IN THE CATHEDRAL

I awoke with the dawn, and, dressing, looked out of the window,

seeing the brindled light spread over the battered roofs and ruins

of the Lower Town. A bell was calling to prayers in the Jesuit

College not far away, and bugle-calls told of the stirring

garrison. Soldiers and stragglers passed down the street near by,

and a few starved peasants crept about the cathedral with downcast

eyes, eager for crumbs that a well-fed soldier might cast aside.

Yet I knew that in the Intendant's Palace and among the officers

of the army there was abundance, with revelry and dissipation.

Presently I drew to the trap-door of my loft, and, raising it

gently, came down the ladder to the little hallway, and softly

opened the door of the room where Labrouk's body lay. Candles

were burning at his head and his feet, and two peasants sat dozing

in chairs near by. I could see Labrouk's face plainly in the

flickering light: a rough, wholesome face it was, refined by death,

yet unshaven and unkempt, too. Here was work for Voban's shears and

razor. Presently there was a footstep behind me, and, turning, I

saw in the half-light the widowed wife.

"Madame," said I in a whisper, "I too weep with you. I pray for

as true an end for myself."

"He was of the true faith, thank the good God," she said

sincerely. She passed into the room, and the two watchers, after

taking refreshment, left the house. Suddenly she hastened to the

door, called one back, and, pointing to the body, whispered

something. The peasant nodded and turned away. She came back into

the room, stood looking at the face of the dead man for a moment,

and bent over and kissed the crucifix clasped in the cold hands.

Then she stepped about the room, moving a chair and sweeping up a

speck of dust in a mechanical way. Presently, as if she again

remembered me, she asked me to enter the room. Then she bolted the

outer door of the house. I stood looking at the body of her husband,

and said, "Were it not well to have Voban the barber?"

"I have sent for him and for Gabord," she replied. "Gabord was

Jean's good friend. He is with General Montcalm. The Governor put

him in prison because of the marriage of Mademoiselle Duvarney, but

Monsieur Doltaire set him free, and now he serves General Montcalm.

"I have work in the cathedral," continued the poor woman, "and I

shall go to it this morning as I have always gone. There is a

little unused closet in a gallery where you may hide, and still see

all that happens. It is your last look at the lady, and I will give

it to you, as you gave me to know of my Jean."

"My last look?" I asked eagerly.

"She goes into the nunnery to-morrow, they say," was the reply.

"Her marriage is to be set aside by the bishop to-day--in the

cathedral. This is her last night to live as such as I--but no,

she will be happier so."

"Madame," said I, "I am a heretic, but I listened when your

husband said, 'Mon grand homme de Calvaire, bon soir!' Was the

cross less a cross because a heretic put it to his lips? Is a

marriage less a marriage because a heretic is the husband? Madame,

you loved your Jean; if he were living now, what would you do to

keep him. Think, madame, is not love more than all?"

She turned to the dead body. "Mon petit Jean!" she

murmured, but made no reply to me, and for many minutes the room

was silent. At last she turned, and said, "You must come at once,

for soon the priests will be at the church. A little later I will

bring you some breakfast, and you must not stir from there till I

come to fetch you--no."

"I wish to see Voban," said I.

She thought a moment. "I will try to fetch him to you by-and-bye,"

she said. She did not speak further, but finished the sentence by

pointing to the body.

Presently, hearing footsteps, she drew me into another little

room. "It is the grandfather," she said. "He has forgotten you

already, and he must not see you again."

We saw the old man hobble into the room we had left, carrying in

one arm Jean's coat and hat. He stood still, and nodded at the body

and mumbled to himself; then he went over and touched the hands and

forehead, nodding wisely; after which he came to his armchair, and,

sitting down, spread the coat over his knees, put the cap on it,

and gossiped with himself:

"In eild our idle fancies all return,

The mind's eye cradled by the open grave."

A moment later, the woman passed from the rear of the house to

the vestry door of the cathedral. After a minute, seeing no one

near, I followed, came to the front door, entered, and passed up a

side aisle towards the choir. There was no one to be seen, but soon

the woman came out of the vestry and beckoned to me nervously. I

followed her quick movements, and was soon in a narrow stairway,

coming, after fifty steps or so, to a sort of cloister, from which

we went into a little cubiculum, or cell, with a wooden lattice

door which opened on a small gallery. Through the lattices the

nave amid choir could be viewed distinctly.

Without a word the woman turned and left me, and I sat down on a

little stone bench and waited. I saw the acolytes come and go,

and priests move back and forth before the altar; I smelt the

grateful incense as it rose when mass was said; I watched the people

gather in little clusters at the different shrines, or seek the

confessional, or kneel to receive the blessed sacrament. Many who

came were familiar--among them Mademoiselle Lucie Lotbiniere. Lucie

prayed long before a shrine of the Virgin, and when she rose at last

her face bore signs of weeping. Also I noticed her suddenly start as

she moved down the aisle, for a figure came forward from seclusion

and touched her arm. As he half turned I saw that it was Juste

Duvarney. The girl drew back from him, raising her hand as if in

protest, and it struck me that her grief and her repulse of him had

to do with putting Alixe away into a nunnery.

I sat hungry and thirsty for quite three hours, and then the

church became empty, and only an old verger kept a seat by the

door, half asleep, though the artillery of both armies was at work,

and the air was laden with the smell of powder. (Until this time

our batteries had avoided firing on the churches.) At last I heard

footsteps near me in the dark stairway, and I felt for my pistols,

for the feet were not those of Labrouk's wife. I waited anxiously,

and was overjoyed to see Voban enter my hiding-place, bearing some

food. I greeted him warmly, but he made little demonstration. He

was like one who, occupied with some great matter, passed through

the usual affairs of life with a distant eye. Immediately he

handed me a letter, saying:

"M'sieu', I give my word to hand you this--in a day or a year,

as I am able. I get your message to me this morning, and then I

come to care for Jean Labrouk, and so I find you here, and I

give the letter. It come to me last night."

The letter was from Alixe. I opened it with haste, and, in the

dim light, read:

MY BELOVED HUSBAND: Oh, was there no power in earth or heaven to

bring me to your arms to-day?

To-morow they come to see my marriage annulled by the Church.

And every one will say it is annulled--every one but me. I, in

God's name, will say no, though it break my heart to oppose

myself to them all.

Why did my brother come back? He has been hard--O, Robert, he

has been hard upon me, and yet I was ever kind to him! My father,

too, he listens to the Church, and, though he likes not Monsieur

Doltaire, he works for him in a hundred ways without seeing it.

I, alas! see it too well, and my brother is as wax in monsieur's

hands. Juste loves Lucie Lotbiniere--that should make him kind.

She, sweet friend, does not desert me, but is kept from me. She

says she will not yield to Juste's suit until he yields to me.

If--oh, if Madame Jamond had not gone to Montreal!

...As I was writing the foregoing sentence, my father asked to

see me, and we have had a talk--ah, a most bitter talk!

"Alixe," said he, "this is our last evening together, and I

would have it peaceful."

"My father," said I, "it is not my will that this evening be our

last; and for peace, I long for it with all my heart."

He frowned, and answered, "You have brought me trouble and

sorrow. Mother of God! was it not possible for you to be as

your sister Georgette? I gave her less love, yet she honours

me more."

"She honours you, my father, by a sweet, good life, and by marriage

into an honourable family, and at your word she gives her hand to

Monsieur Auguste de la Darante. She marries to your pleasure,

therefore she has peace and your love. I marry a man of my own

choosing, a bitterly wronged gentleman, and you treat me as some

wicked thing. Is that like a father who loves his child?"

"The wronged gentleman, as you call him, invaded that which is

the pride of every honest gentleman," he said.

"And what is that?" asked I quietly, though I felt the blood

beating at my temples.

"My family honour, the good name and virtue of my daughter."

I got to my feet, and looked my father in the eyes with an anger

and a coldness that hurts me now when I think of it, and I said, "I

will not let you speak so to me. Friendless though I be, you shall

not. You have the power to oppress me, but you shall not slander me

to my face. Can not you leave insults to my enemies?"

"I will never leave you to the insults of this mock marriage,"

answered he, angrily also. "Two days hence I take command of five

thousand burghers, and your brother Juste serves with General

Montcalm. There is to be last fighting soon between us and the

English. I do not doubt of the result, but I may fall, and your

brother also, and, should the English win, I will not leave you to

him you call your husband. Therefore you shall be kept safe where

no alien hands may reach you. The Church will hold you close."

I calmed myself again while listening to him, and I asked, "Is

there no other way?"

He shook his head.

"Is there no Monsieur Doltaire?" said I. "He has a king's blood

in his veins!"

He looked sharply at me. "You are mocking," he replied. "No, no,

that is no way, either. Monsieur Doltaire must never mate with

daughter of mine. I will take care of that; the Church is a perfect

if gentle jailer."

I could bear it no longer. I knelt to him. I begged him to have

pity on me. I pleaded with him; I recalled the days when, as a

child, I sat upon his knee and listened to the wonderful tales he

told; I begged him, by the memory of all the years when he and I

were such true friends to be kind to me now, to be merciful--even

though he thought I had done wrong--to be merciful. I asked him to

remember that I was a motherless girl, and that if I had missed the

way to happiness he ought not to make my path bitter to the end. I

begged him to give me back his love and confidence, and, if I must

for evermore be parted from you, to let me be with him, not to put

me away into a convent.

Oh, how my heart leaped when I saw his face soften! "Well,

well," he said, "if I live, you shall be taken from the convent;

but for the present, till this fighting is over, it is the only

safe place. There, too, you shall be safe from Monsieur

Doltaire."

It was poor comfort. "But should you be killed, and the English

take Quebec?" said I.

"When I am dead," he answered, "when I am dead, then there is

your brother."

"And if he speaks for Monsieur Doltaire?" asked I.

"There is the Church and God always," he answered.

"And my own husband, the man who saved your life, my father," I

urged gently; and when he would have spoken I threw myself into his

arms--the first time in such long, long weeks!--and, stopping his

lips with my fingers, burst into tears on his breast. I think much

of his anger against me passed, yet before he left he said he could

not now prevent the annulment of the marriage, even if he would,

for other powers were at work; which powers I supposed to be the

Governor, for certain reasons of enmity to my father and me--alas!

how changed is he, the vain old man!--and Monsieur Doltaire, whose

ends I knew so well. So they will unwed us to-morrow, Robert; but

be sure that I shall never be unwed in my own eyes, and that I will

wait till I die, hoping you will come and take me--oh, Robert, my

husband--take me home.

If I had one hundred men, I would fight my way out of this city,

and to you; but, dear, I have none, not even Gabord, who is not let

come near me. There is but Voban. Yet he will bear you this, if it

be possible, for he comes to-night to adorn my fashionable brother.

The poor Mathilde I have not seen of late. She has vanished. When

they began to keep me close, and carried me off at last into the

country, where we were captured by the English, I could not see

her, and my heart aches for her.

God bless you, Robert, and farewell. How we shall smile, when

all this misery is done! Oh, say we shall, say we shall smile, and

all this misery cease. Will you not take me home? Do you still

love thy wife, thy