During the following week Madame Deberle paid a return visit to Madame
Grandjean, and displayed an affability that bordered on affection.
“You know what you promised me,” she said, on the threshold, as she was
going off. “The first fine day we have, you must come down to the
garden, and bring Jeanne with you. It is the doctor’s strict
injunction.”
“Very well,” Hélène answered, with a smile, “it is understood; we will
avail ourselves of your kindness.”
Three days later, on a bright February afternoon, she accompanied her
daughter down to the garden. The porter opened the door connecting the
two houses. At the near end of the garden, in a kind of greenhouse
built somewhat in the style of a Japanese pavilion, they found Madame
Deberle and her sister Pauline, both idling away their time, for some
embroidery, thrown on the little table, lay there neglected.
“Oh, how good of you to come!” cried Juliette. “You must sit down here.
Pauline, move that table away! It is still rather cool you know to sit
out of doors, but from this pavilion we can keep a watch on the
children. Now, little ones, run away and play; but take care not to
fall!”
The large door of the pavilion stood open, and on each side were
portable mirrors, whose covers had been removed so that they allowed
one to view the garden’s expanse as from the threshold of a tent. The
garden, with a green sward in the centre, flanked by beds of flowers,
was separated from the Rue Vineuse by a plain iron railing, but against
this grew a thick green hedge, which prevented the curious from gazing
in. Ivy, clematis, and woodbine clung and wound around the railings,
and behind this first curtain of foliage came a second one of lilacs
and laburnums. Even in the winter the ivy leaves and the close network
of branches sufficed to shut off the view. But the great charm of the
garden lay in its having at the far end a few lofty trees, some
magnificent elms, which concealed the grimy wall of a five-story house.
Amidst all the neighboring houses these trees gave the spot the aspect
of a nook in some park, and seemed to increase the dimensions of this
little Parisian garden, which was swept like a drawing-room. Between
two of the elms hung a swing, the seat of which was green with damp.
Hélène leaned forward the better to view the scene.
“Oh, it is a hole!” exclaimed Madame Deberle carelessly. “Still, trees
are so rare in Paris that one is happy in having half a dozen of one’s
own.”
“No, no, you have a very pleasant place,” murmured Hélène.
The sun filled the pale atmosphere that day with a golden dust, its
rays streaming slowly through the leafless branches of the trees. These
assumed a ruddier tint, and you could see the delicate purple gems
softening the cold grey of the bark. On the lawn and along the walks
the grass and gravel glittered amidst the haze that seemed to ooze from
the ground. No flower was in blossom; only the happy flush which the
sunshine cast upon the soil revealed the approach of spring.
“At this time of year it is rather dull,” resumed Madame Deberle. “In
June it is as cozy as a nest; the trees prevent any one from looking
in, and we enjoy perfect privacy.” At this point she paused to call:
“Lucien, you must come away from that watertap!”
The lad, who was doing the honors of the garden, had led Jeanne towards
a tap under the steps. Here he had turned on the water, which he
allowed to splash on the tips of his boots. It was a game that he
delighted in. Jeanne, with grave face, looked on while he wetted his
feet.
“Wait a moment!” said Pauline, rising. “I’ll go and stop his nonsense!”
But Juliette held her back.
“You’ll do no such thing; you are even more of a madcap than he is. The
other day both of you looked as if you had taken a bath. How is it that
a big girl like you cannot remain two minutes seated? Lucien!” she
continued directing her eyes on her son, “turn off the water at once!”
The child, in his fright, made an effort to obey her. But instead of
turning the tap off, he turned it on all the more, and the water gushed
forth with a force and a noise that made him lose his head. He
recoiled, splashed up to the shoulders.
“Turn off the water at once!” again ordered his mother, whose cheeks
were flushing with anger.
Jeanne, hitherto silent, then slowly, and with the greatest caution,
ventured near the tap; while Lucien burst into loud sobbing at sight of
this cold stream, which terrified him, and which he was powerless to
stop. Carefully drawing her skirt between her legs, Jeanne stretched
out her bare hands so as not to wet her sleeves, and closed the tap
without receiving a sprinkle. The flow instantly ceased. Lucien,
astonished and inspired with respect, dried his tears and gazed with
swollen eyes at the girl.
“Oh, that child puts me beside myself!” exclaimed Madame Deberle, her
complexion regaining its usual pallor, while she stretched herself out,
as though wearied to death.
Hélène deemed it right to intervene. “Jeanne,” she called, “take his
hand, and amuse yourselves by walking up and down.”
Jeanne took hold of Lucien’s hand, and both gravely paced the paths
with little steps. She was much taller than her companion, who had to
stretch his arm up towards her; but this solemn amusement, which
consisted in a ceremonious circuit of the lawn, appeared to absorb them
and invest them with a sense of great importance. Jeanne, like a
genuine lady, gazed about, preoccupied with her own thoughts; Lucien
every now and then would venture a glance at her; but not a word was
said by either.
“How droll they are!” said Madame Deberle, smiling, and again at her
ease. “I must say that your Jeanne is a dear, good child. She is so
obedient, so well behaved—”
“Yes, when she is in the company of others,” broke in Hélène. “She is a
great trouble at times. Still, she loves me, and does her best to be
good so as not to vex me.”
Then they spoke of children; how girls were more precocious than boys;
though it would be wrong to deduce too much from Lucien’s unintelligent
face. In another year he would doubtless lose all his gawkiness and
become quite a gallant. Finally, Madame Deberle resumed her embroidery,
making perhaps two stitches in a minute. Hélène, who was only happy
when busy, begged permission to bring her work the next time she came.
She found her companions somewhat dull, and whiled away the time in
examining the Japanese pavilion. The walls and ceiling were hidden by
tapestry worked in gold, with designs showing bright cranes in full
flight, butterflies, and flowers and views in which blue ships were
tossing upon yellow rivers. Chairs, and ironwood flower-stands were
scattered about; on the floor some fine mats were spread; while the
lacquered furnishings were littered with trinkets, small bronzes and
vases, and strange toys painted in all the hues of the rainbow. At the
far end stood a grotesque idol in Dresden china, with bent legs and
bare, protruding stomach, which at the least movement shook its head
with a terrible and amusing look.
“Isn’t it horribly ugly?” asked Pauline, who had been watching Hélène
as she glanced round. “I say, sister, you know that all these purchases
of yours are so much rubbish! Malignon calls your Japanese museum ‘the
sixpenny bazaar.’ Oh, by the way, talking of him, I met him. He was
with a lady, and such a lady—Florence, of the Varietes Theatre.”
“Where was it?” asked Juliette immediately. “How I shall tease him!”
“On the boulevards. He’s coming here to-day, is he not?”
She was not vouchsafed any reply. The ladies had all at once become
uneasy owing to the disappearance of the children, and called to them.
However, two shrill voices immediately answered:
“We are here!”
Half hidden by a spindle tree, they were sitting on the grass in the
middle of the lawn.
“What are you about?”
“We have put up at an inn,” answered Lucien. “We are resting in our
room.”
Greatly diverted, the women watched them for a time. Jeanne seemed
quite contented with the game. She was cutting the grass around her,
doubtless with the intention of preparing breakfast. A piece of wood,
picked up among the shrubs, represented a trunk. And now they were
talking. Jeanne, with great conviction in her tone, was declaring that
they were in Switzerland, and that they would set out to see the
glaciers, which rather astonished Lucien.
“Ha, here he is!” suddenly exclaimed Pauline.
Madame Deberle turned, and caught sight of Malignon descending the
steps. He had scarcely time to make his bow and sit down before she
attacked him.
“Oh,” she said, “it is nice of you to go about everywhere saying that I
have nothing but rubbishy ornaments about me!”
“You mean this little saloon of yours? Oh yes,” said he, quite at his
ease. “You haven’t anything worth looking at here!”
“What! not my china figure?” she asked, quite hurt.
“No, no, everything is quite _bourgeois_. It is necessary for a person
to have some taste. You wouldn’t allow me to select the things—”
“Your taste, forsooth! just talk about your taste!” she retorted,
flushing crimson and feeling quite angry. “You have been seen with a
lady—”
“What lady?” he asked, surprised by the violence of the attack.
“A fine choice, indeed! I compliment you on it. A girl whom the whole
of Paris knows—”
She suddenly paused, remembering Pauline’s presence.
“Pauline,” she said, “go into the garden for a minute.”
“Oh no,” retorted the girl indignantly. “It’s so tiresome; I’m always
being sent out of the way.”
“Go into the garden,” repeated Juliette, with increased severity in her
tone.
The girl stalked off with a sullen look, but stopped all at once, to
exclaim: “Well, then, be quick over your talk!”
As soon as she was gone, Madame Deberle returned to the charge. “How
can you, a gentleman, show yourself in public with that actress
Florence? She is at least forty. She is ugly enough to frighten one,
and all the gentlemen in the stalls thee and thou her on first nights.”
“Have you finished?” called out Pauline, who was strolling sulkily
under the trees. “I’m not amusing myself here, you know.”
Malignon, however, defended himself. He had no knowledge of this girl
Florence; he had never in his life spoken a word to her. They had
possibly seen him with a lady: he was sometimes in the company of the
wife of a friend of his. Besides, who had seen him? He wanted proofs,
witnesses.
“Pauline,” hastily asked Madame Deberle, raising her voice, “did you
not meet him with Florence?”
“Yes, certainly,” replied her sister. “I met them on the boulevards
opposite Bignon’s.”
Thereupon, glorying in her victory over Malignon, whose face wore an
embarrassed smile, Madame Deberle called out: “You can come back,
Pauline; I have finished.”
Malignon, who had a box at the Folies-Dramatiques for the following
night, now gallantly placed it at Madame Deberle’s service, apparently
not feeling the slightest ill-will towards her; moreover, they were
always quarreling. Pauline wished to know if she might go to see the
play that was running, and as Malignon laughed and shook his head, she
declared it was very silly; authors ought to write plays fit for girls
to see. She was only allowed such entertainments as _La Dame Blanche_
and the classic drama could offer.
Meantime, the ladies had ceased watching the children, and all at once
Lucien began to raise terrible shrieks.
“What have you done to him, Jeanne?” asked Hélène.
“I have done nothing, mamma,” answered the little girl. “He has thrown
himself on the ground.”
The truth was, the children had just set out for the famous glaciers.
As Jeanne pretended that they were reaching the mountains, they had
lifted their feet very high, as though to step over the rocks. Lucien,
however, quite out of breath with his exertions, at last made a false
step, and fell sprawling in the middle of an imaginary ice-field.
Disgusted, and furious with child-like rage, he no sooner found himself
on the ground than he burst into tears.
“Lift him up,” called Hélène.
“He won’t let me, mamma. He is rolling about.”
And so saying, Jeanne drew back, as though exasperated and annoyed by
such a display of bad breeding. He did not know how to play; he would
certainly cover her with dirt. Her mouth curled, as though she were a
duchess compromising herself by such companionship. Thereupon Madame
Deberle, irritated by Lucien’s continued wailing, requested her sister
to pick him up and coax him into silence. Nothing loth, Pauline ran,
cast herself down beside the child, and for a moment rolled on the
ground with him. He struggled with her, unwilling to be lifted, but she
at last took him up by the arms, and to appease him, said, “Stop
crying, you noisy fellow; we’ll have a swing!”
Lucien at once closed his lips, while Jeanne’s solemn looks vanished,
and a gleam of ardent delight illumined her face. All three ran towards
the swing, but it was Pauline who took possession of the seat.
“Push, push!” she urged the children; and they pushed with all the
force of their tiny hands; but she was heavy, and they could scarcely
stir the swing.
“Push!” she urged again. “Oh, the big sillies, they can’t!”
In the pavilion, Madame Deberle had just felt a slight chill. Despite
the bright sunshine she thought it rather cold, and she requested
Malignon to hand her a white cashmere burnous that was hanging from the
handle of a window fastening. Malignon rose to wrap the burnous round
her shoulders, and they began chatting familiarly on matters which had
little interest for Hélène. Feeling fidgety, fearing that Pauline might
unwittingly knock the children down, she therefore stepped into the
garden, leaving Juliette and the young man to wrangle over some new
fashion in bonnets which apparently deeply interested them.
Jeanne no sooner saw her mother than she ran towards her with a
wheedling smile, and entreaty in every gesture. “Oh, mamma, mamma!” she
implored. “Oh, mamma!”
“No, no, you mustn’t!” replied Hélène, who understood her meaning very
well. “You know you have been forbidden.”
Swinging was Jeanne’s greatest delight. She would say that she believed
herself a bird; the breeze blowing in her face, the lively rush through
the air, the continued swaying to and fro in a motion as rythmic as the
beating of a bird’s wings, thrilled her with an exquisite pleasure; in
her ascent towards cloudland she imagined herself on her way to heaven.
But it always ended in some mishap. On one occasion she had been found
clinging to the ropes of the swing in a swoon, her large eyes wide
open, fixed in a vacant stare; at another time she had fallen to the
ground, stiff, like a swallow struck by a shot.
“Oh, mamma!” she implored again. “Only a little, a very, very little!”
In the end her mother, in order to win peace, placed her on the seat.
The child’s face lit up with an angelic smile, and her bare wrists
quivered with joyous expectancy. Hélène swayed her very gently.
“Higher, mamma, higher!” she murmured.
But Hélène paid no heed to her prayer, and retained firm hold of the
rope. She herself was glowing all over, her cheeks flushed, and she
thrilled with excitement at every push she gave to the swing. Her
wonted sedateness vanished as she thus became her daughter’s playmate.
“That will do,” she declared after a time, taking Jeanne in her arms.
“Oh, mamma, you must swing now!” the child whispered, as she clung to
her neck.
She took a keen delight in seeing her mother flying through the air; as
she said, her pleasure was still more intense in gazing at her than in
having a swing herself. Hélène, however, asked her laughingly who would
push her; when she went in for swinging, it was a serious matter; why,
she went higher than the treetops! While she was speaking it happened
that Monsieur Rambaud made his appearance under the guidance of the
doorkeeper. He had met Madame Deberle in Hélène’s rooms, and thought he
would not be deemed presuming in presenting himself here when unable to
find her. Madame Deberle proved very gracious, pleased as she was with
the good-natured air of the worthy man; however, she soon returned to a
lively discussion with Malignon.
“_Bon ami_[*] will push you, mamma! _Bon ami_ will push you!” Jeanne
called out, as she danced round her mother.
[*] Literally “good friend;” but there is no proper equivalent for the
expression in English.
“Be quiet! We are not at home!” said her mother with mock gravity.
“Bless me! if it will please you, I am at your disposal,” exclaimed
Monsieur Rambaud. “When people are in the country—”
Hélène let herself be persuaded. When a girl she had been accustomed to
swing for hours, and the memory of those vanished pleasures created a
secret craving to taste them once more. Moreover, Pauline, who had sat
down with Lucien at the edge of the lawn, intervened with the boldness
of a girl freed from the trammels of childhood.
“Of course he will push you, and he will swing me after you. Won’t you,
sir?”
This determined Hélène. The youth which dwelt within her, in spite of
the cold demureness of her great beauty, displayed itself in a
charming, ingenuous fashion. She became a thorough school-girl,
unaffected and gay. There was no prudishness about her. She laughingly
declared that she must not expose her legs, and asked for some cord to
tie her skirts securely round her ankles. That done, she stood upright
on the swing, her arms extended and clinging to the ropes.
“Now, push, Monsieur Rambaud,” she exclaimed delightedly. “But gently
at first!”
Monsieur Rambaud had hung his hat on the branch of a tree. His broad,
kindly face beamed with a fatherly smile. First he tested the strength
of the ropes, and, giving a look at the trees, determined to give a
slight push. That day Hélène had for the first time abandoned her
widow’s weeds; she was wearing a grey dress set off with mauve bows.
Standing upright, she began to swing, almost touching the ground, and
as if rocking herself to sleep.
“Quicker! quicker!” she exclaimed.
Monsieur Rambaud, with his hands ready, caught the seat as it came back
to him, and gave it a more vigorous push. Hélène went higher, each
ascent taking her farther. However, despite the motion, she did not
lose her sedateness; she retained almost an austre demeanor; her eyes
shone very brightly in her beautiful, impassive face; her nostrils only
were inflated, as though to drink in the air.
Not a fold of her skirts was out of place, but a plait of her hair
slipped down.
“Quicker! quicker!” she called.
An energetic push gave her increased impetus. Up in the sunshine she
flew, even higher and higher. A breeze sprung up with her motion, and
blew through the garden; her flight was so swift that they could
scarcely distinguish her figure aright. Her face was now all smiles,
and flushed with a rosy red, while her eyes sparkled here, then there,
like shooting stars. The loosened plait of hair rustled against her
neck. Despite the cords which bound them, her skirts now waved about,
and you could divine that she was at her ease, her bosom heaving in its
free enjoyment as though the air were indeed her natural place.
“Quicker! quicker!”
Monsieur Rambaud, his face red and bedewed with perspiration, exerted
all his strength. A cry rang out. Hélène went still higher.
“Oh, mamma! Oh, mamma!” repeated Jeanne in her ecstasy.
She was sitting on the lawn gazing at her mother, her little hands
clasped on her bosom, looking as though she herself had drunk in all
the air that was stirring. Her breath failed her; with a rythmical
movement of the shoulders she kept time with the long strokes of the
swing. And she cried, “Quicker! quicker!” while her mother still went
higher, her feet grazing the lofty branches of the trees.
“Higher, mamma! oh, higher, mamma!”
But Hélène was already in the very heavens. The trees bent and cracked
as beneath a gale. Her skirts, which were all they could see, flapped
with a tempestuous sound. When she came back with arms stretched out
and bosom distended she lowered her head slightly and for a moment
hovered; but then she rose again and sank backwards, her head tilted,
her eyes closed, as though she had swooned. These ascensions and
descents which made her giddy were delightful. In her flight she
entered into the sunshine—the pale yellow February sunshine that rained
down like golden dust. Her chestnut hair gleamed with amber tints; and
a flame seemed to have leaped up around her, as the mauve bows on her
whitening dress flashed like burning flowers. Around her the springtide
was maturing into birth, and the purple-tinted gems of the trees showed
like delicate lacquer against the blue sky.
Jeanne clasped her hands. Her mother seemed to her a saint with a
golden glory round her head, winging her way to paradise, and she again
stammered: “Oh, mamma! oh! mamma!”
Madame Deberle and Malignon had now grown interested, and had stepped
under the trees. Malignon declared the lady to be very bold.
“I should faint, I’m sure,” said Madame Deberle, with a frightened air.
Hélène heard them, for she dropped these words from among the branches:
“Oh, my heart is all right! Give a stronger push, Monsieur Rambaud!”
And indeed her voice betrayed no emotion. She seemed to take no heed of
the two men who were onlookers. They were doubtless nothing to her. Her
tress of hair had become entangled, and the cord that confined her
skirts must have given way, for the drapery flapped in the wind like a
flag. She was going still higher.
All at once, however, the exclamation rang out:
“Enough, Monsieur Rambaud, enough!”
Doctor Deberle had just appeared on the house steps. He came forward,
embraced his wife tenderly, took up Lucien and kissed his brow. Then he
gazed at Hélène with a smile.
“Enough, enough!” she still continued exclaiming.
“Why?” asked he. “Do I disturb you?”
She made no answer; a look of gravity had suddenly come over her face.
The swing, still continuing its rapid flights, owing to the impetus
given to it, would not stop, but swayed to and fro with a regular
motion which still bore Hélène to a great height. The doctor, surprised
and charmed, beheld her with admiration; she looked so superb, so tall
and strong, with the pure figure of an antique statue whilst swinging
thus gently amid the spring sunshine. But she seemed annoyed, and all
at once leaped down.
“Stop! stop!” they all cried out.
From Hélène’s lips came a dull moan; she had fallen upon the gravel of
a pathway, and her efforts to rise were fruitless.
“Good heavens!” exclaimed the doctor, his face turning very pale. “How
imprudent!”
They all crowded round her. Jeanne began weeping so bitterly that
Monsieur Rambaud, with his heart in his mouth, was compelled to take
her in his arms. The doctor, meanwhile, eagerly questioned Hélène.
“Is it the right leg you fell on? Cannot you stand upright?” And as she
remained dazed, without answering, he asked: “Do you suffer?”
“Yes, here at the knee; a dull pain,” she answered, with difficulty.
He at once sent his wife for his medicine case and some bandages, and
repeated:
“I must see, I must see. No doubt it is a mere nothing.”
He knelt down on the gravel and Hélène let him do so; but all at once
she struggled to her feet and said: “No, no!”
“But I must examine the place,” he said.
A slight quiver stole over her, and she answered in a yet lower tone:
“It is not necessary. It is nothing at all.”
He looked at her, at first astounded. Her neck was flushing red; for a
moment their eyes met, and seemed to read each other’s soul; he was
disconcerted, and slowly rose, remaining near her, but without pressing
her further.
Hélène had signed to Monsieur Rambaud. “Fetch Doctor Bodin,” she
whispered in his ear, “and tell him what has happened to me.”
Ten minutes later, when Doctor Bodin made his appearance, she, with
superhuman courage, regained her feet, and leaning on him and Monsieur
Rambaud, contrived to return home. Jeanne followed, quivering with
sobs.
“I shall wait,” said Doctor Deberle to his brother physician. “Come
down and remove our fears.”
In the garden a lively colloquy ensued. Malignon was of opinion that
women had queer ideas. Why on earth had that lady been so foolish as to
jump down? Pauline, excessively provoked at this accident, which
deprived her of a pleasure, declared it was silly to swing so high. On
his side Doctor Deberle did not say a word, but seemed anxious.
“It is nothing serious,” said Doctor Bodin, as he came down again—“only
a sprain. Still, she will have to keep to an easy-chair for at least a
fortnight.”
Thereupon Monsieur Deberle gave a friendly slap on Malignon’s shoulder.
He wished his wife to go in, as it was really becoming too cold. For
his own part, taking Lucien in his arms, he carried him into the house,
covering him with kisses the while.