WHICH PROVES THAT EVEN PHILOSOPHIC POLITICIANS MAY HAVE TO ADMIT
THEMSELVES IN THE WRONG.
But now it is quite time for us to go back to the old, wooden
farm-house on the edge of the forest, and see what Master Lepage, and
Gustavus, and that intelligent and experienced person, Cincinnatus, are
doing, while the rest of the household are wandering, alas! not without
growing alarm, and even suffering, in the darkness and cold and snow.
In point of fact, then, though Master Lepage had been so very
determined to please himself by sitting at home, he had found the day
uncommonly long and dull. For he was one of those sociable persons
who are never quite happy without an audience to hold forth to
and instruct, and convince of their own remarkable wisdom and the
hearers' equally remarkable folly. And then, too, for all that he
appeared somewhat dictatorial and high-handed, Lepage was at bottom
an affectionate and warm-hearted man, who loved his wife and children
tenderly. And so, as the afternoon drew on, and the wind rose and the
clouds gathered, he began to get into a fine fume and fret. He walked
up and down the warm, cosy kitchen as restless as a bear in a pit; and
knocked double postman's knocks on the weather glass, and declared out
loud that the mercury was going up, when he saw perfectly well that
it was going down; and did a number of other useless things to try to
persuade himself that he was not one bit anxious or uneasy.
'How inferior is the education of men to that of cats!' thought
Cincinnatus. 'Before I was old enough to lap milk out of a saucer,
my mother had taught me the vulgarity of giving way to purposeless
agitation. "Calm," she would say, "is even a greater sign of
good-breeding than a curl of hair inside the ears." In my poor master,
there, calm and ear-curls alike are wanting. What a situation! Thank
heaven, I at least was born a cat!'
But, you see, Master Lepage had really some cause for his restlessness,
for all this while he was struggling with an unseen enemy. Deep down
in that innermost chamber of the heart--the door of which we most of
us keep so tight shut because we know Truth sits within weighing and
judging all our thoughts and actions, and letting us know from time to
time just what she thinks about them in the very plainest language--in
that innermost heart-chamber, I say, Lepage was aware that there was a
busy, active feeling of shame and remorse. And while Truth pushed hard
at the door inside to let the Feeling out, he pushed equally hard on
the outside to keep the Feeling in. But when finally the snow began to
fall, and the daylight lessen, and the storm grow fierce and fiercer,
Truth pushed and bumped and banged upon the poor door so unmercifully
that Master Lepage, sturdy veteran though he was, grew quite weary of
opposing her. And so the busy Feeling popped out first its head, and
then its two arms, and then squeezed itself out all together, and began
racing up and down the whole length and breadth of the old soldier's
heart in the most audacious manner.
'You were obstinate and conceited this morning,' said the Feeling; 'you
wouldn't listen to John Paqualin, the charcoal-burner. Look at the
snow!'
'The glass was rising,' answered Lepage. 'I am perfectly certain it
was. And John Paqualin is a madman.'
'Madman yourself,' said the Feeling--for feelings are very free-spoken,
you know, and don't mince matters--'madman yourself for letting your
wife, who is a delicate woman, and that poor child, little Peter, run
such a risk of cold, and fatigue, and perhaps worse.'
'Antony knows the way,' answered Lepage again. 'And he's an able
fellow.'
'He is a boy, and like most boys is thoughtless and self-opinionated.
He takes after you in that last, by the same token,' said the Feeling.
'I am a philosophic politician,' cried Lepage, somewhat hotly. 'I
worship the goddess of Reason.'
'Do you?' said the Feeling. 'And these newspapers you were so anxious
to sit at home and read to-day, full--as you perfectly well know--of
garbled news, and one-sided statements, and of cheap party cries--they
are the voice of Reason, are they?'
'Hang you!' answered Lepage--which was not at all a pretty way of
answering. But then, you see, poor Master Lepage was getting very
angry because he was very uncomfortable; and when persons are both
uncomfortable and angry they are liable to make use of expressions
which, very properly, are not printed in the French and English
conversation books that you study in the schoolroom.--'I won't listen
to you. So away with you. I have no doubt--'
'No doubt, haven't you?' said the Feeling. 'Well, I am glad to hear
that.'
'No doubt at all--ten thousand plagues on you--no doubt at all, I say,
that my wife and children will be home in ten minutes at the latest.
Meanwhile I will read a little. I will improve my mind with the history
of those grand, old Romans.'
So Lepage got down the history book, and it fell open at one of his
favourite passages--the account of the Consul, Marcus Attilius Regulus,
who, rather than break his word, left his home and kindred and gave
himself up to his pitiless enemies, and bore in silence all the cruel
tortures to which they subjected him.
'There was a man!' cried Lepage, as he wiped his spectacles with his
red pocket-handkerchief.
'Yes, indeed, a very different man to you, Francis Louis Lepage,' said
the Feeling.
'Why, why what do you mean? Twenty thousand cut-throat Prussians!--at
least I am no coward. No one has ever accused me of that before. What
was I ever afraid of?'
[Illustration: WAITING. _Page 120._]
'Of a little trouble,' answered the Feeling. 'Of a walk, for instance,
when you felt inclined to sit at home smoking--of what one or two
silly, feather-headed fellows, who fancy themselves mighty sharp and
clever, might perhaps say about you, if you were seen kneeling down
beside your wife and sons, in the church there, with your head
uncovered, praying God to forgive you your sins.--Pooh, don't talk
about your courage to me!' said the Feeling.
Master Lepage sat very still for some time after that in the
window-seat, with the Roman History wide open before him; but he did
not care to go on reading about the Consul Regulus. He remembered how
little Peter had climbed on his knee on Friday evening, and coaxed him
to go to Nullepart to see the Infant Jesus and the stable; and had
said--poor, little lad, what a nice, little face he had--Lepage rubbed
the end of his hooked nose, and sniffed--that if only his father came
with them they would all be so happy.
'Well, I hope they have been happy,' he said to himself. 'It is more
than I have been, in any case.'
He turned and looked out of window. Ah! how it snowed, and how dark it
was growing.
'And with this wind, on the moorland the snow will drift. If they have
the intelligence of a blue owl between them they will have started
early!' he cried quite fiercely. 'Ten thousand plagues--poor dear
souls,' he added, for Master Lepage was getting a little confused
somehow.
[Illustration]
He hurried across the kitchen to the house-door and flung it wide
open, and standing on the threshold, gazed long and earnestly down the
dim forest path, drawing his shaggy eyebrows together till they stood
out like _chevaux de frise_ above his keen, grey eyes.
'Ho-la, ho-la, hey!' he shouted. But there was no answer save the
roaring of the wind among the pines and the soft 'hush, hush,' of the
falling snow.
Now for some time past Cincinnatus had been sitting very composedly
staring with his great, yellow eyes into the glowing log fire, and
meditating pleasantly on the inferiority of men to cats. But when
Master Lepage, a prey to that remorseful Feeling which Truth had
let loose to tramp where it would up and down his heart, threw the
house-door wide open, the icy breath of the North Wind rushed wildly
into the kitchen, and made our friend Cincinnatus feel uncommonly cool
about the back.
'Neither calm nor ear-curls, dear me!' he murmured to himself as he
rose slowly, stretching one fore leg and then the other, and then each
hind leg in turn--shaking the last leg rapidly for a moment, too,
because it was slightly cramped--and yawning the while so wide, that
his pink tongue was curled up quite tight, like a rolling-pin, at the
back of his mouth. Then he moved away with dignity, intending to take
up his station upon the cushion of the big arm-chair that stood in the
corner nicely out of the draught. But all of a sudden Cincinnatus heard
something that made him jump all on one side with an arched back and a
bristling tail, and say 'Pffzsh!' twice over, as loud as ever he had
said it in his life.
It was an unfamiliar sound that so startled Cincinnatus, for Master
Lepage was pulling strongly at the rope of the big bell that hung under
the centre gable of the old house, and the urgent clang of its iron
voice rang through the thick, snow-laden air far over the forest. The
bell had been placed there long years before to summon neighbours--the
house standing in a solitary place--in case of fire or accident. And
now Lepage rang it with a double purpose, trusting that even if its
friendly tones failed to reach the ears of the poor wanderers, it
might at least bring Gustavus, the cowherd, from his father's cottage
on the edge of the pastures, where he was spending the Sunday, and that
he might help him search for the wife and children whom he loved so
well.
'By my great-grandmother's whiskers!' exclaimed Cincinnatus, as he
settled himself down on the chair cushion, 'what with draughts, and
bell-ringing, and one thing and another, this house will soon be
impossible for a cat of any pretensions to gentility. Compare it
with the Sacristan's establishment, now, where you can't tell one
day from another except by the smell of the different soups for
dinner.--Delightful!--With an occasional vocal evening, too, in the
back garden, when the moon is full. Lots are strangely unequal in this
world!--Pffzsh! and to add to everything else, if there actually is not
that intolerable charcoal-burner.'
John Paqualin stood on the threshold, a flaming torch of pine boughs
in his hand; his long, unkempt hair was white with snow, and so was
the tattered cloth cloak that hung in so many folds from his stooping
shoulders. His eyes were bright and glowing.
'Ah! the wind,' he said, 'the glorious wind, the roar and the shout of
it; the cry of the trees that strain, and the passionate snap of the
branches--like heart-strings that snap under the blast of incurable
sorrow. And the snow, soft and pure, and light as the coverlet a young
mother lays on her first-born's cradle--getting a little too thick just
now, though, that coverlet.--Eh! what's this? have you smothered the
infant--laid it over the face as well? Be careful, then, with your--But
the bell,' he added suddenly, interrupting himself, and catching hold
of Master Lepage with his hard, thin fingers--'it called to me, while I
was listening to the roll of the drums, and the blare of the trumpets,
and the scream of the fifes in the forest there, and made me come
hither whether I would or no. What do you want spoiling all my splendid
wind-music with your infernal bell-clatter?'
'Want!' cried Lepage hoarsely; 'I want help.'
Paqualin laughed aloud.
'Hey-ho,' he said. 'Times are changed, are they? I never heard you sing
that song before.'
Lepage let go the bell-rope, and raised his clenched fist. But he did
not strike the blow. Something stopped him. Perhaps it was that same
remorseful Feeling which Truth had let loose in his heart.
'Come inside, Paqualin,' he said quite quietly, after a moment or two.
'Now try to remember.--My wife and sons and our maid-servant went to
church at Nullepart this morning. You did your best to prevent them
going. You said the snow was coming, and it has come. They should have
been back a good two hours ago, and they are not here yet.'
'Not here yet,' repeated the charcoal-burner slowly.
'No, not yet.' Lepage drew his hand across his eyes. 'Would to God,' he
said, 'I had gone along with them.--But see now, I will light the lamp
and leave the house-door open; and then will go out to search for them.
You can find your way like a hound, they say, by night or day, through
the forest. Will you come with me and help me?'
Paqualin stood in front of the fire; the snow on his hair and cloak
melted and ran down, forming a little pool of water about his ill-shod
feet.
'I am not over and above fond of you, Francis Lepage,' he said
presently, 'as you most likely know already. Love and hatred alike can
tell their own story without much need of spoken words. I think you a
vain man and a hard one; but your wife is as pitiful as the saints in
heaven. You want me to help you to find her? You have not got a dog to
do the work for you, and so you'll take me. Ah, well! I've known the
dog's place pretty well all my life long;--the kicks and the cuffs, and
the grudging crust from the master's table; and then the "Here! my good
fellow, good cur, here! nose down, tail up, the scent's cold, but still
you're sharp enough to find it; and sweat and faint to catch the hare
that will make your owner a savoury supper, while you slink home to the
dirty straw and the mouldy crust again." Yes, yes--to be sure, I'll go
with you and find them and bring them home; your fair wife and your
children, and leave you happy and go back to my hut and the voices--not
for your sake though, mind you, but for hers--the only woman whose eyes
have ever looked kindly upon me.'
'Come on your own terms,' said Lepage.
Just then Gustavus, in his heavy boots, came clumping into the kitchen.
'The bell, master--has the red cow calved of a sudden?' he asked. For
once in his life Gustavus appeared to be quite excited. He forgot to
take off his hat or put down his big cotton umbrella, from off which
the wet snow slipped in little avalanches, _sthlop_, on to the floor.
'Calf thyself, with thy great, stupid, cheese face!' cried the
charcoal-burner.
Then while Lepage gave the cowherd his orders, and got some things
together to take with them, Paqualin stood murmuring to himself, with
his head bent low, and his lean, grimy hands stretched out towards the
comfortable blaze of the fire:--
[Illustration]
'You, the man, welcome, and brave, and beloved. I, the dog, to show the
man the way. Gustavus, there, the ass, to trot behind loaded up with
the blankets, and the food, and the brandy. And in the end, what? A
bone for the dog, a thistle for the ass, and for the man kisses. Which
has the best of it? Hardly fair, is it, eh?'
'Umph,' said Gustavus, as he got the big bundle on to his back.
'Perhaps she'll be a bit soft-hearted when she sees me. Maybe the snow
will have taken some of the starch out of our Eliza.'