laborer’s appetite, yet stopping to cut off the more tender morsels
for his companion, who persisted in refusing them and contented
herself with a few chestnuts.
“Tell me, little Marie,” he went on, seeing that she had no
intention of answering him, “have you never thought of marrying?
Yet you are old enough?”
“Perhaps,” she said, “but I am too poor. I need at least a hundred
crowns to marry, and I must work five or six years to scrape them
together.”
“Poor girl, I wish Father Maurice were willing to give me a hundred
crowns to make you a present of.”
“Thank you kindly, Germain. What do you suppose people would say of
me?”
“What do you wish them to say of you? They know very well that I am
too old to marry you. They would never believe that I--that you--”
“Look, Germain, your child is waking up,” said little Marie.
[Illustration: (Ornament)]
VIII
The Evening Prayer
Petit-Pierre had raised his head and was looking about him with a
thoughtful air.
“Oh, that is the way he always does, whenever he hears the sound of
eating,” said Germain. “The explosion of a cannon would not rouse
him, but if you work your jaws near him, he opens his eyes at once.”
“You must have been just like him at his age,” said little Marie,
with a sly smile. “See! my Petit-Pierre, you are looking for your
canopy. To-night it is made all of green, my child; but your father
eats his supper none the less. Do you wish to sup with him? I have
not eaten your share; I thought that you might claim it.”
“Marie, I wish you to eat,” cried the husbandman; “I shall not
touch another morsel. I am a greedy glutton. You are depriving
yourself for our sake. It is not fair. I am ashamed. It takes away
all my appetite. I will not have my son eat his supper unless you
take some too.”
“Leave us alone,” said little Marie; “you have not the key to our
appetites. Mine is tight shut to-day, but your Pierre’s is as wide
open as a little wolf’s. Just see how he seizes his food. He will
be a strong workman too, some day!”
In truth, Petit-Pierre showed very soon whose son he was, and
though scarcely awake and wholly at a loss to know where he was and
how he had come there, he began to eat ravenously. As soon as his
hunger was appeased, feeling excited as children do who break loose
from their wonted habits, he had more wit, more curiosity, and more
good sense than usual. He made them explain to him where he was,
and when he found that he was in the midst of a forest, he grew a
little frightened.
“Are there wicked beasts in this forest?” he demanded of his father.
“No, none at all. Don’t be afraid.”
“Then you told a story when you said that if I went with you into
the great forest, the wolves would carry me off.”
“Just see this logician,” said Germain, embarrassed.
“He is right,” replied little Marie. “That is what you told him. He
has a good memory, and has not forgotten. But, little Pierre, you
must learn that your father never tells a story. We passed through
the big forest whilst you were sleeping, and now we are in the
small forest where there are no wicked beasts.”
“Is the little forest very far away from the big one?”
“Far enough; besides, the wolves never go out of the big forest.
And then, if some of them should come here, your father would kill
them.”
“And you too, little Marie?”
“Yes, we, too, for you would help also, my Pierre. You are not
frightened, are you? You would beat them soundly?”
“Yes, indeed, I would,” said the child, proudly, as he struck a
heroic attitude; “we would kill them.”
“There is nobody like you for talking to children and for making
them listen to reason,” said Germain to little Marie. “To be sure,
it is not long ago since you were a small child yourself, and you
have not forgotten what your mother used to say to you. I believe
that the younger one is, the better one gets on with children. I am
very much afraid that a woman of thirty who does not yet know what
it is to be a mother, would find it hard to prattle to children and
reason with them.”
“Why, Germain? I don’t know why you have such a bad idea of this
woman; you will change your mind.”
“The devil take the woman!” exclaimed Germain. “I wish I were going
away from her forever. What do I want of a wife whom I don’t know?”
“Little father,” said the child, “why is it that you speak so much
of your wife to-day, since she is dead?”
“Then you have not forgotten your poor, dear mother?”
“No; for I saw her placed in a beautiful box of white wood, and my
grandmother led me up to her to kiss her and say good-by. She was
very white and very stiff, and every evening my aunt made me pray
God that she might go to him in Heaven and be warm. Do you think
that she is there now?”
“I hope so, my child; but you must always pray. It shows your
mother that you love her.”
“I am going to say my prayers,” answered the boy. “I forgot them
to-night. But I can’t say them all alone, for I always forget
something. Little Marie must help me.”
“Yes, my Pierre, I will help you,” said the young girl. “Come and
kneel down in my lap.”
The child knelt down on the girl’s skirt. He clasped his little
hands and began to say his prayers, at first with great care and
earnestness, for he knew the beginning very well, then slowly
and with more hesitation, and finally repeating word by word
after Marie, when he came to that place in his prayer where sleep
overtook him so invariably that he had never been able to learn the
end. This time again the effort of close attention and the monotony
of his own accent produced their wonted effect. He pronounced the
last syllables with great difficulty, and only after they were
thrice repeated.
His head grew heavy and fell on Marie’s breast; his hands
unclasped, divided, and fell open on his knees. By the light of the
camp-fire, Germain watched his little darling hushed at the heart
of the young girl, who, as she held him in her arms and warmed his
fair hair with her sweet breath, had herself fallen into a holy
reverie, and prayed in quiet for the soul of Catherine.
Germain was touched. He tried to express to little Marie the
grateful esteem which he felt for her, but he could find no fitting
words.
He approached her to kiss his son, whom she held close to her
breast, and he could scarcely raise his lips from little Pierre’s
brow.
“You kiss too hard,” said Marie, gently pushing away the
husbandman’s head. “You will wake him. Let me put him back to bed,
for the boy has left us already for dreams of paradise.”
The child allowed Marie to lay him down, but feeling the goatskin
on the saddle, he asked if he were on the gray. Then opening his
big blue eyes, and keeping them fixed on the branches for a minute,
he seemed to be dreaming, wide-awake as he was, or to be struck
with an idea which had slipped his mind during the daytime, and
only assumed a distinct form at the approach of sleep.
“Little father,” said he, “if you wish to give me a new mother, I
hope it will be little Marie.”
And without waiting for an answer, he closed his eyes and slept.
[Illustration: (Ornament)]
IX
Despite the Cold
Little Marie seemed to give no more heed to the child’s odd words
than to regard them as a proof of friendship. She wrapped him
up with care, stirred the fire, and as the fog resting on the
neighboring pool gave no sign of lifting, she advised Germain to
lie near the fire and take a nap.
“I see that you are sleepy already,” said she, “for you don’t say a
word and you gaze into the fire, just as your little boy was doing.”
“It is you who must sleep,” answered the husbandman, “and I will
take care of both of you, for I have never felt less sleepy than I
do now. I have fifty things to think of.”
“Fifty is a great many,” said the little girl, with a mocking
accent. “There are lots of people who would be delighted to have
one.”
“Well, if I am too stupid to have fifty, I have one, at least,
which has not left me for the past hour.”
“And I shall tell it to you as well as I told you those you thought
of before.”
“Yes, do tell me if you know, Marie. Tell me yourself. I shall be
glad to hear.”
“An hour ago,” she answered, “your idea was to eat--and now it is
to sleep.”
“Marie, I am only an ox-driver, but, upon my word, you take me for
an ox. You are very perverse, and it is easy to see that you do not
care to talk to me, so go to sleep. That will be better than to
pick flaws in a man who is out of sorts.”
“If you wish to talk, let’s talk,” said the girl, half reclining
near the child and resting her head against the saddle. “You
torment yourself, Germain, and you do not show much courage for a
man. What wouldn’t I say if I didn’t do my best to fight my own
troubles?”
“Yes, that’s very true, and that’s just what I am thinking of,
my poor child. You are going to live, away from your friends, in
a horrid country full of moors and fens, where you will catch the
autumn fevers. Sheep do not pay well there, and this is always
discouraging for a shepherdess if she means well. Then you will be
surrounded by strangers who may not be kind to you and will not
know how much you are worth. It makes me more sorry than I can tell
you, and I have a great desire to take you home to your mother
instead of going on to Fourche.”
“You talk very kindly, but there is no reason for your misgivings,
my poor Germain. You ought not to lose heart on your friend’s
account, and instead of showing me the dark side of my lot, you
should show me the bright side, as you did after lunch at Rebec’s.”
“What can I do? That’s the way it appeared to me then, and now my
ideas are changed. It is best for you to take a husband.”
“That cannot be, Germain, and as it is out of the question, I think
no more about it.”
“Yet such a thing might happen. Perhaps if you told me what kind of
a man you want, I might imagine somebody.”
“Imagining is not finding. For myself, I never imagine, for it does
no good.”
“You are not looking for a rich man?”
“Certainly not, for I am as poor as Job.”
“But if he were comfortably off, you wouldn’t be sorry to have a
good house, and good food, and good clothes, and to live with an
honest family who would allow you to help your mother.”
“Oh, yes indeed! It is my own wish to help my mother.”
“And if this man were to turn up, you would not be too hard to
please, even if he were not so very young.”
“Ah! There you must excuse me, Germain. That is just the point I
insist on. I could never love an old man.”
“An old man, of course not; but a man of my age, for example!”
“Your age is too old for me, Germain. I should like Bastien’s age,
though Bastien is not so good-looking as you.”
“Should you rather have Bastien, the swineherd?” said Germain,
indignantly. “A fellow with eyes shaped like those of the pigs he
drives!”
“I could excuse his eyes, because he is eighteen.”
Germain felt terribly jealous.
“Well,” said he, “it’s clear that you want Bastien, but, none the
less, it’s a queer idea.”
“Yes, that would be a queer idea,” answered little Marie, bursting
into shouts of laughter, “and he would make a queer husband. You
could gull him to your heart’s content. For instance, the other
day, I had picked up a tomato in the curate’s garden. I told him
that it was a fine, red apple, and he bit into it like a glutton.
If you had only seen what a face he made. Heavens! how ugly he was!”
“Then you don’t love him, since you are making fun of him.”
“That wouldn’t be a reason. But I don’t like him. He is unkind to
his little sister, and he is dirty.”
“Don’t you care for anybody else?”
“How does that concern you, Germain?”
“Not at all, except that it gives me something to talk about. I see
very well, little girl, that you have a sweetheart in your mind
already.”
“No, Germain, you’re wrong. I have no sweetheart yet. Perhaps one
may come later, but since I cannot marry until I have something
laid by, I am destined to marry late in life and with an old man.”
“Then take an old man without delay.”
“No. When I am no longer young, I shall not care; for the present,
it is different.”
“I see that I displease you, Marie; that’s clear enough,” said
Germain, impatiently, and without stopping to weigh his words.
Little Marie did not answer. Germain bent over her. She was
sleeping. She had fallen back, overcome, stricken down, as it were,
by slumber, as children are who sleep before they cease to babble.
Germain was glad that she had not caught his last words. He felt
that they were unwise, and he turned his back to distract his
attention and change his thoughts.
It was all in vain. He could neither sleep nor think of anything
except the words he had just spoken. He walked about the fire
twenty times; he moved away; he came back. At last, feeling himself
tremble as though he had swallowed gunpowder, he leaned against the
tree which sheltered the two children, and watched them as they
slept.
“I know not how it is,” thought he; “I have never noticed that
little Marie is the prettiest girl in the countryside. She has
not much color, but her little face is fresh as a wild rose. What
a charming mouth she has, and how pretty her little nose is! She
is not large for her age, but she is formed like a little quail
and is as light as a bird. I cannot understand why they made so
much fuss at home over a big, fat woman with a bright red face.
My wife was rather slender and pale, and she pleased me more than
any one else. This girl is very frail, but she is healthy, and
she is pretty to watch as a white kid. And then she has such a
gentle, frank expression. You can read her good heart in her eyes
even though they are closed in sleep. As to wit, I must confess
she has more than ever my dear Catherine had, and she would never
become wearisome. She is gay, wise, industrious, loving, and she is
amusing. I don’t know what more I could wish for....
“But what is the use of thinking of all this?” Germain went on,
trying to look in another direction. “My father-in-law would not
hear of it, and all the family would think me mad! Besides, she
would not have me herself, poor child! She thinks me too old; she
told me so. She is unselfish, and does not mind poverty and worry,
wearing old clothes, and suffering from hunger for two or three
months every year, so long as she can satisfy her heart some day
and give herself to the man she loves. She is right. I should do
the same in her place, and even now, if I had my own way, instead
of marrying a wife whom I don’t care for, I would choose a girl
after my own heart.”
The more Germain tried to compose himself by reasoning, the further
he was from succeeding. He walked away a dozen steps, to lose
himself in the fog; then, all of a sudden, he found himself on his
knees beside the two sleeping children. Once he wished to kiss
Petit-Pierre, who had one arm about Marie’s neck, and made such a
mistake that Marie felt a breath, hot as fire, cross her lips, and
awaking, looked about her with a bewildered expression, totally
ignorant of all that was passing within his mind.
“I didn’t see you, my poor children,” said Germain, retreating
rapidly. “I almost stumbled over you and hurt you.”
Little Marie was so innocent that she believed him, and fell asleep
again. Germain walked to the opposite side of the fire, and swore
to God that he would not stir until she had waked. He kept his
word, but not without a struggle. He thought that he would go mad.
At length, toward midnight, the fog lifted, and Germain could see
the stars shining through the trees. The moon freed herself from
the mist which had hidden her, and began to sow her diamonds over
the damp moss. The trunks of the oak-trees remained in impressive
darkness, but beyond, the white branches of the birch-trees seemed
a long line of phantoms in their shrouds. The fire cast its
reflection in the pool; and the frogs, growing accustomed to the
light, hazarded a few shrill and uneasy notes; the rugged branches
of the old trees, bristling with dim-colored lichens, crossed and
intertwined themselves, like great gaunt arms, above the travelers’
heads. It was a lovely spot, but so lonely and so sad that Germain,
unable to endure it more, began to sing and throw stones into the
water to forget the dread weariness of solitude. He was anxious
also to wake little Marie, and when he saw her rise and look about
at the weather, he proposed that they start on their journey.
“In two hours,” said he, “the approach of morning will chill the
air so that we can’t stay here in spite of our fire. Now we can see
our way, and we shall soon find a house which will open its doors
to us, or at least a barn where we can pass the rest of the night
under shelter.”
Marie had no will of her own, and although she was longing to
sleep, she made ready to follow Germain. The husbandman took his
boy in his arms without awaking him, and beckoned Marie to come
nearer, in order to cover her with his cloak. For she would not
take her own mantle, which was wrapped about the child.
When he felt the young girl so close to him, Germain, who for a
time had succeeded in distracting his mind and raising his spirits,
began to lose his head once more. Two or three times he strode
ahead abruptly, leaving her to walk alone. Then seeing how hard it
was for her to follow, he waited, drew her quickly to his side, and
pressed her so tight that she was surprised, and even angry, though
she dared not say so.
As they knew not the direction whence they had come, they had no
idea of that in which they were going. So they crossed the wood
once more, and found themselves afresh before the lonely moor. Then
they retraced their steps, and after much turning and twisting they
spied a light across the branches.
“Good enough! Here’s a house,” exclaimed Germain. “And the people
are already astir, for the fire is lighted. It must be very late.”
It was no house, but the camp-fire, which they had covered before
they left, and which had sprung up in the breeze.
They had tramped for two hours, only to find themselves at the very
place from which they had started.
[Illustration: (Ornament)]
X
Beneath the Stars
“This time I give up,” said Germain, stamping his foot. “We are
bewitched, that is certain, and we shall not get away from here
before broad day. The devil is in this place!”
“Well, it’s of no use to get angry,” said Marie. “We must take what
is given us. Let us make a big fire. The child is so well wrapped
up that he is in no danger, and we shall not die from a single
night out of doors. Where have you hidden the saddle, Germain?
Right in the midst of the holly-bushes,--what a goose you are! It’s
very convenient to get it from there!”
“Stop, child; hold the boy while I pull his bed from the thorns. I
didn’t want you to scratch your hands.”
“It’s all done. Here’s the bed, and a few scratches are not
saber-cuts,” replied the brave girl.
She proceeded to put the child to bed again, and Petit-Pierre was
so sound asleep this time that he knew nothing of his last journey.
Germain piled so much wood on the fire that the forest all about
glowed with the light.
Little Marie had come to the end of her powers, and although she
did not complain, her legs would support her no longer. She was
white, and her teeth chattered with cold and weakness. Germain took
her in his arms to warm her. The uneasiness, the compassion, the
tenderness of movement he could not repress, took possession of
his heart and stilled his senses. As by a miracle his tongue was
loosened, and every feeling of shame vanished.
“Marie,” said he, “I like you, and I am very sorry that you don’t
like me. If you would take me for your husband, there are no
fathers, nor family, nor neighbors, nor arguments which could
prevent me from giving myself to you. I know how happy you would
make my children, and that you would teach them to love the memory
of their mother, and with a quiet conscience I could satisfy the
wishes of my heart. I have always been fond of you, and now I love
you so well that were you to ask me to spend all my life in doing
your pleasure, I would swear to do it on the instant. Please think
how much I love you, and try to forget my age. Think that it is a
wrong notion to believe that a man of thirty is old. Besides, I
am but twenty-eight. A young girl is afraid that people will talk
about her if she takes a man ten or twelve years older than she,
simply because that is not the custom in our country, but I have
heard say that in other countries people don’t look at it in this
light, and that they had rather allow a sensible man of approved
courage to support a young girl, than trust her to a mere boy, who
may go astray, and, from the honest fellow they thought him, turn
into a good-for-nothing. And then years don’t always make age. That
depends on the health and strength a person has. When a man is used
up by overwork and poverty, or by a bad life, he is old before
twenty-five. While I--but Marie, you are not listening....”
“Yes I am, Germain; I hear you perfectly,” answered little Marie,
“but I am thinking over what my mother used to tell me so often:
that a woman of sixty is to be pitied greatly when her husband is
seventy or seventy-five and can no longer work to support her. He
grows feeble, and it becomes her duty to nurse him at the very age
when she begins to feel great need of care and rest herself, and so
it is that the end comes in a garret.”
“Parents do well to say so, I admit,” answered Germain, “but then
they would sacrifice all their youth, the best years of their
life, to calculating what will become of them at the age when a
person is no longer good for anything, and when it is a matter
of indifference which way death comes. But I am in no danger of
starving in my old age. I am even going to lay by something, since
I live with my wife’s parents and spend nothing. And then, you
see, I shall love you so well that I can never grow old. They say
that when a man is happy he keeps sound, and I know well that in
love for you, I am younger than Bastien; for he does not love you;
he is too stupid, too much of a child to understand how pretty
and how good you are, and how you were made for people to court.
Do not hate me, Marie. I am not a bad man. I made my Catherine
happy, and on her death-bed she swore before God that she had had
only happiness of me, and she asked me to marry again. Her spirit
must have spoken to her child to-night. Did you not hear the words
he said? How his little lips quivered as his eyes stared upward,
watching something that we could not see! He was surely looking at
his mother, and it was she who made him say that he wished you to
take her place.”
“Germain,” answered Marie, amazed and yet thoughtful, “you speak
frankly, and everything that you say is true. I am sure that I
should do well to love you if it did not displease your parents
too much. But what can I do? My heart does not speak for you. I
am very fond of you, but though your age does not make you ugly,
it makes me afraid. It seems as if you were some such relation to
me, as an uncle or a godfather, that I must be respectful toward
you, and that there might be moments when you would treat me like a
little girl rather than like your wife and your equal. And perhaps
my friends would make fun of me, and although it would be silly
to give heed to that, I think that I should be a little sad on my
wedding-day.”
“Those are but childish reasons, Marie; you speak like a child.”
“Yes, that is true; I am a child,” said she, “and it is on that
account I am afraid of too sensible a man. You must see that I am
too young for you, since you just found fault with me for speaking
foolishly. I can’t have more sense than my age allows.”
“O Heavens! How unlucky I am to be so clumsy and to express so ill
what I think!” cried Germain. “Marie, you don’t love me. That is
the long and short of it. You find me too simple and too dull. If
you loved me at all, you would not see my faults so clearly. But
you do not love me. That is the whole story.”
“That is not my fault,” answered she, a little hurt that he was
speaking with less tenderness. “I am doing my best to hear you, but
the more I try the less I can get it into my head that we ought to
be husband and wife.”