
"Oh! come! come! an unfortunate thing has occurred."
They all hurried forward, plunging through the briers.
The elder Hautot, who had fallen on his side, in a fainting condition, kept
both his hands over his stomach, from which flowed down upon the grass
through the linen vest torn by the lead, long streamlets of blood. As he was
laying down his gun, in order to seize the partridge, within reach of him, he
had let the firearm fall, and the second discharge going off with the shock,
had torn open his entrails. They drew him out of the trench; they removed
his clothes, and they saw a frightful wound, through which the intestines
came out. Then, after having bandaged him the best way they could, they
brought him back to his own house, and they awaited the doctor, who had
been sent for, as well as a priest.
When the doctor arrived, he gravely shook his head, and, turning towards
young Hautot, who was sobbing on a chair:
"My poor boy," said he, "this has not a good look."

But, when the dressing was finished, the wounded man moved his fingers,
opened his mouth, then his eyes, cast around his troubled, haggard glances,
then appeared to search about in his memory, to recollect, to understand,
and he murmured:
"Ah! good God! this has done for me!"
The doctor held his hand.
"Why no, why no, some days of rest merely—it will be nothing."
Hautot returned:
"It has done for me! My stomach is split! I know it well."
Then, all of a sudden:
"I want to talk to the son, if I have the time."
Hautot Junior, in spite of himself, shed tears, and kept repeating like a little
boy.
"P'pa, p'pa, poor p'ps!"
But the father, in a firmer tone:
"Come! stop crying—this is not the time for it. I have to talk to you. Sit
down there quite close to me. It will be quickly done, and I will be more
calm. As for the rest of you, kindly give me one minute."
They all went out, leaving the father and son face to face.
As soon as they were alone:
"Listen, son! you are twenty-four years; one can say things like this to you.
And then there is not such mystery about these matters as we import into
them. You know well that your mother is seven years dead, isn't that so?
and that I am not more than forty-five years myself, seeing that I got
married at nineteen. Is not that true?"
The son faltered:
"Yes, it is true."

"So then your mother is seven years dead, and I have remained a widower.
Well! a man like me cannot remain without a wife at thirty-seven isn't that
true?"
The son replied:
"Yes, it is true."
The father, out of breath, quite pale, and his face contracted with suffering,
went on:
"God! what pain I feel! Well, you understand. Man is not made to live
alone, but I did not want to take a successor to your mother, since I
promised her not to do so. Then—you understand?"
"Yes, father."
"So, I kept a young girl at Rouen, Reu de l'Eperlan 18, in the third story, the
second door—I tell you all this, don't forget—but a young girl, who has
been very nice to me, loving, devoted, a true woman, eh? You comprehend,
my lad?"
"Yes, father."
"So then, if I am carried off, I owe something to her, but something
substantial, that will place her in a safe position. You understand?"
"Yes, father."
"I tell you that she is an honest girl, and that, but for you, and the
remembrance of your mother, and again but for the house in which we three
lived, I would have brought her here, and then married her, for certain—
listen—listen, my lad. I might have made a will—I haven't done so. I did
not wish to do so—for it is not necessary to write down things—things of
this sort—it is too hurtful to the legitimate children—and then it embroils
everything—it ruins everyone! Look you, the stamped paper, there's no
need of it—never make use of it. If I am rich, it is because I have not made
use of what I have during my own life. You understand, my son?"
"Yes, father."

"Listen again—listen well to me! So then, I have made no will—I did not
desire to do so—and then I knew what you were; you have a good heart;
you are not niggardly, not too near, in any way, I said to myself that when
my end approached I would tell you all about it, and that I would beg of you
not to forget the girl. And then listen again! When I am gone, make your
way to the place at once—and make such arrangements that she may not
blame my memory. You have plenty of means. I leave it to you—I leave
you enough. Listen! You won't find her at home every day in the week. She
works at Madame Moreau's in the Rue Beauvoisine. Go there on a
Thursday. That is the day she expects me. It has been my day for the past
six years. Poor little thing! she will weep!—I say all this to you, because I
have known you so well, my son. One does not tell these things in public
either to the notary or to the priest. They happen—everyone knows that—
but they are not talked about, save in case of necessity. Then there is no
outsider in the secret, nobody except the family, because the family consists
of one person alone. You understand?"
"Yes, father."
"Do you promise?"
"Yes, father."
"Do you swear it?"
"Yes, father."
"I beg of you, I implore of you, son do not forget. I bind you to it."
"No, father."
"You will go yourself. I want you to make sure of everything."
"Yes, father."
"And, then, you will see—you will see what she will explain to you. As for
me, I can say no more to you. You have vowed to do it."
"Yes, father."

"That's good, my son. Embrace me. Farewell. I am going to break up, I'm
sure. Tell them they may come in."
Young Hautot embraced his father, groaning while he did so; then, always
docile, he opened the door, and the priest appeared in a white surplice,
carrying the holy oils.
But the dying man had closed his eyes, and he refused to open them again,
he refused to answer, he refused to show, even by a sign, that he
understood.
He had spoken enough, this man; he could speak no more. Besides he now
felt his heart calm; he wanted to die in peace. What need had he to make a
confession to the deputy of God, since he had just done so to his son, who
constituted his own family?
He received the last rites, was purified and absolved, in the midst of his
friends and his servants on their bended knees, without any movement of
his face indicating that he still lived.
He expired about midnight, after four hours' convulsive movements, which
showed that he must have suffered dreadfully in his last moments.

PART II

It was on the following Tuesday that they buried him, the shooting opened
on Sunday. On his return home, after having accompanied his father to the
cemetery, César Hautot spent the rest of the day weeping. He scarcely slept
at all on the following night, and he felt so sad on awakening that he asked
himself how he could go on living.
However, he kept thinking until evening that, in order to obey the last wish
of his father, he ought to repair to Rouen next day, and see this girl
Catholine Donet, who resided in the Rue d'Eperlan in the third story, second
door. He had repeated to himself in a whisper, just as a little boy repeats a
prayer, this name and address, a countless number of times, so that he might

not forget them, and he ended by lisping them continually, without being
able to stop or to think of what it was, so much were his tongue and his
mind possessed by the appellation.
According, on the following day, about eight o'clock, he ordered
Graindorge to be yoked to the tilbury, and set forth, at the quick trotting
pace of the heavy Norman horse, along the high road from the Ainville to
Rouen. He wore his black frock coat drawn over his shoulders, a tall silk
hat on his head, and on his legs his breeches with straps; and he did not
wish, on account of the occasion, to dispense with the handsome costume,
the blue overall which swelled in the wind, protected the cloth from dust
and from stains, and which was to be removed quickly on reaching his
destination the moment he had jumped out of the coach.
He entered Rouen accordingly just as it was striking ten o'clock, drew up, as
he had usually done at the Hotel des Bon-Enfants, in the Rue des Trois-
Mares, submitted to the hugs of the landlord and his wife and their five
children, for they had heard the melancholy news; after that, he had to tell
them all the particulars about the accident, which caused him to shed tears,
to repel all the proffered attentions which they sought to thrust upon him
merely because he was wealthy, and to decline even the breakfast they
wanted him to partake of, thus wounding their sensibilities.
Then, having wiped the dust off his hat, brushed his coat and removed the
mud stains from his boots, he set forth in search of the Rue de l'Eperlan,
without venturing to make inquiries from anyone, for fear of being
recognized and arousing suspicions.
At length, being unable to find the place, he saw a priest passing by, and,
trusting to the professional discretion which churchmen possess, he
questioned the ecclesiastic.
He had only a hundred steps farther to go; it was exactly the second street to
the right.
Then he hesitated. Up to that moment, he had obeyed, like a mere animal,
the expressed wish of the deceased. Now he felt quite agitated, confused,
humiliated, at the idea of finding himself—the son—in the presence of this
woman who had been his father's mistress. All the morality which lies

buried in our breasts, heaped up at the bottom of our sensuous emotions by
centuries of hereditary instruction, all that he had been taught since he had
learned his catechism about creatures of evil life, to instinctive contempt
which every man entertains towards them, even though he may marry one
of them, all the narrow honesty of the peasant in his character, was stirred
up within him, and held him back, making him grow red with shame.
But he said to himself:
"I promised the father, I must not break my promise."
Then he gave a push to the door of the house bearing the number 18, which
stood ajar, discovered a gloomy-looking staircase, ascended three flights,
perceived a door, then a second door, came upon the string of a bell, and
pulled it. The ringing, which resounded in the apartment before which he
stood, sent a shiver through his frame. The door was opened, and he found
himself facing a young lady very well dressed, a brunette with a fresh
complexion who gazed at him with eyes of astonishment.
He did not know what to say to her, and she who suspected nothing, and
who was waiting for the other, did not invite him to come in. They stood
looking thus at one another for nearly half-a-minute, at the end of which she
said in a questioning tone:
"You have something to tell me Monsieur?" He falteringly replied:
"I am M. Hautot's son."
She gave a start, turned pale, and stammered out as If she had known him
for a long time:
"Monsieur César?"
"Yes."
"And what next?"
"I have come to speak to you on the part of my father."
She articulated:
"Oh my God!"

She then drew back so that he might enter. He shut the door and followed
her into the interior. Then he saw a little boy of four or five years playing
with a cat, seated on a floor in front of a stove, from which rose the steam
of dishes which were being kept hot.
"Take a seat," she said.
He sat down.
She asked:
"Well?"
He no longer ventured to speak, keeping his eyes fixed on the table which
stood in the center of the room, with three covers laid on it, one of which
was for a child. He glanced at the chair which had its back turned to the
fire. They had been expecting him. That was his bread which he saw, and
which he recognized near the fork, for the crust had been removed on
account of Hautot's bad teeth. Then, raising his eyes, he noticed on the wall
his father's portrait, the large photograph taken at Paris the year of the
exhibition, the same as that which hung above the bed in the sleeping
apartment at Ainville.
The young woman again asked:
"Well, Monsieur César?"
He kept staring at her. Her face was livid with anguish; and she waited, her
hands trembling with fear.
Then he took courage.
"Well, Mam'zelle, papa died on Sunday last just after he had opened the
shooting."
She was so much overwhelmed that she did not move. After a silence of a
few seconds, she faltered in an almost inaudible tone:
"Oh! it is not possible!"
Then, on a sudden, tears showed themselves in her eyes, and covering her
face with her hands, she burst out sobbing.

At that point the little boy turned round, and, seeing his mother weeping,
began to howl. Then, realizing that this sudden trouble was brought about
by the stranger, he rushed at César, caught hold of his breeches with one
hand, and with the other hit him with all his strength on the thigh. And
César remained agitated, deeply affected, with this woman mourning for his
father at one side of him, and the little boy defending his mother at the
other. He felt their emotion taking possession of himself, and his eyes were
beginning to brim over with the same sorrow; so, to recover her self-
command, he began to talk:
"Yes," he said, "the accident occurred on Sunday, at eight o'clock—."
And he told, as if she were listening to him, all the facts without forgetting a
single detail, mentioning the most trivial matters with the minuteness of a
countryman. And the child still kept assailing him, making kicks at his
ankles.
When he came to the time at which his father had spoken about her, her
attention was caught by hearing her own name, and, uncovering her face
she said:
"Pardon me! I was not following you; I would like to know—If you did not
mind beginning over again."
He related everything at great length, with stoppages, breaks and reflections
of his own from time to time. She listened to him eagerly now perceiving
with a woman's keen sensibility all the sudden changes of fortune which his
narrative indicated, and trembling with horror, every now and then,
exclaiming:
"Oh, my God!"
The little fellow, believing that she had calmed down, ceased beating César,
in order to catch his mother's hand, and he listened, too, as if he understood.
When the narrative was finished, young Hautot continued:
"Now we will settle matters together in accordance with his wishes."
"Listen: I am well off he has left me plenty of means. I don't want you to
have anything to complain about—"

But she quickly interrupted him.
"Oh, Monsieur César, Monsieur César, not to-day. I am cut to the heart—
another time—another day. No, not to-day. If I accept, listen! 'Tis not for
myself—no, no, no, I swear to you. 'Tis for the child. Besides this provision
will be put to his account."
Thereupon, César scared, divined the truth, and stammering:
"So then—'tis his—the child?"
"Why, yes," she said.
And Hautot, Junior, gazed at his brother with a confused emotion, intense
and painful.
After a lengthened silence, for she had begun to weep afresh, César, quite
embarrassed, went on:
"Well, then, Mam'zelle Donet I am going. When would you wish to talk this
over with me?"
She exclaimed:
"Oh! no, don't go! don't go. Don't leave me all alone with Emile. I would
die of grief. I have no longer anyone, anyone but my child. Oh! what
wretchedness, what wretchedness. Mousieur César! Stop! Sit down again.
You will say something more to me. You will tell me what he was doing
over there all the week."
And César resumed his seat, accustomed to obey.
She drew over another chair for herself in front of the stove, where the
dishes had all this time been simmering, took Emile upon her knees, and
asked César a thousand questions about his father with reference to matters
of an intimate nature, which made him feel without reasoning on the
subject, that she had loved Hautot with all the strength of her frail woman's
heart.
And, by the natural concatenation of his ideas—which were rather limited
in number—he recurred once more to the accident, and set about telling the

story over again with all the same details.
When he said:
"He had a hole in his stomach—you could put your two fists into it."
She gave vent to a sort of shriek, and the tears gushed forth again from her
eyes.
Then seized by the contagion of her grief, César began to weep, too, and as
tears always soften the fibers of the heart, he bent over Emile whose
forehead was close to his own mouth, and kissed him.
The mother, recovering her breath, murmured:
"Poor lad, he is an orphan now!"
"And so am I," said César.
And they ceased to talk.
But suddenly the practical instinct of the housewife, accustomed to be
thoughtful about many things, revived in the young woman's breast.
"You have perhaps taken nothing all the morning, Monsieur César."
"No, Mam'zelle."
"Oh! you must be hungry. You will eat a morsel."
"Thanks," he said, "I am not hungry; I have had too much trouble."
She replied:
"In spite of sorrow, we must live. You will not refuse to let me get
something for you! And then you will remain a little longer. When you are
gone, I don't know what will become of me."
He yielded after some further resistance, and, sitting down with his back to
the fire, facing her, he ate a plateful of tripe, which had been bubbling in the
stove, and drank a glass of red wine. But he would not allow her to uncork
the bottle of white wine. He several times wiped the mouth of the little boy,
who had smeared all his chin with sauce.

As he was rising up to go, he asked:
"When would you like me to come back to speak about this business to you,
Mam'zelle Donet?"
"If it is all the same to you, say next Thursday, Monsieur César. In that way,
I would lose none of my time, as I always have my Thursdays free."
"That will suit me—next Thursday."
"You will come to lunch. Won't you?"
"Oh! On that point I can't give you a promise."
"The reason I suggested is that people can chat better when they are eating.
One has more time too."
"Well, be it so. About twelve o'clock, then."
And he took his departure, after he had again kissed little Emile, and
pressed Mademoiselle Donet's hand.

PART III

The week appeared long to César Hautot. He had never before found
himself alone, and the isolation seemed to him insupportable. Till now, he
had lived at his father's side, just like his shadow, followed him into the
fields, superintended the execution of his orders, and, when they had been a
short time separated, again met him at dinner. They had spent the evenings
smoking their pipes, face to face with one another, chatting about horses,
cows or sheep, and the grip of their hands when they rose up in the morning
might have been regarded as a manifestation of deep family affection on
both sides.
Now César was alone, he went vacantly through the process of dressing the
soil of autumn, every moment expecting to see the tall gesticulating
silhouette of his father rising up at the end of a plain. To kill time, he

entered the houses of his neighbors, told about the accident to all who had
not heard of it, and sometimes repeated it to the others. Then, after he had
finished his occupations and his reflections, he would sit down at the side of
a road, asking himself whether this kind of life was going to last for ever.
He frequently thought of Mademoiselle Donet. He liked her. He considered
her thoroughly respectable, a gentle and honest young woman, as his father
had said. Yes, undoubtedly she was an honest girl. He resolved to act
handsomely towards her, and to give her two thousand francs a year,
settling the capital on the child. He even experienced a certain pleasure in
thinking that he was going to see her on the following Thursday and arrange
this matter with her. And then the notion of this brother, this little chap of
five, who was his father's son, plagued him, annoyed him a little, and, at the
same time, exhibited him. He had, as it were, a family in this brat, sprung
from a clandestine alliance, who would never bear the name of Hautot, a
family which he might take or leave, just as he pleased, but which would
recall his father.
And so, when he saw himself on the road to Rouen on Thursday morning,
carried along by Graindorge trotting with clattering foot-beats, he felt his
heart lighter, more at peace than he had hitherto felt it since his
bereavement.
On entering Mademoiselle Donet's apartment, he saw the table laid as on
the previous Thursday with the sole difference that the crust had not been
removed from the bread. He pressed the young woman's hand, kissed Emile
on the cheeks, and sat down, more at ease than if he were in his own house,
his heart swelling in the same way. Mademoiselle Donet seemed to him a
little thinner and paler. She must have grieved sorely. She wore now an air
of constraint in his presence, as if she understood what she had not felt the
week before under the first blow of her misfortune, and she exhibited an
excessive deference towards him, a mournful humility, and made touching
efforts to please him, as if to pay him back by her attentions for the
kindness he had manifested towards her. They were a long time at lunch
talking over the business, which had brought him there. She did not want so
much money. It was too much. She earned enough to live on herself, but she
only wished that Emile might find a few sous awaiting him when he grew

big. César held out, however, and even added a gift of a thousand francs for
herself for the expense of mourning.
When he had taken his coffee, she asked:
"Do you smoke?"
"Yes—I have my pipe."
He felt in his pocket. Good God! He had forgotten it! He was becoming
quite woebegone about it when she offered him a pipe of his father that had
been shut up in a cupboard. He accepted it, took it up in his hand,
recognized it, smelled it, spoke of its quality in a tone of emotion, filled it
with tobacco, and lighted it. Then, he set Emile astride on his knee, and
made him play the cavalier, while she removed the tablecloth, and put the
soiled plates at one end of the sideboard in order to wash them as soon as he
was gone.
About three o'clock, he rose up with regret, quite annoyed at the thought of
having to go.
"Well! Mademoiselle Donet," he said, "I wish you good evening, and am
delighted to have found you like this."
She remained standing before him, blushing, much affected, and gazed at
him while she thought of the other.
"Shall we not see one another again?" she said.
He replied simply:
"Why, yes, mam'zelle, if it gives you pleasure."
"Certainly, Monsieur César. Will next Thursday suit you then?"
"Yes, Mademoiselle Donet."
"You will come to lunch, of course?"
"Well—if you are so kind as to invite me, I can't refuse."

"It is understood, then, Monsieur César—next Thursday at twelve, the same
as to-day."
"Thursday at twelve, Mam'zelle Donet!"

LITTLE LOUISE ROQUÉ
Mederic Rompel, the postman, who was familiarly called by the country
people Mederi, started at the usual hour from the posthouse at Rouy-le-
Tors. Having passed through the little town with his big strides of an old
trooper, he first cut across the meadows of Villaumes in order to reach the
bank of the Brindelle, which led him along the water's edge to the village of
Carvelin, where his distribution commenced. He went quickly, following
the course of the narrow river, which frothed, murmured, and boiled along
its bed of grass, under an arch of willow-trees. The big stones, impeding the
flow, had around them a cushion of water, a sort of cravat ending in a knot
of foam. In some places, there were cascades, a foot wide, often invisible,
which made under the leaves, under the tendrils, under a roof of verdure, a
big noise at once angry and gentle; then, further on, the banks widened out,
and you saw a small, placid lake where trouts were swimming in the midst
of all that green vegetation which keeps undulating in the depths of tranquil
streams.
Mederic went on without a halt, seeing nothing, and with only this thought
in his mind: "My first letter is for the Poivron family, then I have one for M.
Renardet; so I must cross the wood."
His blue blouse, fastened round his waist by a black leathern belt moved in
a quick, regular fashion above the green hedge of the willow-trees; and his
stick of stout holly kept time with the steady movement of his legs.
Then, he crossed the Brindelle over a bridge formed of a single tree thrown
lengthwise, with a rope attached to two stakes driven into the river's banks
as its only balustrade.
The wood, which belonged to M. Renardet, the Mayor of Carvelin, and the
largest landowner in the district, consisted of a number of huge old trees,
straight as pillars, and extending for about half a league along the left-bank
of the stream which served as a boundary for this immense arch of foliage.
Alongside the water there were large shrubs warmed by the sun; but under

the trees you found nothing but moss, thick, soft, plastic moss, which
exhaled into the stagnant air a light odor of loam with withered branches.
Mederic slackened his pace, took off his black cap adorned with red lace,
and wiped his forehead, for it was by this time hot in the meadows, though
it was not yet eight o'clock in the morning.
He had just recovered from the effects of the heat, and resumed his
accelerated pace when he noticed at the foot of a tree a knife, a child's small
knife. When he picked it up, he discovered a thimble and also a needle-case
not far away.
Having taken up these objects, he thought: "I'll intrust them to the Mayor,"
and he resumed his journey, but now he kept his eyes open expecting to find
something else.
All of a sudden, he drew up stiffly as if he had knocked himself against a
wooden bar; for, ten paces in front of him, lay stretched on her back a little
girl, quite naked, on the moss. She was about twelve years old. Her arms
were hanging down, her legs parted, and her face covered with a
handkerchief. There were little spots of blood on her thighs.
Mederic advanced now on tiptoe, as if he were afraid to make a noise,
apprehended some danger, and he glanced towards the spot uneasily.
What was this? No doubt, she was asleep. Then, he reflected that a person
does not go to sleep thus naked, at half-past seven in the morning under
cool trees. So then she must be dead; and he must be face to face with a
crime. At this thought, a cold shiver ran through his frame, although he was
an old soldier. And then a murder was such a rare thing in the country, and
above all the murder of a child, that he could not believe his eyes. But she
had no wound—nothing save this blood stuck on her leg. How, then, had
she been killed?
He stopped quite near her; and he stared at her, while he leaned on his stick.
Certainly, he knew her, as he knew all the inhabitants of the district; but, not
being able to get a look at her face, he could not guess her name. He
stooped forward in order to take off the handkerchief which covered her
face, then paused with outstretched hand, restrained by an idea that
occurred to him.

Had he the right to disarrange anything in the condition of the corpse before
the magisterial investigation? He pictured justice to himself as a kind of
general whom nothing escapes, and who attaches as much importance to a
lost button as to a stab of a knife in the stomach. Perhaps under this
handkerchief evidence to support a capital charge could be found; in fact if
there were sufficient proof there to secure a conviction, it might lost its
value, if touched by an awkward hand.
Then, he raised himself with the intention of hastening towards the Mayor's
residence, but again another thought held him back. If the little girl was still
alive, by any chance, he could not leave her lying there in this way. He sank
on his knees very gently, a little bit away from her through precaution, and
extended his hand towards her feet. It was icy cold, with the terrible
coldness which makes the dead flesh frightful, and which leaves us no
longer in doubt. The letter-carrier, as he touched her, felt his heart in his
mouth, as he said to himself afterwards and his lips were parched with dry
spittle. Rising up abruptly he rushed off under the trees towards M.
Renardet's house.
He walked on in double-quick time, with his stick under his arm, his hands
clenched, and his head thrust forward, and his leathern bag, filled with
letters and newspapers, kept regularly flapping at his side.
The Mayor's residence was at the end of the wood which he used as a park,
and one side of it was washed by a little pool formed at this spot by the
Brindelle.
It was a big, square house of gray stone, very old, which had stood many a
siege in former days, and at the end of it was a huge tower, twenty meters
high, built in the water.
From the top of this fortress the entire country around it could be seen in
olden times. It was called the Fox's tower, without anyone knowing exactly
why; and from this appellation, no doubt, had come the name Renardet,
borne by the owners of this fief, which had remained in the same family, it
was said, for more than two hundred years. For the Renardets formed part
of the upper middle class all but noble to be met with so often in the
provinces before the Revolution.

The postman dashed into the kitchen where the servants were taking
breakfast, and exclaimed:
"Is the Mayor up? I want to speak to him at once."
Mederic was recognized as a man of weight and authority, and it was soon
understood that something serious had happened.
As soon as word was brought to M. Renardet, he ordered the postman to be
sent up to him. Pale and out of breath, with his cap in his hand, Mederic
found the Mayor seated in front of a long table covered with scattered
papers.
He was a big, tall man, heavy and red-faced, strong as an ox and was
greatly liked in the district, though of an excessively violent disposition.
Very nearly forty years old, and a widower for the past six months, he lived
on his estate like a country gentleman. His choleric temperament had often
brought him into trouble, from which the magistrates of Rouy-le-Tors, like
indulgent and prudent friends, had extricated him. Had he not one day
thrown the conductor of the diligence from the top of his seat because he
was near crushing his retriever, Micmac? Had he not broken the ribs of a
gamekeeper, who abused him for having, with a gun in his hand, passed
through a neighbor's property? Had he not even caught by the collar the
sub-prefect, who stopped in the village in the course of an administrative
round described by M. Renardet as an electioneering round; for he was
against the government, according to his family tradition.
The Mayor asked:
"What's the matter now, Mederic?"
"I found a little girl dead in your wood."
Renardet rose up, with his face the color of brick.
"Do you say—a little girl?"
"Yes, m'sieur, a little girl, quite naked, on her back, with blood on her, dead
—quite dead!"
The Mayor gave vent to an oath:

"My God, I'd make a bet 'tis little Louise Roqué! I have just learned that she
did not go home to her mother last night. Where did you find her?"
The postman pointed out where the place was, gave full details, and offered
to conduct the Mayor to the spot.
But Renardet became brusque:
"No, I don't need you. Send the steward, the Mayor's secretary, and the
doctor immediately to me, and resume your rounds. Quick, quick, go and
tell them to meet me in the woods."
The letter-carrier, a man used to discipline, obeyed and withdrew, angry and
grieved at not being able to be present at the investigation.
The Mayor, in his turn, prepared to go out, took his hat, a big soft hat, and
paused for a few seconds on the threshold of his abode. In front of him
stretched a wide sward, in which three large patches were conspicuous—
three large beds of flowers in full bloom, one facing the house and the
others at either side of it. Further on, rose skyward the principal trees in the
wood, while at the left, above the Brindelle widened into a pool, could be
seen long meadows, an entirely green flat sweep of the country, cut by dikes
and willow edges like monsters, twisted dwarf-trees, always cut short, and
having on their thick squat trunks a quivering tuft of thick branches.
At the right, behind the stables, the outhouses, all the buildings connected
with the property, might be seen the village, which was wealthy, being
mainly inhabited by rearers of oxen.
Renardet slowly descended the steps in front of his house, and turning to
the left, gained the water's edge, which he followed at a slow pace, his hand
behind his back. He went on with bent head, and from time to time he
glanced round in search of the persons for whom he had sent.
When he stood beneath the trees, he stopped, took off his hat, and wiped his
forehead as Mederic had done; for the burning sun was falling in fiery rain
upon the ground. Then the Mayor resumed his journey, stopped once more,
and retraced his steps. Suddenly, stooping down, he steeped his
handkerchief in the stream that glided at his feet, and stretched it round his
head, under his hat. Drops of water flowed along his temples over his ears

always purple over his strong red neck, and made their way, one after the
other, under his white shirt-collar.
As nobody yet appeared he began tapping with his foot, then he called out
—
"Hallo! Hallo!"
A voice at his right, answered:
"Hallo! Hallo!"
And the doctor appeared under the trees. He was a thin little man, an ex-
military surgeon, who passed in the neighborhood for a very skillful
practitioner. He limped, having been wounded while in the service, and had
to use a stick to assist him in walking.
Next came the steward and the Mayor's secretary, who, having been sent for
at the same time, arrived together. They looked scared, and hurried forward
out of breath, walking and trotting in turn in order to hasten their progress,
and moving their arms up and down so vigorously that they seemed to do
more work with them than with their legs.
Renardet said to the doctor:
"You know what the trouble is about?"
"Yes, a child found dead in the wood by Mederic."
"That's quite correct. Come on."
They walked on side by side, followed by the two men.
Their steps made no noise on the moss, their eyes were gazing downward
right in front of them.
The doctor hastened his steps, interested by the discovery. As soon as they
were near the corpse, he bent down to examine it without touching it. He
had put on a pair of glasses, as when one is looking at some curious object,
and turned round very quietly.
He said without rising up:

"Violated and assassinated, as we are going to prove presently. This little
girl moreover, is almost a woman—look at her throat."
Her two breasts, already nearly full-developed, fell over her chest, relaxed
by death.
The doctor lightly drew away the handkerchief which covered her face. It
looked black, frightful, the tongue protruding, the eyes bloodshot. He went
on:
"Faith, she was strangled the moment the deed was done."
He felt her neck:
"Strangled with the hands without leaving any special trace, neither the
mark of the nails nor the imprint of the fingers. Quite right. It is little Louise
Roqué, sure enough!"
He delicately replaced the handkerchief:
"There's nothing for me to do—She's been dead for the last hour at least.
We must give notice of the matter to the authorities."
Renardet, standing up, with his hands behind his back, kept staring with a
stony look at the little body exposed to view on the grass. He murmured:
"What a wretch! We must find the clothes."
The doctor felt the hands, the arms, the legs. He said:
"She must have been bathing, no doubt. They ought to be at the water's
edge."
The Mayor thereupon gave directions:
"Do you, Princépe" (this was his secretary), "go and look for those clothes
for me along the river. Do you, Maxime" (this was the steward), "hurry on
towards Roug-le-Tors, and bring on here to me the examining magistrate
with the gendarmes. They must be here within an hour. You understand."
The two men quickly departed, and Renardet said to the doctor:

"What miscreant has been able to do such a deed in this part of the country."
The doctor murmured:
"Who knows? Everyone is capable of that? Everyone in particular and
nobody in general. No matter, it must be some prowler, some workman out
of employment. As we live under a Republic, we must expect to meet only
this kind of person along the roads."
Both of them were Bonapartists.
The Mayor went on:
"Yes, it can only be a stranger, a passer-by, a vagabond without heart or
home."
The doctor added with the shadow of a smile on his face:
"And without a wife. Having neither a good supper nor a good bed, he
procured the rest for himself. You can't tell how many men there may be in
the world capable of a crime at a given moment. Did you know that this
little girl had disappeared?"
And with the end of his stick he touched one after the other the stiffened
fingers of the corpse, resting on them as on the keys of a piano.
"Yes, the mother came last night to look for me about nine o'clock, the child
not having come home from supper up to seven. We went to try and find her
along the roads up to midnight, but we did not think of the wood. However,
we needed daylight to carry out a search with a practical result."
"Will you have a cigar?" said the doctor.
"Thanks, I don't care to smoke. It gives me a turn to look at this."
They both remained standing in front of this corpse of a young girl, so pale,
on the dark moss. A big fly with a blue belly that was walking along one of
the thighs, stopped at the bloodstains, went on again, always rising higher,
ran along the side with his lively, jerky movements, climbed up one of the
breasts, then came back again to explore the other, looking out for

something to drink on this dead girl. The two men kept watching this
wandering black speck.
The doctor said:
"How pretty it is, a fly on the skin! The ladies of the last century had good
reason to paste them on their faces. Why has this fashion gone out?"
The Mayor seemed not to hear, plunged as he was in deep thought.
But, all of a sudden, he turned round, for he was surprised by a shrill noise.
A woman in a cap and a blue apron rushed up under the trees. It was the
mother, La Roqué. As soon as she saw Renardet she began to shriek:
"My little girl, where's my little girl?" in such a distracted manner that she
did not glance down at the ground. Suddenly, she saw the corpse, stopped
short, clasped her hands, and raised both her arms while she uttered a sharp,
heartrending cry—the cry of a mutilated animal. Then she rushed towards
the body, fell on her knees, and took off, as if she would have snatched it
away, the handkerchief that covered the face. When she saw that frightful
countenance, black and convulsed, she rose up with a shudder, then pressed
her face against the ground, giving vent to terrible and continuous screams
with her mouth close to the thick moss.
Her tall, thin frame, to which her clothes were clinging tightly, was
palpitating, shaken with convulsions. They could see her bony ankles and
her dried up calves covered with thick blue stockings, shivering horribly;
and she went digging the soil with her crooked fingers as if in order to make
a hole there to hide herself in it.
The doctor moved, said in a low tone:
"Poor old woman!"
Renardet felt a strange rumbling in his stomach; then he gave vent to a sort
of loud sneeze that issued at the same time through his nose and through his
mouth; and, drawing his handkerchief from his pocket, he began to weep
internally, coughing, sobbing, and wiping his face noisily.
He stammered—

"Damn—damn—damned pig to do this! I would like to see him
guillotined."
But Princépe reappeared, with his hands empty. He murmured—
"I have found nothing, M'sieu le Maire, nothing at all anywhere."
The doctor, scared, replied in a thick voice, drowned in tears:
"What is that you could not find?"
"The little girl's clothes."
"Well—well—look again, and find them—or you'll have to answer to me."
The man, knowing that the Mayor would not brook opposition, set forth
again with hesitating steps, casting on the corpse indirect and timid glances.
Distant voices arose under the trees, a confused sound, the noise of an
approaching crowd; for Mederic had, in the course of his rounds carried the
news from door to door. The people of the neighborhood, stupefied at first,
had gone chatting from their own firesides into the street, from one
threshold to another. Then they gathered together. They talked over,
discussed, and commented on the event for some minutes, and they had
now come to see it for themselves.
They arrived in groups a little faltering and uneasy through fear of the first
impression of such a scene on their minds. When they saw the body they
stopped, not daring to advance, and speaking low. They grew bold, went on
a few steps, stopped again, advanced once more, and soon they formed
around the dead girl, her mother, the doctor, and Renardet, a thick circle,
agitated and noisy, which crushed forward under the sudden pushes of the
last comers. And now they touched the corpse. Some of them even bent
down to feel it with their fingers. The doctor kept them back. But the
mayor, waking abruptly out of his torpor, broke into a rage, and, seizing Dr.
Labarbe's stick, flung himself on his townspeople, stammering:
"Clear out—clear out—you pack of brutes—clear out!"
And in a second, the crowd of sightseers had fallen back two hundred
meters.

La Roqué was lifted up, turned round, and placed in a sitting posture, and
she now remained weeping with her hands clasped over her face.
The occurrence was discussed among the crowd; and young lads' eager eyes
curiously scrutinized this naked body of a girl. Renardet perceived this, and
abruptly taking off his vest, he flung it over the little girl, who was entirely
lost to view under the wide garment.
The spectators drew near quietly. The wood was filled with people, and a
continuous hum of voices rose up under the tangled foliage of the tall trees.
The Mayor, in his shirt sleeves, remained standing, with his stick in his
hands, in a fighting attitude. He seemed exasperated by this curiosity on the
part of the people, and kept repeating:
"If one of you come nearer, I'll break his head just as I would a dog's."
The peasants were greatly afraid of him. They held back. Dr. Labarbe, who
was smoking, sat down beside La Roqué, and spoke to her in order to
distract her attention. The old woman soon removed her hands from her
face, and she replied with a flood of tearful words, emptying her grief in
copious talk. She told the whole story of her life, her marriage, the death of
her man, a bullsticker, who had been gored to death, the infancy of her
daughter, her wretched existence as a widow without resources and with a
child to support. She had only this one, her little Louise, and the child had
been killed—killed in this wood. All of a sudden, she felt anxious to see it
again, and dragging herself on her knees towards the corpse, she raised up
one corner of the garment that covered her; then she let it fall again, and
began wailing once more. The crowd remained silent, eagerly watching all
the mother's gestures.
But all of a sudden, a great swaying movement took place, and there was a
cry of "the gendarmes! the gendarmes!"
The gendarmes appeared in the distance, coming on at a rapid trot,
escorting their captain and a little gentleman with red whiskers, who was
bobbing up and down like a monkey on a big white mare.
The steward had just found M. Putoin, the examining magistrate, at the
moment when he was mounting his horse to take his daily ride, for he posed

as a good horseman to the great amusement of the officers.
He alighted along with the captain, and passed the hands of the Mayor and
the Doctor, casting a ferret-like glance on the linen vest which swelled
above the body lying underneath.
When he was thoroughly acquainted with the facts, he first gave orders to
get rid of the public, whom the gendarmes drove out of the wood, but who
soon reappeared in the meadow, and formed a hedge, a big hedge of excited
and moving heads all along the Brindelle, on the other side of the stream.
The doctor in his turn, gave explanations, of which Renardet took a note in
his memorandum book. All the evidence was given, taken down, and
commented on without leading to any discovery. Maxime, too, came back
without having found any trace of the clothes.
This disappearance surprised everybody; no one could explain it on the
theory of theft, and as these rags were not worth twenty sous, even this
theory was inadmissible.
The examining magistrate, the mayor, the captain, and the doctor, set to
work by searching in pairs, putting aside the smallest branches along the
water.
Renardet said to the judge:
"How does it happen that this wretch has concealed or carried away the
clothes, and has thus left the body exposed in the open air and visible to
everyone?"
The other, sly and knowing, answered:
"Ha! Ha! Perhaps a dodge? This crime has been committed either by a brute
or by a crafty blackguard. In any case we'll easily succeed in finding him."
The rolling of a vehicle made them turn their heads round. It was the deputy
magistrate, the doctor and the registrar of the court who had arrived in their
turn. They resumed their searches, all chatting in an animated fashion.
Renardet said suddenly:

"Do you know that I am keeping you to lunch with me?"
Everyone smilingly accepted the invitation, and the examining magistrate,
finding that the case of little Louise Roqué was quite enough to bother
about for one day, turned towards the Mayor:
"I can have the body brought to your house, can I not? You have a room in
which you can keep it for me till this evening."
The other got confused, and stammered:
"Yes—no—no. To tell the truth, I prefer that it should not come into my
house on account of—on account of my servants who are already talking
about ghosts in—in my tower, in the Fox's tower. You know—I could no
longer keep a single one. No—I prefer not to have it in my house."
The magistrate began to smile:
"Good! I am going to get it carried off at once to Roug, for the legal
examination."
Turning towards the door:
"I can make use of your trap can I not?"
"Yes, certainly."
Everybody came back to the place where the corpse lay. La Roqué now,
seated beside her daughter, had caught hold of her head, and was staring
right before her, with a wandering listless eye.
The two doctors endeavored to lead her away, so that she might not witness
the dead girl's removal; but she understood at once what they wanted to do,
and, flinging herself on the body, she seized it in both arms. Lying on top of
the corpse, she exclaimed:
"You shall not have it—'tis mine—'tis mine now. They have killed her on
me, and I want to keep her—you shall not have her—!"
All the men, affected and not knowing how to act, remained standing
around her. Renardet fell on his knees, and said to her: