On the following day a report spread through Maillebois that a

deputation of parents, fathers and mothers, had called upon the

schoolmaster, and that there had been a stormy explanation, a frightful

scandal. But Marc soon understood whence the attack had really come,

for chance acquainted him with the circumstances which had led to

Savin's visit. Though pretty Madame Savin took no real interest in the

affair, absorbed as she was in her desire for a little more personal

happiness, she had none the less served as an instrument in the hands

of Father Théodose; for it was on being approached by her, on the

Capuchin's behalf, that her husband had repaired to a secret interview

with the latter, which interview had prompted him to call on Marc and

endeavour to check a state of things which was so prejudicial to family

morality and good order. No crucifixes in the schools indeed! Would

that not mean indiscipline among the boys, and shamelessness among

the girls and their mothers also? So the lean and little Savin, the

Republican and anti-clerical, unhinged by his wretched spoilt life and

his idiotic jealousy, had set forth to champion the cause of virtue,

like an authoritarian, a topsy-turvy Catholic, who pictured the human

paradise as a gaol, in which everything human ought to be subdued and

crushed.

Besides, behind Father Théodose, Marc readily divined Brother Fulgence

and his assistants, Brothers Gorgias and Isidore, who hated the secular

school more than ever since it had been taking pupils from them. And

behind the Brothers came Fathers Philibin and Crabot of the College

of Valmarie, those powerful personages whose skilful unseen hands

had been directing the whole campaign ever since the monstrous Simon

affair. The accomplices in that slumbering crime seemed determined to

defend it by other deeds of iniquity. At the outset Marc had guessed

where the whole band, from the lowest to the highest, was crouching.

But how could one seize and convict them? If Father Crabot, amiable

and worldly, still showed himself constantly among the fine society

of Beaumont, busily directing the steps of his penitents and ensuring

the rapid fortune of his former pupils, his assistant, Father Philibin,

had virtually disappeared, restricting himself entirely, so it seemed,

to his absorbing duties as manager at Valmarie. Nothing transpired

of the stealthy work which was so ardently pursued in the darkness,

every moment being employed to ensure the triumph of the good cause.

All that Marc himself could detect was the espionage attending his own

movements. He was tracked with priestly caution, black figures were

constantly prowling around him. None of his visits to the Lehmanns,

none of his conversations with David could have remained unknown.

And, as Salvan had said, the others tracked him because he was an

impassioned soldier of truth and justice, because he was a witness who

already possessed certain proofs, and whose avenging cry must be thrust

back into his throat, even by extermination if necessary. To that

task the frock and cassock wearers devoted themselves with increasing

audacity, joined even by poor Abbé Quandieu, who felt grieved at having

to place religion at the service of such iniquitous work, but who

resigned himself to it in obedience to the behests of his Bishop, the

mournful Monseigneur Bergerot, whom he visited every week at Beaumont

to take his orders and console him in his defeat. Bishop and priest

cast the cloak of their ministry over the sore devouring the Church

whose respectful sons they were, hiding meantime their tears and their

fears, unwilling to acknowledge the mortal danger into which they saw

religion sinking.

One evening Mignot, on coming into the school from the playground, said

to Marc in a fury:

'It's getting quite disgusting, monsieur! I've again caught

Mademoiselle Rouzaire spying on us from the top of a ladder!'

Indeed, whenever the schoolmistress fancied that she would not

be detected, she set a ladder against the wall dividing the two

playgrounds, in order that she might ascertain what was going on in the

boys' school. And Mignot accused her of sending secret reports on the

subject to Mauraisin every week.

'Oh! let her pry,' Marc answered gaily. 'But there is no occasion for

her to tire herself by climbing a ladder. I'll set the door wide open

for her, if she desires it.'

'Ah! no, not that!' cried the assistant. 'Let her keep her place! If

she tries it on again, I shall go round and pull her down by the legs!'

Marc, to his great satisfaction, was now gradually completing the

conquest of Mignot. The latter, like a peasant's son whose one desire

was to escape the plough, a man of average mind and character, who like

so many others thought solely of his immediate interests, had always

shown himself distrustful with Simon. Indeed, nothing good could come

from a Jew, and so he had deemed it prudent to keep aloof from him. At

the time of the trial, therefore, though he was sufficiently honest to

refrain from overwhelming the innocent prisoner, he had not given the

good and truthful evidence which might have saved him. At a later stage

he had likewise placed himself on the defensive with Marc, with whom he

thought it would be foolish to ally himself if he desired advancement.

For nearly a whole year, therefore, he had displayed hostility, taking

his meals at an eating-house, grudging the help he gave in the school

work, and freely blaming his principal's attitude. At that time indeed

he had been very thick with Mademoiselle Rouzaire, and willing, it

seemed, to place himself at the orders of the Congregations. But

Marc, instead of evincing any perturbation, had treated his assistant

with unremitting kindness, as if he were desirous of giving him all

necessary time to reflect and understand that his real interest lay on

the side of truth and equity.

Indeed, in Marc's opinion, that big, calm young fellow, whose only

passion was angling, offered an interesting subject for experiment.

Though he became cowardly when he thought of the future, and was

somewhat spoilt by the environment of ferocious egotism in which he

found himself, there was nothing absolutely evil in his nature. In

fact, he might be made an excellent school teacher and even a man of

most upright mind if he were helped, sustained by one of energy and

intelligence. The idea of experimenting in that sense attracted Marc,

who felt well pleased as, little by little, he gained the confidence

and affection of this wanderer, thereby proving the truth of the axiom

in which he set all his hopes of future deliverance--that there is

no man, even one on the road to perdition, who may not be made an

artisan of progress. Mignot had been won over by the active gaiety, the

beneficent glow of truth and justice which Marc set around him. He now

took his meals with his principal, and had become, as it were, a member

of the family.

'It is wrong of you not to distrust Mademoiselle Rouzaire,' he resumed.

'You have no idea, monsieur, of what she is capable. She would betray

you a dozen times over in order to obtain good reports from her friend

Mauraisin.'

Then, being in a confidential mood, he related how she had repeatedly

urged him to listen at keyholes and report to her. He knew her well;

she was a terrible woman, harsh and avaricious, despite all her

varnish of exaggerated courtesy; and though she was big and bony,

with a flat, freckled face, quite destitute of any charm, she ended

by seducing everybody. As she herself boasted, she knew how to act.

To the anti-clericals who angrily reproached her for taking her girls

so often to church, she replied that she was compelled to comply with

the desires of the parents under penalty of losing her pupils. To the

clericals she gave the most substantial pledges, convinced as she was

that they were the stronger party and that on their influence depended

the best appointments even in the secular school world. In reality

she was guided solely by her own interests, as she understood them,

having inherited the instincts of a petty trader from her parents, who

had kept a fruiterer's shop at Beaumont. She had not married, because

she preferred to live as she listed, and, although she did not carry

on with the priests, as was maliciously rumoured by evil tongues, it

seemed certain that she had a soft spot in her heart for handsome

Mauraisin, who, like the little man he was, admired women built after

the fashion of gendarmes. Again, it was not true that she got drunk,

though she was very fond of sweet liqueurs. If she occasionally looked

very red when afternoon lessons began, it was simply because she ate

abundantly and her digestive organs were out of order.

Marc made an indulgent gesture. 'She does not keep her school badly,'

said he; 'the only thing that grieves me is the spirit of narrow

pietism which she introduces into all her teaching. My boys and her

girls are separated by an abyss, not merely by a wall. And when they

meet one another, later, and think of marrying, they will belong to

different worlds. But is not that the traditional custom? The warfare

of the sexes largely arises from it.'

The young man did not mention the chief cause of his rancour against

Mademoiselle Rouzaire, the reason which had impelled him to keep

aloof from her. This was her abominable conduct in Simon's case. He

remembered the quiet effrontery with which she had played the game of

the Congregations at the trial at Beaumont, how she had heaped impudent

falsehoods on the innocent prisoner, how she had accused him of giving

immoral and anti-patriotic lessons to his pupils. And so Marc's

intercourse with her since his appointment to Maillebois had never gone

beyond the limits of strict politeness, such as the proximity of their

homes required. She, however, having seen the young man strengthen his

position, in such wise that his sudden downfall could now hardly be

anticipated, had made attempts at reconciliation; for, in her anxiety

to be always on the stronger side, she was not the woman to turn her

back on the victorious. She had manœuvred particularly with the object

of ingratiating herself with Geneviève, but the latter in this matter

had hitherto shared Marc's opinions and kept her at a distance.

'At all events, monsieur,' Mignot concluded, 'I advise you to keep your

eyes open. If I had listened to La Rouzaire I should have betrayed you

a score of times. She never ceased questioning me about you, repeating

to me that I was a stupid and would never succeed in getting into a

decent position.... But you showed me great kindness, and you don't

know what horrid things you saved me from; for one soon listens to

those creatures when they promise you every kind of success. And, as I

am on this subject, I hope you will excuse me if I venture to give you

some advice. You ought to warn Madame Froment.'

'Warn her? What do you mean?'

'Yes, yes, I don't keep my eyes in my pockets. For some time past I

have seen La Rouzaire prowling around your wife. It is "dear madame"

here, a smile or a caress there, all kinds of advances, which would

make me tremble if I were in your shoes.'

Marc, who felt greatly astonished, made a pretence of smiling: 'Oh! my

wife has nothing to fear, she is warned,' said he. 'It is difficult for

her to behave impolitely with a neighbour, particularly when one is

connected by similar duties.'

Mignot did not insist, but he shook his head doubtfully, for his

intercourse with the Froments had acquainted him with the secret drama

which was slowly gathering in their home. However, it seemed as if

he were unwilling to say all he knew. And Marc, on his side also,

became silent, again mastered by the covert dread, the unacknowledged

weakness which assailed and paralysed him whenever the possibility of a

struggle between Geneviève and himself presented itself to his mind.

All at once the attack of the Congregations, which he had been

anticipating ever since his visit to Salvan, took place. The campaign

began with a virulent report from Mauraisin on the subject of the

removal of the crucifix, and the scandal caused among the boys'

parents by that act of religious intolerance. Savin's protest was duly

recorded, and the Doloir and Bongard families were cited among those

who blamed the proceeding. The incident was one of exceptional gravity,

according to the Inspector, for it had occurred in a clerical-minded

town, reputed for its frequent and numerously attended pilgrimages--a

town indeed where it was necessary for the secular school to make

concessions if it was to escape defeat from its Congregational rival.

Mauraisin concluded, therefore, in favour of the removal of the

schoolmaster, a sectarian of the worst kind, who had thus incautiously

compromised the university cause. And his indictment was completed by

the recital of a number of little facts, the harvest of all the daily

espionage carried on by Mademoiselle Rouzaire, whose docile little

girls, ever at Mass or at the Catechism classes, were contrasted with

the idle, rebellious, unbelieving lads trained by that anarchist

master, Froment.

Three days later Marc learnt that Count Hector de Sanglebœuf, the

Catholic deputy, accompanied by two of his colleagues, had made an

application on the subject to Prefect Hennebise. Sanglebœuf was

evidently acquainted with Mauraisin's report, even if he had not helped

to draft it in conjunction with his friend Father Crabot, who so

frequently visited La Désirade; and the idea undoubtedly was to take

that report as a basis in demanding the dismissal of Marc.

Hennebise, whose policy was to live at peace with everybody, and

who constantly urged his subordinates to refrain from stirring up

trouble, must have felt very worried by the incident, which might

lead to disastrous complications. The Prefect's feelings were with

Sanglebœuf, but it was dangerous to adhere publicly to the reactionary

cause; so, while sympathising with the fiery anti-Semite deputy, he

explained that he was not master of the situation, for the law was

precise and prevented him from removing a schoolmaster unless that

step were proposed to him by Academy Inspector Le Barazer. With some

relief, therefore, the Prefect referred the gentlemen to the Inspector,

to whose office, which was also in the Préfecture buildings, they

immediately repaired.

Le Barazer, an ex-professor who had become a prudent diplomatist,

listened to them with a great show of attentive deference. He was a

man of fifty, with a broad full-coloured face, and as yet scarcely

a grey hair. He had grown up hating the Empire, and as he regarded

secular education as one of the foundation stones of the Republic, he

pursued by all available means the task of crushing the Congregational

schools, whose triumph in his estimation would have killed France. But

experience had shown him the danger of violent action, and he adhered

to a long meditated and prudent course, which led some extremists

to regard him as a very lukewarm Republican. Yet he was associated

with some extraordinary victories achieved by long years of discreet

and patient action. At Sanglebœuf's first words he made a show of

disapproving Marc's removal of the crucifix, which, said he, was a

useless demonstration, though he pointed out that nothing in the laws

compelled the schoolmasters to allow religious emblems in the schools.

It was all a mere question of usage, and he discreetly allowed it to be

seen that this usage scarcely had his approval. Then, as Sanglebœuf,

losing his temper, proclaimed himself a defender of the Church, and

described the schoolmaster of Maillebois as a shameless individual

who had stirred up the entire population against him, the Inspector

placidly promised that he would study the question with all the care it

deserved.

But Sanglebœuf wished to know if he had not received a report from his

subordinate, Mauraisin; and whether that report did not suffice to

show the gravity of the evil, the demoralisation, which could only be

arrested by the immediate removal of the schoolmaster. At this question

Le Barazer feigned great surprise. What report? Ah! yes, the quarterly

report from the Elementary Inspector! Were its contents known, then? In

any case, those reports were purely administrative, and merely supplied

certain elements of appreciation for the Academy Inspector, whose duty

it was to make personal inquiries. And thereupon Le Barazer dismissed

the gentlemen, after again promising to take their application into

full account.

A month went by, and nothing reached Marc, who daily expected a

summons to the Préfecture. Le Barazer was doubtless following his usual

tactics in order to gain time and exhaust the determination of the

other side. Even as his friend Salvan had foretold, he was covertly

supporting the young schoolmaster. But it was essential that the

affair should not be aggravated, that increasing scandal should not

compel his intervention; for assuredly he would not defend Marc beyond

certain limits, but would end by sacrificing him if he thought that

course expedient in order that the rest of his slow and opportunist

campaign against the Congregational schools might not be interfered

with. Unfortunately, things went from bad to worse at Maillebois. _Le

Petit Beaumontais_, yielding to an inspiration which could be easily

identified, started a vile campaign against Marc. As usual, it began

with brief and vague paragraphs: Abominations were taking place in a

neighbouring little town, and if necessary precise information would

be given. Then schoolmaster Froment was plainly named, and under the

headline 'The Scandal of Maillebois,' which was repeated almost daily,

the paper published an extraordinary collection of tittle-tattle, the

results of a pretended inquiry among the pupils and their parents, in

which the schoolmaster was accused of the blackest crimes.

People were quite upset by these so-called revelations; the good

Brothers and the Capuchins helped to spread terror abroad, and devotees

never passed the Communal school without crossing themselves. Marc

became conscious that he was in great peril; and Mignot bravely began

to pack up his belongings, feeling certain that he would be swept away

with his principal, whose side he had taken. Meantime Mademoiselle

Rouzaire affected the most victorious airs when she conducted her girls

to Mass; Father Théodose in his chapel, and even Curé Quandieu in his

pulpit at St. Martin's, foretold the approaching restoration of God

among the infidels, by which they meant that the crucifix would be soon

set up again, with all solemnity, in the secular school; and, as a last

blow, Marc, on meeting Darras, found him very cold, resolved to abandon

him, for fear of losing the support of the minority of the Municipal

Council.

'What can you expect, my dear fellow,' said the ex-Mayor; 'you have

gone too far; we cannot follow you, at present at all events.... That

blackbeetle Philis is watching me, and I should merely share your fate,

which would be useless.'

In his despair Marc hastened to Salvan, whom he regarded as the only

faithful supporter remaining to him. And he found him thoughtful,

gloomy, almost embarrassed.

'Things are going badly,' said he. 'Le Barazer remains silent,

seemingly anxious, and such a furious campaign is being waged around

him that I fear he may abandon you.... Perhaps you acted too hastily.'

Marc's heart was wrung by a pang of grief, for he interpreted those

last words as signifying that even Salvan abandoned him. 'You, you as

well, my master!' he exclaimed.

But Salvan, full of emotion, caught hold of his hands. 'No, no, my

lad, you must not doubt me; I remain on your side with all my heart.

Only you can have no idea of the difficulties in which all of us have

been placed by your action, simple and logical though it was. This

Training College is suspected, denounced as a hot-bed of irreligion.

Depinvilliers profits by it to exalt the services which the chaplain

of his Lycée renders to the cause of national pacification, the

reconcilement of all parties in the bosom of the Church. Even our

Rector, the peaceable Forbes, is full of concern, fearing lest his

tranquillity should be destroyed. Le Barazer, no doubt, is skilful, but

does he possess the necessary strength of resistance?'

'What is to be done, then?'

'Nothing: one must wait. I can only repeat to you that you must show

yourself prudent and courageous. For the rest we must rely on the force

of truth and justice.'

During the next two months Marc displayed much brave serenity amid the

outrages by which he was assailed each day. As if ignorant of the muddy

tide beating against his door, he pursued his duties with wondrous

gaiety and uprightness. Never had he accomplished more important or

more useful work, devoting himself to his pupils, and teaching them, as

much by example as by words, how necessary it was to continue working

and to retain one's love for truth and justice amid the very worst

events. To the filth, the bitter insults flung at him by his fellow

townsmen, he replied with gentleness, kindliness, and sacrifice. He

strove to make the children better than their fathers, he sowed the

happy future in the furrows of the hateful present, he redeemed the

crime of others at the cost of his own happiness. It was the thought of

the young ones around him, the duty of helping to save them a little

more each day from error and falsehood, that lent him so much calmness

and enabled him to await the blow he expected with a quiet smile, like

one who, every evening, felt well satisfied with the work accomplished

during the day.

At last, one morning, _Le Petit Beaumontais_ announced that the

revocation of 'the ignoble poisoner of Maillebois' was signed. On

the previous day Marc had heard of a fresh visit which the Count de

Sanglebœuf had paid to the Préfecture, and he ceased to hope; his ruin

was about to be consummated. The evening proved a very trying one.

Whenever he quitted his classroom, and his boys, with their smiling

faces and their fair and their dark little pates, were no longer near

to remind him of the good time coming, he sank into sadness, and

only after a struggle recovered the courage which he needed for the

morrow. And so that particular evening proved particularly bitter. He

thought of his work, destined to be so brutally interrupted--of those

dearly-loved boys, whom he had taught perhaps for the last time, and

whom he would not be allowed to save. They would be taken from him,

handed over to some deformer of intellect and character, and it was the

wreck of his ministry that made his heart bleed. He went to bed in such

a gloomy mood that Geneviève gently, silently, cast her arms about him,

as she still did occasionally from an impulse of wifely affection.

'You are worried, are you not, my poor darling?' she whispered.

He did not answer immediately. He knew that she shared his views

less than ever, and he always avoided painful explanations in spite

of his secret remorse at allowing her to drift away from him without

attempting an effort to make her wholly his own. Indeed, if he himself

had again ceased to call on her mother and grandmother, he lacked the

courage to forbid her visits to that icy little house, though he well

divined that their happiness was greatly endangered there. Each time

that Geneviève returned from the Place des Capucins he felt that she

belonged to him a little less than before. Recently, while the whole

clerical pack was barking at his heels, he had learnt that the ladies

had denied him on every side, blushing for their connection as if it

were some unmerited shame that soiled their family.

'Why don't you answer me, dear?' Geneviève began again. 'Don't you

think that I share your sorrow?'

He felt touched, and, returning her embrace, replied: 'Yes, I am

grieved. But it is about matters in which you do not feel as I do, and,

as I don't wish to reproach you, what is the use of confiding them to

you? Still I may say I fear that in a few days we shall be here no

longer.'

'How is that?'

'Oh! I shall certainly be sent elsewhere if I am not dismissed

altogether. It is all over ... and we shall have to go away, I know not

whither.'

She raised a cry of delight: 'Oh, my dear! so much the better! That is

the best thing that can happen to us.'

He felt astonished, for her meaning at first escaped him. And when he

questioned her she seemed somewhat embarrassed, and endeavoured to

recall her words: 'Oh, I say that because, of course, it would be all

the same to me if I did have to go away with you and our Louise. One

may be happy anywhere.' But when he pressed her she added: 'Besides,

if we went elsewhere we should no longer be worried by all the horrid

things which go on here, and which might end by making us quarrel.

I should be so happy if we could be alone in some little nook where

nobody would come between us, where nothing from outside would try to

separate us. Oh! let us go away to-morrow, dear!'

Several times already, in moments of affectionate self-abandonment,

Marc had noticed in his wife that same dread of rupture, that desire,

that need to remain wholly his. It was as if she said to him: 'Keep me

on your heart, carry me away, so that none may tear me from your arms.

I feel that I am being parted from you a little more each day, I shiver

with the great chill which comes over me when I am no longer in your

embrace.' And, with his dread of the inevitable, nothing could have

upset him more.

'Go away, my love?' he answered; 'it is not enough to go away. But what

joy you give me, and how grateful I feel to you for comforting me like

that!'

Several more days elapsed and still the terrible letter expected from

the Préfecture did not arrive. No doubt this was due to the fact that

a fresh incident began to impassion the district and divert public

attention from the secular school of Maillebois. For some time past

Abbé Cognasse of Jonville, whose triumph was complete, had been

meditating a great stroke, striving to induce Mayor Martineau to

allow the parish to be consecrated to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. In

all likelihood the idea had not come from the Abbé himself for every

Thursday morning during the previous month he had been seen going to

the College of Valmarie, where he had long conferences with Father

Crabot. And a remark made by Férou, the schoolmaster at Le Moreux, was

circulating, filling some folk with indignation and amusing others.

'If those dirty Jesuits bring their bullock's heart here, I will spit

in their faces,' he had said.

Henceforth the worship of the Sacred Heart was absorbing the whole

Christian faith, developing into a new Incarnation, a new Catholicism.

The sickly vision of a poor creature stricken with hysteria--the sad

and ardent Marie Alacoque--that real, gory heart half wrenched from

an open bosom, was becoming the symbol of a baser faith, degraded,

lowered to supply a need of carnal satisfaction. The ancient and

pure worship of an immaterial Jesus, who had risen on high to join

the Father, seemed to have become too delicate for modern souls

lusting for terrestrial enjoyment; and it had been resolved to serve

the very flesh of Jesus, His heart of flesh, to devotees, by way of

daily sustenance, such as superstition and brutishness required. It

was like a premeditated onslaught on human reason, an intentional

degradation of the religion of former times in order that the mass of

believers, bowed beneath the weight of falsehood, might become yet

more stupefied and more servile. With the religion of the Sacred Heart

only tribes of idolaters were left, fetichists who adored offal from

a slaughter-house, and carried it, banner-wise, on a pike-head. And

all the genius of the Jesuits was found therein--the humanisation of

religion, God coming to man since centuries of effort had failed to

lead man to God. It was necessary to give the ignorant multitude the

only deity it understood, one made in its own image, gory and dolorous

like itself, an idol of violent hues, whose brutish materiality would

complete the transformation of the faithful into a herd of fat beasts,

fit for slaughter. All conquests effected on reason are conquests

effected on liberty, and it had become necessary to reduce France to

that savage worship of the Sacred Heart, fit for the aborigines of some

undiscovered continent, in order to hold it in submission beneath the

imbecility of the Church's dogmas.

The first attempts had been made on the very morrow of the great

defeats, amid the grief arising from the loss of the two provinces.

Then already the Church had availed herself of the public confusion

to endeavour to consecrate France to the Sacred Heart--France, which

after being chastised so heavily by the hand of God, repented of her

sins. And at last, on the highest summit of that great revolutionary

city of Paris, the Church had reared that Sacred Heart, palpitating and

gory red like the hearts which one sees hanging from hooks in butchers'

shops. From that summit it bled over the entire land, to the farthest

depths of the country districts. And if at Montmartre it kindled the

adoration of the gentility, of ladies and gentlemen belonging to the

administrative services, the magistracy and the army, with what emotion

must it not infect the simple, the ignorant, and the devout of the

villages and hamlets! It became the national emblem of repentance, of

the country's self-relinquishment in the hands of the Church. It was

embroidered in the centre of the tricolor flag, whose three colours

became mere symbols of the azure of heaven, the lilies of the Virgin,

and the blood of the martyrs. And huge, swollen, and streaming with

gore, it hung thus like the new Deity of degenerate Catholicism,

offered to the base superstition of enslaved France.

At first it had been Father Crabot's idea to triumph at Maillebois,

the chief place in the canton, by consecrating that little town to the

Sacred Heart. But he had become anxious, for at Maillebois there was a

manufacturing suburb inhabited by some hundreds of working men who were

beginning to send Socialist representatives to the Municipal Council.

Thus, in spite of the Brothers and the Capuchins, he had feared some

sensational repulse. All considered, it was better to act at Jonville,

where the ground appeared well prepared. If successful there, one might

always repeat the experiment on a larger stage, some other time.

Abbé Cognasse now reigned at Jonville, which schoolmaster Jauffre

had gradually handed over to him. Jauffre's guiding principle was

a very simple one. As Clericalism was sweeping through the region,

why should he not allow it to waft him to the headmastership of some

important school at Beaumont? Thus, after prompting his wife to make

advances to the parish priest, he himself had openly gone over to

the Church, ringing the bell, chanting at the offices, taking his

pupils to Mass every Sunday. Mayor Martineau, who, following Marc, had

been an anti-clerical in former times, was at first upset by the new

schoolmaster's doings. But what could he say to a man who was so well

off and who explained so plausibly that it was wrong to be against the

priests? Thus Martineau was shaken in his ideas and allowed the other

to follow his course, till, at last, prompted thereto by the beautiful

Madame Martineau, he himself declared to the parish council that it was

best to live in agreement with the curé. After that, a year sufficed

for Abbé Cognasse to become the absolute master of the parish, his

influence no longer being counterbalanced by that of the schoolmaster,

who, indeed, willingly walked behind him, confident that he would

derive a handsome profit from his submissiveness.

Nevertheless, when the idea of consecrating Jonville to the Sacred

Heart was propounded, some dismay and resistance arose. Nobody knew

whence that idea had come, nobody could have said by whom it had been

first mooted. However, Abbé Cognasse, with his eager militant nature,

immediately made it his business in the hope of gaining great personal

glory should he be the first priest of the region to win an entire

parish over to God. He made such a stir, indeed, that Monseigneur

Bergerot, in despair at the threat of a new superstition, and grieved

by its base idolatry, summoned him to Beaumont, where, however, after

a scene which proved, it was rumoured, both terrible and pathetic, the

Bishop once again was compelled to give way. But, on two occasions, the

parish council of Jonville held tumultuous meetings, several members

angrily desiring to know what profit they would all derive from the

consecration of the parish to the Sacred Heart. For a moment it seemed

as if the affair were condemned and buried. But Jauffre also made a

trip to Beaumont, and, though nobody guessed exactly what personage he

saw there, he no sooner came back than, in a gentle, insidious manner,

he resumed the negotiations with the parish council.

The question was what the parish would gain by consecrating itself

to the Sacred Heart. Well, first of all, several ladies of Beaumont

promised presents to the church, a silver chalice, an altar cloth, some

flower vases, and a big statue of the Saviour, with a huge, flaming,

bleeding heart painted on it. Then, too, said Jauffre, there was talk

of giving a dowry of five hundred francs to the most deserving Maiden

of the Virgin when she married. But the council seemed to be most

impressed by the promise of setting up a branch establishment of the

Order of the Good Shepherd, where two hundred girls would work at

fine linen, chemises, petticoats, and knickers, for some of the great

Parisian shops. The peasants at once pictured all their daughters

working for the good Sisters, and speculated on the large amount

of money which such an establishment would probably bring into the

district.

At last it was decided that the ceremony should take place on June

10 (a Sunday), and, as Abbé Cognasse pointed out, never was festival

favoured by brighter sunshine. For three days his servant, the terrible

Palmyre, with the help of Madame Jauffre and the beautiful Madame

Martineau, had been decorating the church with evergreens and hangings,

lent by the inhabitants. The ladies of Beaumont, Présidente Gragnon,

Générale Jarousse, Préfete Hennebise--and even, so it was said, Madame

Lemarrois, the wife of the radical mayor and deputy,--had presented

the parish with a superb tricolor flag on which the Sacred Heart was

embroidered, with the motto: 'God and Country.' And Jauffre himself was

to carry that flag, walking on the right hand of the Mayor of Jonville.

An extraordinary concourse of important personages arrived during

the morning: many notabilities of Beaumont, with the ladies who had

presented the flag; Philis, the Mayor of Maillebois, with the clerical

majority of his council, as well as a shoal of cassocks and frocks; a

grand-vicar, delegated by Monseigneur the Bishop, Father Théodose and

other Capuchins, Brother Fulgence and his assistant Brothers, Father

Philibin and even Father Crabot, both of whom were surrounded and

saluted with the greatest deference. But people noticed the absence of

Abbé Quandieu, who, according to his own account, had been laid up by a

violent attack of gout at the last moment.

At three o'clock in the afternoon a band of music, which had come from

the chief town, struck up an heroic march on the Place de l'Église.

Then appeared the parish councillors, all wearing their scarves, and

headed by Mayor Martineau and schoolmaster Jauffre, the latter of whom

grasped the staff of his flag with both hands. A halt ensued until the

band had finished playing. A dense crowd of peasant families in their

Sunday best, and ladies in full dress, had gathered round, waiting.

Then, all at once, the principal door of the church was thrown wide

open, and Curé Cognasse appeared in rich sacerdotal vestments, followed

by numerous members of the clergy, the many priests who had hastened

to Jonville from surrounding spots. Chants arose, and all the people

prostrated themselves devoutly during the solemn blessing of the flag.

The pathetic moment came when Mayor Martineau and the members of the

council knelt beneath the folds of the symbolic standard, which Jauffre

held slantwise above them in order that one might the better see the

gory heart embroidered amid the three colours. And then in a loud voice

the Mayor read the deed officially consecrating the parish of Jonville

to that heart.

Women wept and men applauded. A gust of blissful insanity arose into

the clear sunlight, above the blare of the brass instruments and the

beating of the drums which had again struck up a triumphal march. And

the procession entered the church, the clergy, the Mayor, and the

council, still and ever attended by the schoolmaster and the flag. Then

came the benediction of the Holy Sacrament; the monstrance glittering

like a great star on the altar, amid all the lighted candles, while

the municipality again knelt down most devoutly. And afterwards Abbé

Cognasse began to speak with fiery eloquence, exulting at the sight of

the representatives of civil authority sheltering themselves beneath

the banner of the Sacred Heart, prostrating themselves before the Holy

Sacrament, abdicating all pride and rebellion in the hands of the

Deity, relying on Him alone to govern and save France. Did not this

signify the end of impiety, the Church mistress of men's souls and

bodies, sole representative of power and authority on earth? Ah! she

would not long delay to restore happiness to her well-beloved eldest

Daughter, who at last repented of her errors, submitted, and sought

nothing but salvation. Every parish would end by following the example

of Jonville, the whole country would give itself to the Sacred Heart,

France would recover her empire over the world by the worship of the

national flag now transformed into the flag of Jesus! Cries of ecstatic

intoxication burst forth, and the splendid ceremony came to an end in

the sacristy, whither the council, headed by the Mayor, repaired to

sign the deed on parchment which set forth that the whole parish of

Jonville had for ever consecrated itself to the Divine Heart, the civil

power piously renouncing its claims in favour of the religious power.

But when the party quitted the church a scandalous scene occurred.

Among the crowd was Férou, the schoolmaster at Le Moreux, clad in a

wretched, tattered frock coat and looking more emaciated, more ardent

than ever. He had sunk to the worst tortures of indebtedness, he was

pursued for francs and half francs which he had borrowed, for he

could no longer obtain on credit the six pounds of bread which he

needed daily to feed his exhausted wife and his three lean and ailing

daughters. Even before it was due, his paltry salary of a hundred

francs a month disappeared in that ever-widening gulf, and the little

sum which he received as parish clerk was constantly being attached by

creditors. His growing and incurable misery had increased the contempt

of the peasants who were all at their ease, and who looked askance at

knowledge as it did not even feed the master appointed to teach it. And

Férou, the only man of intelligence and culture in that abode of dense

ignorance, grew more and more exasperated at the thought that he, the

man who knew, should be the poor one, whereas the ignorant were rich.

Feverish rebellion against such social iniquity came upon him, he was

maddened by the sufferings of those who were dear to him, and dreamt of

destroying this abominable world by violence.

As he stood there he caught sight of Saleur, the Mayor of Le Moreux,

who, wishing to make himself agreeable to the triumphant Abbé Cognasse,

had come over to Jonville, arrayed in a fine new frock coat. Peace now

reigned between his parish and the priest, though the latter still

grumbled at having to walk several miles to say Mass for people who

might very well have kept a priest of their own. However, all the

esteem which had departed from the thin, ghastly, ill-paid, penniless,

and deeply indebted schoolmaster had now gone to the sturdy and

flourishing priest who was so much better off, and who turned every

baptism, wedding, and burial into so much money. Beaten, as was only

natural, in that unequal duel, Férou was no longer able to control his

rage.

'Well, Monsieur Saleur,' he exclaimed, 'here's a carnival and no

mistake! Aren't you ashamed to lend yourself to such ignominy?'

Though Saleur was not at heart with the priests, this remark vexed him.

He construed it as an attack upon his own _bourgeois_ position as an

enriched grazier, living on his income in a pretty house, repainted

and decorated at his own expense. So he sought for dignified words of

reprimand: 'You would do better to keep quiet, Monsieur Férou. The

shame belongs to those who can't even succeed sufficiently to lead

respectable lives.'

Irritated by this rejoinder, which smacked of the low standard of

morality that brought him so much suffering, Férou was about to reply

when his anger was diverted by the sight of Jauffre.

'Ah! colleague,' said he, 'so it's you who carry their banner of

falsehood and imbecility! That's a fine action for an educator of the

lowly and humble ones of our democracy! You know very well that the

priest's gain is the schoolmaster's loss.'

Jauffre, like a man who had an income of his own, and who, moreover,

was well pleased with what he had done, replied with compassionate yet

crushing contempt: 'Before judging others, my poor comrade, you would

do well to provide your daughters with shifts to hide their nakedness!'

At this Férou lost all self-control. With his unkempt hair bristling

on his head, and a savage gleam in his wild eyes, he waved his long

arms and cried: 'You gang of bigots! you pack of Jesuits! Carry your

bullock's heart about, worship it, eat it raw, and become, if you can,

even more bestial and imbecile than you are already!'

A crowd gathered around the blasphemer, hoots and threats arose, and

things would have turned out badly for him if Saleur, like a prudent

Mayor, alarmed for the good name of his commune, had not extricated him

from the hostile throng and led him away by the arm.

On the morrow the incident was greatly exaggerated; on all sides people

talked of execrable sacrilege. Indeed, _Le Petit Beaumontais_ related

that the schoolmaster of Le Moreux had spat on the national flag of the

Sacred Heart at the very moment when worthy Abbé Cognasse was blessing

that divine emblem of repentant and rescued France. And in its ensuing

number it announced that the revocation of schoolmaster Férou was a

certainty. If that were so, the consequences would be serious, for as

Férou had not completed his term of ten years' duty as a teacher he

would have to perform some years' military service. And, again, while

he was in barracks, what would become of his wife and daughters, those

woeful creatures for whom he was already unable to provide? He gone,

would they not utterly starve to death?

When Marc heard of what had happened he went to see Salvan at Beaumont.

This time the newspaper's information was correct, the revocation of

Férou was about to be signed, Le Barazer was resolved on it. And as

Marc nevertheless begged his old friend to attempt some intervention,

the other sadly refused to do so.

'No, no, it would be useless,' he said; 'I should simply encounter

inflexible determination. Le Barazer cannot act otherwise; at least,

such is his conviction. Opportunist as he is, he finds in that course

a means of ridding himself of the other difficulties of the present

time.... And you must not complain too much; for if his severity falls

on Férou it is in order that he may spare you.'

At this Marc burst into protest, saying how much he was upset and

grieved by such a _dénouement_.

'But you are not responsible, my dear fellow,' Salvan replied. 'He

is casting that prey to the clericals because they require one, and

because he thus hopes to save a good workman like yourself. It is

a very _distinguée_ solution, as somebody said to me yesterday....

Ah! how many tears and how much blood must necessarily flow for the

slightest progress to be accomplished, how many poor corpses must fill

up the ditches in order that the heroes may pass on!'

Salvan's forecast was fulfilled to the very letter. Two days afterwards

Férou was dismissed, and, rather than resign himself to military

service, he fled to Belgium, full of exasperation at the thought that

justice should be denied him. He hoped to find some petty situation at

Brussels, which would enable him to send for his wife and children, and

make himself a new home abroad. He even ended by declaring that he felt

relieved at having escaped from the university galleys, and that he now

breathed freely, like a man who was at last at liberty to think and act

as he listed.

Meantime his wife installed herself with her three little girls in two

small, sordid rooms at Maillebois, where, with all bravery, she at

once began to ply her needle as a seamstress, though she found herself

unable to earn enough for daily bread. Marc visited her and helped

her as far as he could, feeling quite heartbroken at the sight of her

pitiable wretchedness. And a remorseful feeling clung to him, for the

affair of the crucifix appeared to be forgotten amid the keen emotion

roused by the sacrilege of Jonville and the revocation which had

followed it. _Le Petit Beaumontais_ triumphed noisily, and the Count de

Sanglebœuf promenaded the town with victorious airs as if his friends,

the Brothers, the Capuchins, and the Jesuits, had now become the

absolute masters of the department. And then life followed its course,

pending the time when the struggle would begin again, on another field.

One Sunday Marc was surprised to see his wife come home carrying a

Mass-book. 'What! have you been to church?' he asked her.

'Yes,' she answered,' I have just taken the Communion.' He looked at

her, turning pale the while, penetrated by a sudden chill, a quiver,

which he strove to hide. 'You do that now, and you did not tell me of

it?' said he.

On her side she feigned astonishment, though, according to her wont,

she remained very calm and gentle: 'Tell you of it--why?' she asked.

'It is a matter of conscience. I leave you free to act according to

your views, so I suppose I may act according to mine.'

'No doubt; all the same, for the sake of a good understanding between

us, I should have liked to have known.'

'Well, you know now. I do not hide it, as you may see. But we shall,

none the less, remain good friends, I hope.'

She added nothing more, and he lacked the strength to tell her of all

that he felt seething within him, to provoke the explanation which he

knew to be imperative. But the day remained heavy with silence. This

time some connecting link had certainly snapped and sundered them.

III

Some months elapsed, and day by day Marc found himself confronted by

the redoubtable question: Why had he married a woman whose belief was

contrary to his own? Did not he and Geneviève belong to two hostile

spheres, divided by an abyss, and would not their disagreement bring

them the most frightful torture? Some scientists were suggesting that

when people desired to marry they should undergo proper examination,

and provide themselves with certificates setting forth that they were

free from all physical flaws. The young man for his part felt convinced

that all such certificates ought also to state that the holder's heart

and mind were free from every form of inherited or acquired imbecility.

Two beings, ignorant one of the other, coming from different worlds,

as it were, with contradictory and hostile notions, could only torture

and destroy each other. And yet how great an excuse was, at the outset,

furnished by the imperious blindness of love, and how difficult it was

to solve the question in some particular cases, which were often those

instinct with most charm and tenderness!

Marc did not yet accuse Geneviève--he merely dreaded lest she should

become a deadly weapon in the hands of those priests and monks against

whom he was waging war. As the Church had failed to strike him down

by intriguing with his superiors, it must now be thinking of dealing

him a blow in the heart by destroying his domestic happiness. That was

essentially the device of the Jesuits, the everlasting manœuvre of

the father-confessor, who helps on the work of Catholic domination in

stealthy fashion, like a worldly psychologist well acquainted with the

passions and the means they offer for triumphing over the human beast,

who, fondled and satiated, may then be strangled. To glide into a home,

to set oneself between husband and wife, to capture the latter and

thereby destroy the man whom the Church wishes to get rid of, no easier

and more widely adopted stratagem than this is known to the black

whisperers of the confessional.

The Church, having taken possession of woman, has used her as its most

powerful weapon of propaganda and enthralment. At the first moment

an obstacle certainly arose. Was not woman all shame and perdition,

a creature of sin, and terror, before whom the very saints trembled?

Vile nature had set its trap in her, she was the source of life, she

was life itself, the contempt of which was taught by the Church. And

so for a moment the latter denied a soul to woman, the creature from

whom men of purity fled to the desert, in danger of succumbing if the

evening breeze wafted to them merely the odour of her hair. Beauty

and passion being cast out of the religious system, she became the

mere embodiment of all that was condemned, all that was regarded as

diabolical, denounced as the craft of Satan, all against which prayer,

mortification, and strict and perpetual chastity were enjoined. And

in the desire to crush sexuality in woman, the ideal woman was shown

sexless, and a virgin was enthroned as queen of heaven.

But the Church ended by understanding the irresistible sexual power of

woman over man, and in spite of its repugnance, in spite of its terror,

decided to employ it as a means to conquer and enchain man. That great

flock of women, weakened by an abasing system of education, terrorised

by the fear of hell, degraded to the status of serfs by the hatred and

harshness of priests, might serve as an army. And as man was ceasing

to believe and turning aside from the altars, an effort to bring him

back to them might be attempted with the help of woman's Satanic but

ever victorious charm. She need only withhold herself from man, and he

would follow her to the very foot of the shrines. In this, no doubt,

there was much immoral inconsistency; but had not the Church lost much

of its primitive sternness, and had not the Jesuits appeared upon

the scene to fight the great fight on the new field of casuistry and

accommodation with the world? From that time, then, the Church handled

woman more gently and skilfully than before. It still refused to take

her to wife, for it feared and loathed her as the embodiment of sin,

but it employed her to ensure its triumph. Its policy was to keep her

to itself, by stupefying her as formerly, by holding her in a state

of perpetual mental infancy. That much ensured, it turned her into a

weapon of war, confident that it would vanquish incredulous man by

setting pious woman before him. And in woman the Church always had a

witness at the family hearth, and was able to exert its influence even

in the most intimate moments of conjugal life, whenever it desired to

plunge resisting men into the worst despair. Thus, at bottom, woman

still remained the human animal, and the priests merely made use of her

in order to ensure the triumph of their creed.

Marc easily reconstituted the early phases of Geneviève's life: in

childhood, the pleasant convent of the Sisters of the Visitation, with

all sorts of devout attractions; the evening prayer on one's knees

beside the little white bed; the providential protection promised to

those who were obedient; the lovely stories of Christians saved from

lions, of guardian angels watching over children, and carrying the

pure souls of the well-beloved to heaven, such indeed as Monsieur

le Curé related in the dazzling chapel. Afterwards came years of

skilful preparation for the first Communion, with the extraordinary

mysteries of the Catechism enshrouded in fearsome obscurity, for ever

disturbing the reason, and kindling all the perverse fever of mystical

curiosity. Then in the first troublous hour of maidenhood the young

girl, enraptured with her white gown, her first bridal gown, was

affianced to Jesus, united to the divine lover, whose gentle sway she

accepted for ever; and man might come afterwards, he would find himself

forestalled by an influence which would dispute his possession of her

with all the haunting force of remembrance. Again and again throughout

her life woman would see the candles sparkling, feel the incense

filling her with languor, hark back to the wakening of her senses amid

the mysterious whispering of the confessional and the languishing

rapture of the Holy Table. She would spend her youth encompassed by

the worst prejudices, nourished with the errors and falsehoods of

ages, and, above all things, kept in close captivity in order that

nothing of the real world might reach her. Thus the girl of sixteen

or seventeen, on quitting the good Sisters of the Visitation, was a

miracle of perversion and stultification, one whose natural vision had

been dimmed, one who knew nothing of herself nor of others, and who in

the part she would play in love and wifehood would bring, apart from

her beauty, nought save religious poison, the evil ferment of every

disorder and every suffering.

Marc pictured Geneviève, somewhat later, in the devout little house on

the Place des Capucins. It was there that he had first seen her in the

charge of her grandmother and mother, the chief care of whose vigilant

affection had been to complete the convent work by setting on one

side everything that might have made the girl a creature of truth and

reason. It was enough that she should follow the Church's observances

like an obedient worshipper; she was told that she need take no

interest in other things; she was prepared for life by being kept

quite blind to it. Some effort on Marc's part was already necessary

to enable him to recall her such as she had been at the time of their

first interviews--delightfully fair, with a refined and gentle face, so

desirable too with the flush of her youth, the penetrating perfume of

her blond beauty, that he only vaguely remembered whether she had then

shown much intelligence and sense. A gust of passion had transported

them both; he had felt that she shared his flame; for, however chilling

might have been her education, she had inherited from her father a real

craving for love.

In matters of intellect she was doubtless no fool; he must have deemed

her similar to other young girls, of whom one knows nothing; and

certainly he had resolved to look into all that after their marriage.

But when he now recalled their first years at Jonville he perceived

how slight had been his efforts to know her better and make her more

wholly his own. They had spent those years in mutual rapture, in such

passionate intoxication that they had remained unconscious even of

their moral differences. She showed real intelligence in many things,

and he had not cared to worry her about the singular gaps which he had

occasionally discovered in her understanding. As she ceased to follow

the observances of the Church he imagined that he had won her over to

his views, though he had not even taken the trouble to instruct her in

them. He now suspected that there must have been some little cowardice

on his part, some dislike of the bother of re-educating her entirely,

and also some fear of encountering obstacles, and spoiling the adorable

quietude of their love. Indeed, as their life was all happiness, why

should he have sought a cause of strife, particularly as he had felt

convinced that their great love would suffice to ensure their good

understanding whatever might arise?

But now the crisis was at hand, heavy with menace. When Salvan had

interested himself in the marriage he had pointed out to Marc that if

husband and wife were ill-assorted there was always some fear for the

future; and to tranquillise his own conscience with respect to the

young man's case it had been necessary that he should accept the view

adopted by Marc, that when a young couple adored one another it was

possible for the husband to make his wife such as he desired her to be.

Indeed, when an ignorant young girl is handed over to a man whom she

loves, is it not in his power to re-create her in his own image? He

is her god, and may mould her afresh by the sovereign might of love.

Such is the theory, but how often is it put into practice? Languor,

blindness, come upon the man himself; and in Marc's case it was only

long afterwards that he had realised how ignorant he had really

remained of Geneviève's mind--a mind which, awaking according to the

play of circumstances, revealed itself at last as that of an unknown,

antagonistic woman.

The effects of the warm bath of religiosity in which Geneviève had

grown up were still there. The adored woman, whom Marc had imagined

to be wholly his own, was possessed by the indelible, indestructible

past, in which he had no share whatever. He perceived with stupefaction

that they had nothing in common, that though he had made her wife

and mother, he had in no degree modified her brain, fashioned from

her cradle days by skilful hands. Ah! how bitterly he now regretted

that, in the first months of their married life, he had not striven to

conquer the mind that existed behind the charming face which he had

covered with his kisses! He ought not to have abandoned himself to his

happiness, he ought to have striven to re-educate the big child who

hung so amorously about his neck. As it had been his desire to make

her entirely his own, why had he not shown himself a prudent, sensible

man, whose reason remained undisturbed by the joys of love? If he

suffered now it was by reason of his vain illusions, his idleness, and

his egotism in refraining from action, from the fear of spoiling the

felicity of his dalliance.

But the danger had now become so serious that he resolved to contend

with it. A last excuse for avoiding anything like rough intervention

remained to him: respect for another's freedom, tolerance of whatever

might be the sincere faith of his life's companion. With amorous

weakness he had consented to a religious marriage, and subsequently to

the baptism of his daughter Louise, and, in the same way, he now lacked

the strength to forbid his wife's attendance at Mass, Communion,

and Confession, if her belief lay in such observances. Yet times

had changed; he might have pleaded that at the date of his wedding,

and again at the period of his daughter's birth, he had been quite

indifferent to Church matters, whereas things were very different now

that he had formally rejected the Church and its creed. He had imposed

a duty on himself, he ought to set an example, he ought not to allow

in his own home that which he condemned in the homes of others. If

he, the secular schoolmaster, who showed such marked hostility to the

interference of priests in the education of the young, should suffer

his wife to go to Mass and take little Louise with her, would he not

render himself liable to reproach? Nevertheless, he did not feel that

he had the right to prevent those things, so great was his innate

respect for liberty of conscience. Thus, confronted as he was by the

imperious necessity of defending his happiness, he perceived no other

available weapons, particularly in his own home, than discussion,

persuasion, and the daily teaching of life in all that it has of a

logical and healthful nature. That which he ought to have done at the

outset, he must attempt now, not only in order to win his Geneviève

over to healthy human truth, but also to prevent their dear Louise from

following her into the deadly errors of Roman Catholicism.

For the moment, however, the case of Louise, now seven years of

age, seemed less urgent. Moreover, though Marc was convinced that a

child's first impressions are the keenest and the most tenacious,

circumstances compelled a waiting policy with respect to his little

girl. He had been obliged to let her attend the neighbouring school,

where Mademoiselle Rouzaire was already filling her mind with Bible

history. There were also prayers at the beginning and at the end of

lessons, Sunday attendance at Mass, benedictions and processions. The

schoolmistress had certainly bowed assent with a sharp smile when Marc

had exacted from her a promise that his daughter should not be required

to follow any religious exercises. But the girl was still so young that

it seemed ridiculous to insist on preserving her from contamination

in this fashion; besides which, Marc was not always at hand to make

sure whether she said prayers with the other children or not. That

which disgusted him with Mademoiselle Rouzaire was less the clerical

zeal which seemed to consume her than her hypocrisy, the keen personal

interest which guided all her actions. The woman's lack of real

faith, her mere exploitation of religious sentimentality for her own

advantage, was so apparent that even Geneviève, whose uprightness still

remained entire, was wounded by it, and for this reason had repulsed

the other's advances.

The schoolmistress, indeed, wishing to worm her way into Marc's home

and scenting the possibility of a drama there, had suddenly manifested

great friendship for her neighbour. What delight and glory it would be

if she could render the Church a service in that direction, separate

the wife from the husband, and strike the secular schoolmaster down

at his own fireside! She therefore showed herself very amiable and

insinuating, ever keeping on the watch behind the party-wall, hoping

for some opportunity which would enable her to intervene and console

the 'poor persecuted little wife.' At times she risked allusions,

expressions of sympathy, words of advice: 'It was so sad when husband

and wife were not of the same faith! And assuredly one must not wreck

one's soul, so it was best to offer some gentle resistance.' On two

occasions Mademoiselle Rouzaire had the pleasure of seeing Geneviève

shed tears. But afterwards the young wife, feeling very uneasy,

drew away from her, and avoided all further confidential chats.

That mealy-mouthed woman, with her 'gendarme' build, her fondness

for anisette, and her chatter about the priests,--'who, after all,

were not different from other men, and of whom it was wrong to speak

badly,'--inspired her with unconquerable repugnance. Thus repulsed,

Mademoiselle Rouzaire felt her hatred for her neighbours increase, and

visited her spite on little Louise by instructing her most carefully in

religious matters, in spite of the paternal prohibition.

If Marc was not seriously concerned as yet about his daughter, he

understood that it was urgent he should act in order to prevent his

beloved Geneviève from being wrested from him. It was now plain to

him that her religious views had revived at her grandmother's house.

The pious little home on the Place des Capucins was like a hot-bed of

mystical contagion, where a faith, which had not been extinguished,

but which had died down amid the first joys of human love, was bound

to be fanned into flame once more. Had they remained at Jonville in

loving solitude, he, Marc, might have sufficed for Geneviève's yearning

passion. But at Maillebois foreign elements had intervened between

them. That terrible Simon case had brought about the first snap, and

then had come its consequences, the struggle between himself and the

Congregations, and the liberating mission which he had undertaken.

Besides, they had no longer remained alone; a stream of people and

things now flowed between them, growing ever wider and wider, and they

could already foresee the day when they would be utter strangers, one

to the other.

At present Geneviève met some of Marc's bitterest enemies at Madame

Duparque's. The young man learnt at last that the terrible grandmother,

after years of humble solicitation, had obtained the favour of being

included among Father Crabot's penitents. The Rector of Valmarie

usually reserved his services as confessor for the fine ladies of

Beaumont, and only some very powerful reasons could have induced him

to confess that old _bourgeoise_, who, socially, was of no account

whatever. And not only did he receive her at the chapel of Valmarie,

but he did her the honour to repair to the Place des Capucins whenever

an attack of gout confined her to her armchair. He there met other

personages of the cloth, Abbé Quandieu, Father Théodose, and Brother

Fulgence, who became partial to that pious nook all shadows and

silence, that well-closed little house where their conclaves, it

seemed, might pass unperceived. Nevertheless, rumours circulated,

some evil-minded people saying that the house was indeed the clerical

faction's secret headquarters, the hidden laboratory, where its most

important resolutions were prepared. Yet how could one seriously

suspect the modest dwelling of two old ladies, who certainly had every

right to receive their friends? The latter's shadows were scarcely

seen; Pélagie, the servant, swiftly and softly closed the door upon

them; not a face ever appeared at the windows, not a murmur filtered

through the sleepy little façade. Everything was very dignified--great

deference was shown for that highly respectable dwelling.

But Marc regretted that he had not gone there more frequently.

Assuredly he had made a great mistake in abandoning Geneviève to the

two old ladies, allowing her to spend whole days in their company with

little Louise. His presence would have counteracted the contagion

of that sphere; had he been there the others would have restrained

the stealthy attacks which, as he well realised, they made upon his

ideas and his person. Geneviève, as if conscious of the danger with

which the peace of her home was threatened, occasionally offered some

resistance, struggling to avoid hostilities with the husband whom

she still loved. For instance, on returning to the observances of

the Church, she had chosen Abbé Quandieu as her confessor instead of

Father Théodose, whom Madame Duparque had sought to impose on her. The

young woman was conscious of the warlike ardour that lurked behind

the Capuchin's handsome face, his beautifully-kept black beard, and

his glowing eyes, which filled his penitents with dreams of rapture;

whereas the Abbé was a prudent and gentle man, a fatherly confessor,

whose frequent silence was full of sadness--one, too, in whom she

vaguely divined a friend, one who suffered from the fratricidal warfare

of the times, and longed for peace among all workers of good will.

Geneviève, indeed, was yet at a stage of loving tenderness, when her

mind, though gradually becoming clouded, still manifested some anxiety

before it finally sank into mystical passion. But day by day she was

confronted by more serious assaults, and yielded more and more to the

disturbing influence of her relatives, whose unctuous gestures and

caressing words slowly benumbed her. In vain did Marc now repair more

frequently to the Place des Capucins; he could no longer arrest the

poison's deadly work.

As yet, however, there was no attempt to enforce authority, no brutal

roughness. Geneviève was merely enticed, flattered, cajoled, with

gentle hands. And no violent words were spoken of her husband; on the

contrary, he was said to be a man deserving of all pity, a sinner whose

salvation was most desirable. The unhappy being! He knew not what

incalculable harm he was doing to his country, how many children's

souls he was wrecking, sending to hell, through his obstinate rebellion

and pride! Then, at first vaguely, and afterwards more and more

plainly, a desire was expressed in Geneviève's presence that she might

devote herself to the most praiseworthy task of converting that sinner,

redeeming that guilty man, whom, in her weakness, she still loved. What

joy and glory would be hers if she should lead him back to religion,

arrest his rageful work of destruction, save him, and thereby save

his innocent victims from eternal damnation! For several months, with

infinite craft, the young woman was in this wise worked upon, prepared

for the enterprise expected of her, with the evident hope of bringing

about conjugal rupture by fomenting a collision between the two

irreconcilable principles which she and her husband represented--she

a woman of the past, full of the errors of the ages--he a man of free

thought, marching towards the future. And in time the much-sought,

inevitable developments appeared.

The conjugal life of Marc and Geneviève grew sadder every day--that

life so gay and loving once, when their kisses had perpetually mingled

with their merry laughter. They had not yet reached the quarrelling

stage; but, as soon as they found themselves alone together and

unoccupied, they felt embarrassed. Something of which they never

spoke seemed to be growing up between them, chilling them more and

more, prompting them to enmity. On Marc's side there was a growing

consciousness that she who was bound up with every hour of his life,

she whom he embraced at night, was a woman foreign to him, one whose

ideas and sentiments he reprobated. And on Geneviève's side there was

a similar feeling, an exasperating conviction that she was regarded as

an ignorant, unreasonable child, one who was still adored but with a

love laden with much dolorous compassion. Thus their first wounds were

imminent.

One night, when they were in bed, encompassed by the warm darkness,

while Marc held Geneviève in a mute embrace as if she were some sulking

child, she suddenly burst into bitter sobs, exclaiming: 'Ah! you love

me no longer!'

'No longer love you, my darling!' he replied; 'why do you say that?'

'If you loved me you would not leave me in such dreadful sorrow! You

turn away from me more and more each day. You treat me as if I were

some ailing creature, sickly or insane. Nothing that I may say seems

of any account to you. You shrug your shoulders at it. Ah! I feel it

plainly, you are growing more and more impatient; I am becoming a

worry, a burden to you.'

Though Marc's heart contracted, he did not interrupt her, for he wished

to learn everything.

'Yes,' she resumed, 'unhappily for me I can see things quite plainly.

You take more interest in the last of your boys than you do in me.

When you are downstairs with the boys, in the classroom, you become

impassioned, you pour out your whole soul, you exert yourself to

explain the slightest things to them, and laugh and play with them like

an elder brother. But directly you come upstairs you get gloomy again;

you can think of nothing to say to me, you look ill at ease, like a

man who's worried by his wife and tired of her.... Ah! God, God, how

unhappy I am!'

Again she burst into sobs.

Then Marc, making up his mind, gently responded: 'I dared not tell

you the cause of my sadness, darling, but if I suffer it is precisely

because I find in you all that you reproach me with. You are never

with me now. You spend whole days elsewhere, and when you come home

you bring with you an air of unreason and death, which ravages our

poor home. It is you who no longer speak to me. Your mind is always

wandering, deep in some dim dream, even while you are sewing, or

serving the meals, or attending to our little Louise. It is you who

treat me with indulgent pity, as if I were a guilty man, perhaps one

unconscious of his crime; and it is you who will soon have ceased to

love me, if you refuse to open your eyes to a little reasonable truth.'

But she would not admit it; she interrupted each sentence that came

from him with protests full of vehemence and stupefaction: I! I! It

is I whom you accuse! I tell you that you no longer love me, and you

dare to assert that I am losing my love for you!' Then, casting aside

all restraint, revealing the innermost thoughts that haunted her day

by day, she continued: 'Ah! how happy are the women whose husbands

share their faith! I see some in church who are always accompanied by

their husbands. How delightful it must be for husband and wife to place

themselves conjointly in the hands of God! Those homes are blessed,

they indeed have but one soul, and there is no felicity that heaven

does not shower on them!'

Marc could not restrain a slight laugh, at once very gentle and

distressful. 'So now, my poor wife,' he said, 'you think of trying to

convert me?'

'What harm would there be in that?' she answered eagerly. 'Do you

imagine I do not love you enough to feel frightful grief at the

thought of the deadly peril you are in? You do not believe in future

punishment, you brave the wrath of heaven; but for my part I pray

heaven every day to enlighten you, and I would give--ah! willingly--ten

years of my life to be able to open your eyes, and save you from the

terrible catastrophes which threaten you. Ah! if you would only love

me, and listen to me, and follow me to the land of eternal delight!'

She trembled in his embrace, she glowed with such a fever of superhuman

desire that he was thunderstruck, for he had not imagined the evil to

be so deep. It was she who catechised him now, who tried to win him to

her faith, and he felt ashamed, for was she not doing what he himself

ought to have done the very first day--that is, strive to convert her

to his own views? He could not help expressing his thoughts aloud, and

unluckily he said: 'It is not you yourself who is speaking; you have

been given a task full of danger for the happiness of both of us.'

At this she began to lose her temper: 'Why do you wound me like that?'

she asked. 'Do you think I am incapable of acting for myself--from

personal conviction and affection? Am I senseless, then--so stupid

and docile that I can only serve as an instrument? Besides, even if

people--who are worthy of all respect, and whose sacred character you

disregard--do speak to me about you in a brotherly way which would

surprise you--ought you not rather to be moved by it, ought you not to

yield to such loving-kindness?... God, who might strike you down, holds

out His arms to you ... yet when He makes use of me and my love to lead

you back to Him you can only jest and treat me as if I were a foolish

little girl repeating a lesson!... Ah! we understand each other no

longer, and it is that which grieves me so much!'

While she spoke he felt his fear and desolation increasing. 'That

is true,' he repeated slowly, 'we no longer understand one another.

Words no longer have the same meaning for us, and every reproach that

I address to you, you address to me. Which of us will break away from

the other? Which of us loves the other and works for the other's

happiness?... Ah! I am the guilty one and I greatly fear that it is too

late for me to repair my fault. I ought to have taught you where to

find truth and equity.'

At these words, so suggestive of his profession, her rebellion became

complete. 'Yes, for you I am always a foolish pupil who knows nothing

and whose eyes require to be opened. But it is I who know where truth

and justice are to be found. You have not the right to speak those

words.'

'Not the right!'

'No; you have plunged into that monstrous error, that ignoble Simon

affair, in which your hatred of the Church blinds you and urges you

to the worst iniquity. When a man like you goes so far as to override

all truth and justice in order to strike and befoul the ministers of

religion, it is better to believe that he has lost his senses.'

This time Marc reached the root of the quarrel which Geneviève was

picking with him. The Simon case lay beneath everything else, it was

that alone which had inspired all the discreet and skilful manœuvring

of which he beheld the effects. If his wife were enticed away from him

at her relatives' home, if she were employed as a weapon to strike him

a deadly blow, it was especially in order that an artisan of truth, a

possible justiciary, might be smitten in his person. It was necessary

to suppress him, for his destruction alone could ensure the impunity of

the real culprits.

His voice trembled with deep grief as he answered: 'Ah! Geneviève, this

is more serious. There will be an end to our home if we can no longer

agree on so clear and so simple a question. Are you no longer on my

side, then, in that painful affair?'

'No, certainly not.'

'You think poor Simon guilty?'

'Why, there is no doubt of it! The reasons you give for asserting his

innocence repose on no foundation whatever! I should like you to hear

the persons whose purity of life you dare to suspect! And as you fall

into such gross error respecting a case in which everything is so

evident, a case which is settled beyond possibility of appeal, how can

I place the slightest faith in your other notions, your fanciful social

system, in which you begin by suppressing religion?'

He had taken her in his arms again, and was holding her in a tight

embrace. Ah! she was right. Their slowly increasing rupture had

originated in their divergence of views on that question of truth

and justice, in reference to which others had managed to poison her

understanding. 'Listen, Geneviève,' he said; 'there is only one truth,

one justice. You must listen to me, and our agreement will restore our

peace.'

'No, no!'

'But, Geneviève, you must not remain in such darkness when I see light

all around me; it would mean separation forever.'

'No, no, let me be! You tire me; I won't even listen.'

She wrenched herself from his embrace and turned her back upon him.

He vainly sought to clasp her again, kissing her and whispering

gentle words; she would not move, she would not even answer. A chill

swept down on the conjugal couch, and the room seemed black as ink,

dolorously lifeless, as if the misfortune which was coming had already

annihilated everything.

From that time forward Geneviève became more nervous and ill-tempered.

Much less consideration was now shown for her husband at her

grandmother's house; he was attacked in her presence in an artfully

graduated manner, as by degrees her affection for him was seen to

decline. Little by little he became a public malefactor, one of

the damned, a slayer of the God she worshipped. And the rebellion

to which she was thus urged re-echoed in her home in bitter words,

in an increase of discomfort and coldness. Fresh quarrels arose at

intervals, usually at night, when they retired to rest, for in the

daytime they saw little of each other, Marc then being busy with his

boys and Geneviève being constantly absent, now at church, now at her

grandmother's. Thus their life was gradually quite spoilt. The young

woman showed herself more and more aggressive, while her husband, so

tolerant by nature, in his turn ended by manifesting irritation.

'My darling, I shall want you to-morrow during afternoon lessons,' he

said one evening.

'To-morrow? I can't come,' she replied; 'Abbé Quandieu will be

expecting me. Besides, you need not rely on me for anything.'

'Won't you help me, then?'

'No, I detest everything you do. Damn yourself if you choose; but I

have to think of my salvation.'

'Then each is to go his own way?'

'As you please.'

'Oh! darling, darling, is it you who speak like that? Are they going to

change your heart after fogging your mind? So now you are altogether on

the side of the corrupters and poisoners?'

'Be quiet, be quiet, you unhappy man! It is your work which is all

falsehood and poison. You blaspheme; your justice and your truth are

filthy; and it is the devil--yes, the devil--who teaches those wretched

children of yours, whom I no longer even pity, for they must be stupid

indeed to remain here!'

'My poor darling, how is it possible that you, once so intelligent, can

say such foolish things?'

'When a man finds women foolish he leaves them to themselves.'

Thereupon, in his turn losing his temper, Marc, indeed, left her to

herself, making no effort to win her back by a loving caress as in

former days. It often happened that they were unable to get to sleep;

they lay in bed, side by side, with their eyes wide open in the

darkness, silent and motionless, as if the little space which separated

them had become an abyss.

Marc was particularly afflicted by the growing hatred which Geneviève

manifested against his school, against the dear children whom he so

passionately strove to teach. At each fresh dispute she expressed

herself so bitterly that it seemed as if she became jealous of the

little ones when she saw him treat them so affectionately, endeavour

so zealously to make them sensible and peaceable. At bottom, indeed,

Geneviève's quarrel with Marc had no other cause; for she herself was

but a child, one of those who needed to be taught and freed, but who

rebelled and clung stubbornly to the errors of the ages. And in her

estimation all the affection which her husband lavished on his boys

was diverted from herself. As long as he should busy himself with them

in such a fatherly fashion, she would be unable to conquer him, carry

him away into the divine and rapturous stultification, in which she

would fain have seen him fall asleep in her arms. The struggle at last

became concentrated on that one point. Geneviève no longer passed the

classroom without feeling an inclination to cross herself, like one who

was utterly upset by the diabolical work accomplished there, who was

irritated by her powerlessness to wrest from such impious courses the

man whose bed she still shared.

Months, even years went by, and the battle between Marc and Geneviève

grew fiercer. But no imprudent haste was displayed at the home of her

relatives, for the Church has all eternity before her to achieve her

ends. Besides, leaving on one side that vain marplot, Brother Fulgence,

Father Théodose and Father Crabot were too skilled in the manipulation

of souls to overlook the necessity of proceeding slowly with a woman

of passionate nature, whose mind was an upright one when mysticism did

not obscure and pervert it. As long as she should love her husband,

as long as there should be no conjugal rupture, the work they had

undertaken would not be complete. And it required a long time to uproot

and extirpate a great love from a woman's heart and flesh in such wise

that it might never grow again. Thus Geneviève was left in the hands

of Abbé Quandieu, so that he might gently rock her to sleep before

more energetic action was attempted. Meantime, the others contented

themselves with watching her. It was a masterpiece of delicate,

gradual, but certain spell working.

Another affair helped to disturb Marc's home. He took a great deal of

interest in Madame Férou, who had installed herself with her three

daughters in a wretched lodging at Maillebois, where she had sought

work as a seamstress while awaiting a summons from her husband, the

dismissed schoolmaster, who had fled to Brussels to seek employment

there. But the wretched man's endeavours had proved fruitless. He had

found himself unable even to provide for his own wants; and tortured

by separation, exasperated by exile, he had lost his head and returned

to Maillebois with the bravado of one whom misery pursues and who can

know no worse misfortune than that already befalling him. Denounced

on the very next day, he was seized by the military authorities as a

deserter, and Salvan had to intervene actively to save him from being

incorporated at once in some disciplinary company. He was now in

garrison in a little Alpine town, at the other end of France, while his

wife and daughters, scarcely possessed of shelter and clothes, often

found themselves without bread.

Marc also had exerted himself on Férou's behalf at the time of his

arrest. He had then seen him for a few minutes and was unable to

forget him. That poor, big, haggard fellow lingered in his mind like

the victim, _par excellence_, of social abomination. Doubtless he had

made his retention in office impossible, even as Mauraisin said; but

how many excuses there were for this shepherd's son who had become a

schoolmaster, who had been starved for years, who had been treated

with so much scorn on account of his poverty, who had been cast to the

most extreme views by his circumstances: he, a man of intelligence and

learning, who found himself possessing nothing, knowing not one joy of

life, whereas ignorant brutes possessed and enjoyed all around him. And

the long iniquity had ended in brutal barrack-life far away from those

who were dear to him, and who were perishing of misery.

'Is it not enough to goad one into turning everything upside down?'

he had cried to Marc at their brief interview, his eyes flashing

while he waved his long bony arms. 'I signed, it's true, a ten years'

engagement which exempted me from barrack-life if I gave those ten

years to teaching. And it's true also that I gave only eight years, as

I was revoked for having said what I thought about the black-frocks'

revolting idolatry! But was it I who cancelled my engagement? And

after casting me brutally adrift, without any means of subsistence,

isn't it monstrous to seize me and claim payment of my old debt to the

army, in such wise that my wife and children must remain with nobody

to earn a living for them? The eight years I spent in the university

penitentiary, where a man who believes in truth is allowed neither

freedom of speech nor freedom of action, were not enough for them! They

insist on robbing me of two more years, on shutting me up in their gaol

of blood and iron, and reducing me to that life of passive obedience

which is the necessary apprenticeship for devastation and massacre, the

mere thought of which exasperates me! Ah! it's too much. I've given

them quite enough of my life, and they will end by maddening me if they

ask me for more.'

Alarmed at finding him so excited, Marc tried to calm him by promising

to do all he could for his wife and daughters. In two years' time he

would be released, and then some position might be found for him, and

he would be able to begin his life afresh. But Férou remained gloomy,

and growled angry words: 'No, no, I'm done for. I shall never get

through those two years quietly. They know it well, and it's to get the

chance of killing me like a mad dog that they are sending me yonder.'

Then he inquired who had replaced him at Le Moreux, and on hearing

that it was a man named Chagnat, an ex-assistant teacher at Brévannes,

a large parish of the region, he began to laugh bitterly. Chagnat,

a dusky little man with a low brow and retreating mouth and chin,

was the personification of the perfect beadle--not a hypocrite like

Jauffre, who made use of religion as a means to advancement, but

a shallow-brained bigot, such a dolt indeed as to believe in any

nonsensical trash that fell from the priest's lips. His wife, a huge

carroty creature, was yet more stupid than himself. And Férou's bitter

gaiety increased when he learnt that Mayor Saleur had completely

abdicated in favour of that idiot Chagnat, whom Abbé Cognasse employed

as a kind of sacristan-delegate to rule the parish on his behalf.

'When I told you long ago,' said Férou, 'that all that dirty gang, the

priests, the good Brothers, and the good Sisters, would eat us up and

reign here, you wouldn't believe me; you declared that my mind was

diseased! Well, now it has come to pass; they are your masters, and

you'll see into what a fine mess they will lead you. It disgusts one to

be a man: a stray dog is less to be pitied. And as for myself I've had

quite enough of it all. I'll bring things to an end if they plague me.'

Nevertheless Férou was sent off to join his regiment, and another

three months went by, the wretchedness of his unhappy wife steadily

increasing. She, once so fair and pleasant with her bright and fresh

round face, now looked twice as old as she really was, aged betimes

by hard toil and want. She still found very little work, and spent an

entire winter month fireless, almost without bread. To make matters

worse, her eldest daughter fell ill with typhoid fever, and lay

perishing in the icy garret into which the wind swept through every

chink in the door and window. Marc, who in a discreet way had already

given alms to the poor woman, at last begged his wife to entrust her

with some work.

Although Geneviève spoke of Férou even as those whom she met at her

grandmother's house spoke of him, saying that he had blasphemously

insulted the Sacred Heart and was a sacrilegist, she felt stirred by

the story of his wife's bitter want. 'Yes,' she said to her husband,

'Louise needs a new frock; I have the stuff, and I will take it to that

woman.'

'Thank you for her. I will go with you,' Marc replied.

On the following day they repaired together to Madame Férou's sordid

lodging, whence her landlord threatened to expel her as she was in

arrears with her rent. Her eldest daughter was now near her death; and

when the Froments arrived she herself and her two younger girls were

sobbing in heartrending fashion amid the fearful disorder of the place.

For a moment Marc and Geneviève remained standing there, amazed and

unable to understand the situation.

'You haven't heard it, you haven't heard it, have you?' Madame Férou

at last exclaimed. 'Well, it's done now; they are going to kill him.

Ah! he guessed it; he said that those brigands would end by having his

skin.'

She went on speaking in a disjointed fashion amid her sobs, and Marc

was thus able to extract from her the distressful story. Férou, as was

inevitable, had turned out a very bad soldier, and unfavourably noted

by his superiors, treated with the utmost harshness as a revolutionary,

he had carried a quarrel with his corporal so far as to rush on the

latter and kick and pommel him. For this he had been court-martialled,

and they were now about to send him to a military _bagnio_ in Algeria,

where he would be drafted into one of those disciplinary companies,

among which the abominable tortures of the old ages are still practised.

'He will never come back, they will murder him!' his wife continued in

a fury. 'He wrote to bid me good-bye; he knows that he will soon be

killed.... And what shall I do? What will become of my poor children?

Ah! the brigands, the brigands!'

Marc listened, sorely grieved, unable to think of a word of

consolation, whereas Geneviève began to show signs of impatience.

'But, my dear Madame Férou,' she exclaimed, 'why should they kill your

husband? The officers of our army are not in the habit of killing their

men. You increase your own distress by your unjust thoughts.'

'They are brigands, I tell you!' the unhappy woman repeated with

growing violence. 'What! my poor Férou starved for eight years,

discharging the most ungrateful duties, and he is taken for another

two years and treated like a brute beast, simply because he spoke like

a sensible man! And now what was bound to happen has happened; he is

sent to the galleys, where they'll end by murdering him after dragging

him from agony to agony! No, no, I won't have it! I'll go and tell them

that they are all a band of brigands--brigands!'

Marc endeavoured to calm her. He, all kindliness and equity, was

shocked by such excessive social iniquity. But what could those on whom

it recoiled, the wife and children, do, crushed as they were beneath

the millstone of tragic fate? 'Be reasonable,' said he. 'We will try to

do something; we will not forsake you.'

But Geneviève had become icy cold. That wretched home where the mother

was wringing her hands, where the poor puny girls were sobbing and

lamenting, no longer inspired her with any pity. She no longer even saw

the eldest daughter, wrapped in the shreds of a blanket and looking so

ghastly as she gazed at the scene with dilated, expressionless eyes,

unable even to weep, such was her weakness. Erect and rigid, still

carrying the little parcel formed of the stuff for Louise's new frock,

the young woman slowly said: 'You must place yourself in the hands of

God. Cease to offend Him, for He might punish you still more.'

A laugh of terrible scorn came from Madame Férou: 'Oh! God is too busy

with the rich to pay attention to the poor!' she cried. 'It was in His

name that we were reduced to this misery, it is in His name that they

are going to murder my poor husband!'

At this Geneviève was carried away by anger: 'You blaspheme! You

deserve no help!' said she. 'If you had only shown a little religious

feeling, I know persons who would have helped you already.'

'But I ask you for nothing, madame,' the poor woman answered. 'Yes, I

know that help has been refused me because I do not go to confession.

Even Abbé Quandieu, who is so charitable, does not dare to include me

among his poor.... But I am not a hypocrite, I simply endeavour to earn

my bread by work.'

'Well, then, apply for work to the wretched madmen who regard the

priests and the officers as brigands!'

And thereupon Geneviève hurried away in a passion, carrying with her

the stuff for her daughter's frock. Marc was obliged to follow her,

though he quivered with indignation. And halfway down the stairs he

could restrain himself no longer. 'You have just done a bad action!' he

exclaimed.

'How?'

'How? A God of kindness would be charitable to all. Your God of wrath

and punishment is but a monstrous phantasy.... It is not necessary that

one should humble oneself to deserve assistance, it is sufficient that

one should suffer.'

'No, no! Those who sin deserve their sufferings! Let them suffer if

they persist in impiety. My duty is to do nothing for them.'

That same evening, when they were alone, the quarrel began afresh, and

Marc, on his side, for the first time became violent, unable as he

was to forgive Geneviève's lack of charity. Hitherto he had fancied

that her mind alone was threatened, but was it not evident now that

her heart also would be spoilt? And that night irreparable words were

spoken, husband and wife realised what an abyss had been dug between

them by invisible hands. Then both relapsed into silence in the black

room full of grief and pain, and on the morrow they did not exchange a

word.

Moreover, a source of constant disputes, one which was bound to make

rupture inevitable, had now sprung up. Louise would be soon ten years

old, and the question of sending her to Abbé Quandieu's Catechism

classes, in order that she might be prepared for her first Communion,

presented itself. Marc, after begging Mademoiselle Rouzaire to

exempt his daughter from all religious exercises, had noticed that

the schoolmistress took no account of his request, but crammed the

child with orisons and canticles as she did with her other pupils.

But he was obliged to close his eyes to it, for he realised that the

schoolmistress was only too anxious to have a chance of appealing

to Geneviève on the subject in order to create trouble in his home.

When the Catechism question arose, however, he desired to act firmly,

and watched for an opportunity to have a decisive explanation with

Geneviève. That opportunity presented itself naturally enough on the

day when Louise, returning from her lessons, said to her mother in her

father's presence: 'Mamma, Mademoiselle Rouzaire told me to ask you to

see Abbé Quandieu, so that he may put my name down for his Catechism

class.'

'All right, my dear, I will go to see him to-morrow.'

Marc, who was reading, quickly raised his head: 'Excuse me, my dear,

but you will not go to Abbé Quandieu.'

'Why not?'

'It is simple enough. I do not wish Louise to follow the Catechism

lessons because I do not wish her to make her first Communion.'

Geneviève did not immediately lose her temper, but laughed as if with

ironical compassion: 'You are out of your senses, my friend,' said she.

'Not make her first Communion indeed! Why in that case how would you

find a husband for her? What a casteless, shameless position you would

give her throughout her life! Besides, you allowed her to be baptised,

you allowed her to learn her Bible history and prayers, so it is

illogical on your part to forbid the Catechism and the Communion.'

Marc also kept his temper for the moment, and answered quietly: 'You

are right, I was weak, and for that very reason I am resolved to be

weak no longer. I showed all tolerance for your belief as long as the

child remained quite young, and hung about your skirts. A daughter,

it is said, ought to belong more particularly to her mother, and I am

willing that it should be so until the time comes when the question of

the girl's moral life, her whole future, presents itself. Surely the

father then has a right to intervene?'

Geneviève waved her hand impatiently and her voice began to tremble

as she answered: 'I wish Louise to follow the Catechism lessons, you

don't wish her to do so. If we have equal rights over the child we may

go on disputing for ever without reaching a solution. What I desire

seems to you idiotic, and what you desire appears to me abominable.'

'Oh! what I desire, what I desire! My desire simply is that my daughter

shall not be prevented from exercising her own free will later on....

The question now is to profit by her childishness in order to deform

her mind and heart, poison her with lies, and render her for ever

incapable of becoming human and sensible. And that is what I desire to

prevent. But I do not wish to impose my will on her, I simply wish to

ensure her the free exercise of her will at a later date.'

'But how do you provide for that? What is to be done with this big

girl?'

'It is only necessary to let her grow up and to open her eyes to every

truth. When she is twenty she will decide who is right--you or I; and

if she should then think it sensible and logical she will revert to the

Catechism and make her first Communion.'

At this Geneviève exploded: 'You are really mad! You say such absurd

things before the child that I feel ashamed of you!'

Marc also lost patience. 'Absurd, my poor wife? It is your notions

that are absurd! And I won't have my child's mind perverted with such

absurdities.'

'Be quiet! be quiet!' she cried. 'You don't know what you wrench from

me when you speak like that! Yes, you tear away all my love for you,

all our happiness, which I should still like to save!... But how are

we to agree if words no longer have the same meaning for us, if what

you declare to be absurd is for me the divine and the eternal?... And

is not your fine logic at fault? How can Louise choose between your

ideas and mine if you now prevent me from having her instructed as I

desire?... I do not prevent you from telling her whatever you wish, but

I must be free to take her to the Catechism class.'

Marc was already weakening: 'I know the theory,' said he. 'The child

enlightened by both the father and the mother, with the right of

choosing between their views later on. But is that right left intact

when a full course of religious training, aggravating the child's long

Catholic heredity, deprives her of all power of thinking and acting

freely? The father, who is so imperfectly armed, can do little when

he talks truth and sense to a girl whose senses and whose heart are

disturbed by others. And when she has grown up amid the pomps of the

Church, its terrifying mysteries and its mystical absurdities, it is

too late for her to revert to a little sense--her mind has been warped

for ever.'

'If you have your right as a father,' Geneviève retorted violently, 'I

have my right as a mother. You are not going to take my daughter from

me when she is only ten years old and still has so much need of me. It

would be monstrous! I am an honest woman, and I mean to make Louise

an honest woman too.... She shall go to the Catechism class, and, if

necessary, I myself will take her!'

Marc, who had risen from his chair, made a furious gesture of protest,

but he had strength enough to restrain the violent, the supreme words

which would have precipitated immediate rupture. What could he say,

what could he do? As usual, he recoiled from the fearful prospect of

seeing his home destroyed, his happiness changed into hourly torture.

He still loved that woman who showed herself so narrow-minded and

particularly so stubborn; there still lingered on his lips the taste

of hers; and he could not forget, he could not obliterate, the happy

days of their early married life, the powerful bond then formed between

them, that child who was the flesh of their flesh, and now the cause

of their quarrels. Like many others before him he felt he was driven

into a corner, whence he could not extricate himself unless he took to

brutal courses--tore the child from her mother's arms, and plunged the

house into desolation and commotion every day. And there was too much

gentleness, too much kindness, in his nature; he lacked the cold energy

that was requisite for a struggle in which his own heart and the hearts

of those he loved must bleed. On that field then he was foredoomed to

defeat.

Louise had listened in silence, without moving, to the dispute between

her father and mother. For some time past, whenever she had seen them

thus at variance, her large brown eyes had glanced from one to the

other with an expression of sad and increasing surprise.

'But, papa,' she now said, amid the painful silence which had fallen,

'why don't you wish me to go to the Catechism class?'

She was very tall for her age, and had a calm and gentle face, in which

the features of the Duparques and the Froments were blended. Though

she was still only a child, she displayed keen intelligence, and a

thirst for information which constantly impelled her to ply her father

with questions. And she worshipped him, and showed also great affection

for her mother, who attended to all her wants with a kind of loving

passion.

'So you think, papa,' she resumed, 'that if things which are not

reasonable are told me at the Catechism class I shall accept them?'

Marc, in spite of his emotion, could not help smiling. 'Reasonable or

not,' said he, 'you must of necessity accept them.'

'But you will explain them to me?'

'No, my dear; they are, and must remain, unexplainable.'

'But you explain to me everything I ask you when I come back from

Mademoiselle Rouzaire's and haven't understood some lesson.... It is

thanks to you that I am often the first of my class.'

'If you came back from Abbé Quandieu's there would be nothing for me to

explain to you,' Marc answered, 'for the essential characteristic of

the pretended truths of the Catechism is that they are not accessible

to our reason.'

'Ah! how funny!'

For a moment Louise remained silent, in meditation, her glance

wandering far away. Then, still with a pensive expression on her face,

she slowly gave utterance to her thoughts. 'It's funny; when things

haven't been explained to me and I don't understand them I recollect

nothing about them, it is as if they didn't exist. I close my eyes and

see nothing. Everything is black. And then, however much I may try, I'm

the last of the class.'

She looked charming with her serious little face, well balanced as she

already was, going instinctively towards all that was good, clear, and

sensible. Whenever an attempt was made to force into her head things

whose sense escaped her, or which seemed to her to be wrong, she smiled

in a quiet way and passed them by.

But Geneviève now intervened, saying with some irritation, 'If your

father cannot explain the Catechism to you I will do so.'

At this Louise immediately ran to kiss her mother as if she feared she

had offended her: 'That's it, mamma, you will hear me my lessons. You

know that I always try my best to understand.' And, turning towards

her father, she gaily resumed, 'You see, papa, you may as well let me

go to the Catechism, particularly as you say yourself that one ought

to learn everything, so that one may be the better able to judge and

choose.'

Then, once again, Marc gave way, having neither the strength nor the

means to act otherwise. He reproached himself with his weakness; but

such was his craving for affection that it was impossible for him to be

otherwise than weak when he thought of his devastated home where the

struggle each day became more painful.

The rupture was soon to be precipitated, however, by a final incident.

Years had elapsed since Marc's arrival at Maillebois, and there had

been all sorts of changes among his pupils. Sébastien Milhomme, his

favourite, now fifteen years of age, was by his advice preparing

himself for admission into the Training College of Beaumont, having

secured his elementary certificate already in his twelfth year.

Four other boys had left the school with similar certificates--the

two Doloirs and the twin Savins. Auguste Doloir had now embraced

his father's calling as a mason, while his brother Charles had been

apprenticed to a locksmith. As for Savin, he had declined to follow

Marc's advice and make schoolmasters of his sons, for he did not

wish to see them starve, said he, in an ungrateful calling which

everybody held in contempt. So he had proudly placed Achille with a

process-server and was looking about him for some petty employment

which would suit Philippe.

Meantime, the hard-headed Fernand Bongard had quietly returned to his

father's farm to till the ground, having failed to gain a certificate,

though in Marc's hands he had acquired more understanding than his

parents possessed. As for the girls who had quitted Mademoiselle

Rouzaire, Angèle Bongard, who was more intelligent than her brother,

had duly carried a certificate to the farm, where, like the shrewd

ambitious young person she was, quite capable of keeping accounts, she

dreamt of improving her position. Then Hortense Savin, still without a

certificate at sixteen years of age, had become a very pretty brunette,

extremely devout and sly. She had remained a Handmaiden of the Virgin,

and her father dreamt of a fine marriage for her, though there were

rumours of a mysterious seduction, the consequences of which she each

day found it more difficult to hide.

Of course several new boys had come to Marc's school, replacing their

elders there. There was another little Savin, Jules, whom Marc

remembered having seen as an infant at the time of the Simon case; and

there was another little Doloir, Léon, born subsequent to the affair,

and now nearly seven years old. Later on the children's children would

be coming to the school, and if Marc were left at his post perhaps he

would teach them also, thus facilitating another step to humanity, ever

on the march towards increase of knowledge.

But Marc was particularly concerned about one of his new boys, one whom

he had greatly desired to have at the school. This was little Joseph,

Simon's son, who had now almost completed his eleventh year. For a

long time Marc had not dared to expose him to the taunts and blows of

the other boys. Then, thinking that their passions had calmed down

sufficiently, he had made the venture, applying to Madame Simon and the

Lehmanns, and promising them that he would keep a good watch over the

lad. For three years now he had had Joseph in the school, and, after

defending him against all sorts of vexations, had prevailed on the

other boys to treat him with some good fellowship. Indeed, he even made

use of the lad as a living example when seeking to inculcate principles

of tolerance, dignity, and kindness.

Joseph was a very handsome boy, in whom his mother's beauty was

blended with his father's intelligence; and the dreadful story of his

father's fate, with which it had been necessary to acquaint him, seemed

to have ripened him before his time. Usually grave and reserved, he

studied with a sombre ardour, intent on being always the first of his

class, as if, by that triumph, to raise himself above all outrage.

His dream, his express desire, which Marc encouraged, was to become a

schoolmaster, for in this he boyishly pictured a kind of _revanche_

and rehabilitation. No doubt it was Joseph's fervour, the passionate

gravity of that clever and handsome boy, which the more particularly

struck little Louise, whose senior he was by nearly three years. At all

events she became his great friend, and they were well pleased whenever

they found themselves together.

At times Marc kept Joseph after lessons, and at times also his sister

Sarah came to fetch him. Then, if Sébastien Milhomme, as was sometimes

the case, happened to be at Marc's, a delightful hour was spent. The

four children agreed so well that they never quarrelled. Sarah, whom

her mother feared to confide to others as she did her boy, was, at ten

years of age, a most charming child, gentle and loving; and Sébastien,

five years her elder, treated her with the playful affection of an

elder brother. Geneviève alone manifested violent displeasure when the

four children happened to meet in her rooms. She found in this another

cause for anger with her husband. Why had he brought those Jews into

their home? There was no need for her daughter to compromise herself by

associating with the children of that horrid criminal who had been sent

to the galleys! Thus this also helped to bring about quarrels in the

home.

At last came the fated catastrophe. One evening, when the four young

people were playing together after lessons, Sébastien suddenly felt

ill. He staggered as if intoxicated, and Marc had to take him to his

mother's. On the morrow the boy was unable to leave his bed, a terrible

attack of typhoid fever prostrated him, and for three weeks his life

hung in the balance. It was a frightful time for his mother, Madame

Alexandre, who remained at his bedside, no longer setting foot in the

shop downstairs. Moreover, since the Simon affair she had gradually

withdrawn from it, leaving her sister-in-law, Madame Edouard, to

conduct the business in accordance with their joint interests. As a

matter of fact, Madame Edouard, who was the man in their partnership,

was designated for the directorship by the triumph of the clerical

party. The custom of the secular school was sufficiently insured by

the presence of Madame Alexandre behind her, and for her own part she

intended to increase her business among the devotees of the town with

the help of her son Victor, who had lately left the Brothers' school.

He was now a big, squarely-built youth of seventeen, with a large head,

a harsh face, and fierce eyes. He had failed to secure an elementary

certificate, having always shown himself an execrable pupil; and he now

dreamt of enlisting and becoming a general as in the old days, when

he had played at war with his cousin Sébastien, taken him prisoner,

and pommelled him passionately. Meantime, as he was not old enough for

soldiering, he lived in idleness, making his escape from the shop as

often as possible--for he hated having to stand behind a counter and

sell paper and pens--and roaming through Maillebois in the company of

his old schoolfellow Polydor, the son of Souquet the road-mender, and

the nephew of Pélagie, Madame Duparque's servant.

Polydor, a pale and artful youth, whose taste for idleness was

extraordinary, desired to become an Ignorantine by way of flattering

the inclinations of his aunt, from whom he thereby extracted little

presents. Moreover, by embracing this religious calling he would

not have to break stones on the roads as his father did, and, in

particular, he would escape barrack-life, the thought of which quite

horrified him. Though in other respects Victor and Polydor had

different tastes, they were in full agreement as to the delight of

roaming about from morn till night with their hands in their pockets,

to say nothing of their goings on with the little hussies of the

factory quarter of the town, whom they met in the fields near the

Verpille. In this wise, Victor being always out and about, and Madame

Alexandre remaining beside her son, Madame Edouard, since Sébastien had

fallen so seriously ill, found herself quite without assistance in the

shop, where she busied herself with her customers and gaily counted up

her takings, which were often large.

Marc went every evening to ascertain the condition of his pupil, and

thus he became a daily spectator of a heartrending drama--the bitter

grief of a mother who saw death taking her son a little further from

her every hour. That gentle, fair, pale-faced Madame Alexandre, who had

loved her husband passionately, had been leading a cloistered life,

as it were, ever since his death, all her restrained passion going to

that son of hers, who was fair and gentle like herself. Fondled, almost

spoilt by that loving mother, Sébastien regarded her with a kind of

filial idolatry, as if she were a divine mother whom he could never

requite for all her delightful gifts. They were united by a strong, a

powerful bond of tender affection, one of those infinite affections in

which two beings mingle and blend to such a point that neither can quit

the other without wrenching away his or her heart.

When Marc reached the little dark, close room over the stationery shop,

he often found Madame Alexandre forcing back her tears and striving

to smile at her son, who lay there already emaciated and burning with

fever.

'Well, Sébastien, are you better to-day?' the master would ask.

'Oh! no, Monsieur Froment, I'm no better at all--no better at all.'

He could scarcely speak, his voice was faint, his breath came short.

But the red-eyed, shuddering mother exclaimed gaily: 'Don't listen to

him, Monsieur Froment, he is much better, we shall pull him through it.'