THE UPROOTED VINEYARD.
Winter had come. La Fromentiere seemed peaceful and happy. Anyone
going over the fields and watching the men at work, would have had no
fear for the future of the farmstead. The new farm-hand did not excite
himself, as Toussaint Lumineau said, that is to say, he worked his
fourteen hours a day regularly, without uttering fourteen words. As
for Andre, he was the joy and pride of his father, who, on his part,
did not spare himself. Good labourer, good sower, an early riser,
careful of the animals and of everything else that came to his hand,
the young man seemed to prove that he had found his vocation, and was
determined to remain a farmer all his life.
And yet at the bottom of his affectionate, restless heart, there was a
growing sore. Andre could not accustom himself to Francois' absence.
He missed the friend of his young life, the companion without whom La
Fromentiere had never presented itself to his mind.
The week after his return home, Andre had gone to see Francois and
Eleonore at La Roche-sur-Yon. He had found them settled in a house in
the outskirts, already somewhat discontented: one inveighing against
the hardness of his employers; the other that customers did not come;
without any regrets, however, for what they had done, and quite
decided as to the advantages of living in a town, and being their own
masters. He had gone back without the least wish to follow their
example--more severe even than before against the renegades from the
old home life; but possessed of a fixed idea, he sought Francois in
everything. La Fromentiere that knew Francois no longer was to him
empty and void. It became a thing of which he could not shake himself
free; a suffering of which he never spoke, but that everyone
unwittingly renewed.
The farmer, whose anger had abated, more particularly since he knew
that the position of his two absent children at La Roche was none too
brilliant, began voluntarily to speak of Francois as if to secretly
encourage the others to remember him, and to do their best to bring
him home again. It would be: "To-day we will sow La Cailleterie, where
Francois ploughed the first two furrows," or, "let us have some
chestnuts roasted in the embers to-night, Rousille, Francois used to
like them." He thought to do well by so speaking, to re-unite, as it
were, in some degree those whom misfortune had parted. And Rousille
did the same. Still oftener did everyday objects speak of, and recall
the absent one. Now it was a fork he had been wont to use; a basket
woven by him; the rope twisted round a rafter of the stables by a hand
no longer there; or even a nook or corner of a road or field to which
some memory clung; the stump of a tree; a furze-bush; in fact, the
whole Marais, where for years two boys of almost the same age,
brothers inseparable, had driven the cows, jumped dykes, and gone
birds'-nesting together.
Poor Francois, lazy, spendthrift, pleasure-loving as he was in
reality, legendary virtues were already gathering round him at La
Fromentiere. His place in the diminished family was reserved to him
with tender, affectionate regret, a regret that even magnified what
had been his place there. Andre, disheartened, and disappointed in the
joy of home coming, had not the same love for the new La Fromentiere
that he had had for the old one. It was all so changed! He had known
it bright with the noise and bustle of a large, united family under
the control of a man who, despite his years, was cheery and vigorous,
and with more willing hands than were needed to get through the day's
work--a home as passionately loved and defended as any nest from which
the fledgelings have not yet flown. He found it unrecognisable. Two
had gone, leaving the house desolate, the old father inconsolable, the
work too heavy for those left behind. Rousille was wearing herself
out. Andre saw clearly that he alone would not suffice to keep La
Fromentiere in a state of good cultivation, certainly not to improve
it, as he had so often meditated through the hot, sleepless nights in
Africa, thinking of the elm-trees at home. For this two strong young
pair of arms were needed, without counting the help of a farm-servant:
Francois should have been there with Andre! He struggled against the
discouragement that oppressed him, for he was a brave lad. Every
morning he went out into the fields with the determination to work so
hard that there should be no room for thought; and he worked and
ploughed, sowed seed or dug ditches, planted apple-trees with all zest
and energy, not taking a moment's rest. But the recollection of
Francois followed him everywhere; in everything he saw the decline of
the farmstead. Working alone made the days long; longer still were
they in the company of the new farm-hand, who went about his work
stolidly, interested neither in the projects nor regrets of the
farmer's son.
In the evening when Andre returned from work in whom should he
confide, or who was there to comfort him? His mother was dead; his
father had need of all his own hope and buoyancy of spirit that he
might not break down himself; Mathurin was so uncertain and so soured
that pity might well go out to him, but not real brotherly love. There
remained Rousille, possibly. But Rousille was seventeen when Andre
had left home, and he continued to treat her as a child, and told her
nothing. Besides she was scarcely ever to be seen, poor girl, always
on the run and hurried. The house was dull, and the young man felt it
the more that regimental life, hard enough in all conscience, was yet
full of go and movement.
Weeks went by, and there was no break in the sadness. Weary of being
thus thrown upon himself, little by little Andre suffered his thoughts
to go out from the mournful surroundings amid which he, in vain, tried
to recognise the home of his youth. Like all peasants of the coast, he
was one of those taciturn labourers who look over the sand-hills
towards the sea, and who dream dreams when the wind blows. Sad and
dejected he fell back upon the fatal knowledge he had acquired in
absence: that life was possible in other places than at La Fromentiere
on the borders of the Marais of La Vendee.
The temptation grew stronger. Two months after having re-taken
possession of the room that the two brothers had formerly shared
together, one night, when the other inmates of the farm were sound
asleep, Andre began a letter to a comrade in the foreign legion, whom
he had known in Africa. "I find it too dull here. My brother and
sister have left home. If you happen to know of any good investment in
land in Algiers, or elsewhere, let me know. I have not come to any
decision, but I am thinking of going away. I am, as it were, alone
here." And answers soon came. To the great astonishment of Toussaint
Lumineau the postman began bringing pamphlets, papers, and
prospectuses to La Fromentiere, over which Andre did not make merry as
did Rousille and Mathurin. Laughingly his father, who had no suspicion
of Andre, said:
"There has never been such a supply of paper at La Fromentiere, Driot,
as in the few weeks since you have been home. I don't grudge it you,
reading is such a hobby of yours! As for me, I should be tired to
death with all the printed stuff."
Only on Sundays the old father suffered a little from his son's
passion for reading and writing. On that day after vespers it was his
habit to bring back some old friend, either Le Glorieux de la
Terre-Aymont, or Pipet de la Pinconniere to pay a visit of inspection
round the farm fields. Up hill and down dale they would go in single
file, examining everything, expressing approval or disapproval by
uplifted eye or shrug of the shoulder, exchanging an occasional word
that had always the same object: the harvest, present or future, good
or indifferent, threatened or gathered in. In this winter season it
was the fields, the young wheat, and patches of lucerne that were
under consideration; and Toussaint Lumineau, who had not succeeded in
getting Andre to accompany them, would confide to his neighbour of La
Terre-Aymont, or La Pinconniere as they stopped where the slanting
rays of the sun fell on the corner of a field:
"My son Andre is quite different from anyone I have ever known, and
not a bit like we used to be. Not that he despises the land, on the
contrary, he loves it, and I have no fault to find with his work all
the week. But since he came home from the regiment, his one idea on
Sunday is reading."
Rousille, too, was sometimes surprised. She had too much to do indoors
to occupy herself with the work or amusements of the others. Busy with
housekeeping, and the thousand and one duties of the farmyard, she
never saw Andre save at meal-times, and in presence of the others. At
those times, whether by an effort of will, or that youth obtained the
mastery over depression, Andre was usually in gay and careless
spirits, bantering Rousille and trying to make her laugh. But as a
woman and one who had suffered, Rousille had learned to discern the
sorrows of others; and from many a little sign, eyes fixed on the
upper window, words dropped that might bear some other meaning, her
loving heart had divined that Andre was not altogether happy; without
knowing more, she felt sorry for him. But even she was far from
guessing the crisis through which her brother was passing, or the
project he was meditating.
One solitary member of the family had penetrated the designs of Andre,
and that was Mathurin. He had observed his brother's increasing
sadness; the useless efforts he was making to regain his former
equability of temper; his calm fortitude in daily labour. Sometimes
he would follow him into the fields, then watch for the arrival of the
postman and take charge of the letters and papers addressed to Andre.
The smallest details remained engraven on his brooding memory; and one
day, under the guise of indifference, with a skilfully put question
his brooding took shape. He was aware that the greater number of the
letters received by Andre bore the stamp either of Algiers or Antwerp,
and the latter place conveying nothing to Mathurin, Andre had
explained:
"It is a large port in Belgium, larger than Nantes that you once
passed through."
"How do you come to know anyone living so far from here and far from
Algiers?"
"It's very simple," replied his brother. "My best friend in Algiers is
a Belgian in the foreign legion, whose family live in Antwerp.
Sometimes I hear from Demolder, sometimes from his people, who write
to give me the information I want."
"News of old comrades, then?"
"No, things that interest me in the matter of voyages, other
countries.... One of the sons has settled across the sea, in America.
He has a farm as large as this whole parish."
"Was he rich?"
"No. He is now."
Mathurin did not further press the subject, but he continued to
observe, to add indication on indication. If Andre chanced to leave a
pamphlet on emigration lying about, or an advertisement of land to be
let or sold, taking it up Mathurin would seek to discover the places
over which his brother's brows had met in a frown, or where something
like a smile, a wish, a desire had lighted up his eyes.
By proof on proof he had arrived at the conviction that Driot was
thinking of leaving La Fromentiere. When? For what remote land where
money was easily made? Those were the problems. Thus in the month of
December, when opportunities for confidential chat are more frequent
by reason of days of snow and rain and squall, when alone with Andre
in the stables or the house, he would say treacherously:
"Tell me about Africa, Driot. Tell me some yarns of men who have made
money out there. I like to hear such things." Or at other times he
would say: "La Fromentiere must seem small and insignificant to a
fellow like you who read so much. It certainly is not as productive as
it used to be."
Mathurin had settled coming events in his mind, while Driot was still
in doubt.
So the year drew to a close, and the new year began. It was a wet
winter, with hard frost at nights; every morning spiders' webs covered
with frozen mist would wave in the breeze like white wings, the damp
earth would steam in the mid-day sun, and the white wings turn grey.
The main work of the fields was suspended; the owners of land on high
ground felled trees, or re-made fences; those on the Marais were
perforce reduced to idleness; it was holiday-time with them; dykes
and ditches were overflowing. The greater number of the farms
surrounded by water, and, as it were, floating above it, were cut off
from all communication with the neighbouring towns or each other save
by boats steered over the inundated meadows. It was the time for
dancing and shooting.
The ground, however, was not too hard to work upon, and, following
Mathurin's advice, Toussaint Lumineau resolved to dig up his vineyard
attacked by phylloxera.
So one morning the farmer and Andre made their way up to the little
field lying well exposed to the south on the high ground which cuts
the road between Chalons and La Fromentiere. Before them they saw
nothing but seven rows of vine enclosed by furze hedges, stony ground,
and the revolving sails of two wind-mills.
"You begin on one row," said the farmer, "I will take the next," and
pulling off their coats, despite the cold, for it meant hard work,
they began on their task. Coming up the hill they had talked cheerily
to each other; but no sooner did they begin to dig than their spirits
sank, and they grew silent, not wanting to impart the thoughts that
the work of destruction engendered. If a root, perchance, made very
tough resistance, the father once or twice attempted to joke, saying
playfully: "It felt quite comfortable there, and did not want to be
turned out," or something else to that effect. But he soon gave up the
attempt. He could not succeed in banishing from his mind, nor from
that of the son working beside him, sad thoughts of the time when the
vine prospered, and yielded abundantly the white foaming wine they had
drunk so merrily in the old happy days of fetes and gatherings. The
contrast of his former prosperity with present hard times fretted him;
and as far as he could see, it weighed still more upon the spirits of
his Driot.
Thus, in silence, they plied their huge, old-fashioned pickaxes, made
to be wielded by giants. The earth flew in showers; the trunks
trembled; some few shrivelled leaves left upon the branches fell, and
were blown about in the wind with a noise as of broken glass; now the
stem was disclosed, vigorous but warped, covered with green moss, the
effects of many a summer dew and rain, and tapering off to the size of
a tendril. The marks of pruning made by successive vinedressers were
not to be numbered; no one could tell the age of the vineyard. Every
year since he could remember anything, Driot had pruned it, dressed
it, gathered its grapes, drunk of its juice. And now it was dying.
Each time that he gave the final blow to a root he felt a pang; each
time that, seizing a portion of the lifeless fibres he threw it on the
heap of dead uprooted stems, he shrugged his shoulders with mingled
sorrow and rage. Dead those veins through which the red, joyous sap
was wont to rise. Dead the fertile branches once bending under the
weight of bunches of grapes, until they rested a golden glory on the
ground! Never again would the flowerets, pale stars with drops of
honey in each centre, attract the summer gnats, nor diffuse their
mignonette-like perfume far over the fields, even to La Fromentiere.
Never again would the children of the farmstead push eager hands
through the gaps in the hedge to clutch the bunches within reach!
Never again would the women carry away basketfuls at vintage time. For
many a long day wine would be scarce at the farm, and would be no more
of "our own growing." Something belonging to the family, an hereditary
and sacred possession seemed to perish with the vineyard, old and
faithful servant of the Lumineaus. Father and son were both so
intensely penetrated by the sense of their loss, that, as night
descended, and the father raised his pickaxe for a final stroke, he
could not help exclaiming:
"It's a hateful work, Driot, we have done to-day."
All the same, there was a difference between the sadness of father and
son. Toussaint Lumineau, as he rooted up the vines, was already
thinking of the day when he would plant fresh ones, and in his silent
musings had seen his successor gathering in the vintage and drinking
the muscadet of the new vineyard. He possessed that love, strong and
tried, which rises hopefully after every stroke of misfortune. With
Andre hope did not speak, because with him love had waxed feeble.
The two men, their figures indistinct in the darkening day, turned to
skirt the grassy edge of the vineyard, then descended the sloping
fields that led towards the farm. With weary, stooping frame,
shouldering their heavy implements, they looked across the Marais to
the crimson horizon, and at the clouds driven by the wind towards the
setting sun. It was a melancholy evening; all around them were
furze-bushes, ground uncultivated, hedges devastated, leafless trees,
the gloom and chill of autumn. Thus they had gone some two hundred
yards before the son could make up his mind to speak, as though
feeling that his reply would be too hard for the father, who lived on
in the same old groove.
"Yes," he said, "the day of the vine is at an end in our land, but it
flourishes elsewhere."
"Where, my Driot?"
In the half dark the son extended his disengaged hand above La
Fromentiere, sunk below in the shadows; and the action extended so
far, away over the Marais and over La Vendee, that through his stout
woollen garments Toussaint Lumineau felt the keen blast of the wind.
"What do other countries matter to us, my Driot," said he, "seeing
that we are living in our own?"
Did the son understand the anxious tenderness of the words? He
answered:
"Because in ours it becomes more and more difficult to live."
Toussaint Lumineau remembered words, almost similar, spoken by
Francois and was silent, trying to explain to himself how it was that
Andre, who was neither lazy nor a frequenter of town pleasures, could
have fallen upon the very same way of thought. As the men, skirting
the brown fields, came nearer home, La Fromentiere with its masses of
trees rose like a dome of denser darkness, above which the winter
night was lighting its first stars. The farmer never entered the
beloved precincts of his home without emotion; to-night, more than
ever, he experienced its sweetness, dear to him as any bridal promise.
Rousille, hearing their approaching footsteps, opened the door, and
raised the lamp high in air, like a signal.
"You are late to-night," she said.
Before they could make reply, the long-drawn sound of a horn was heard
coming from the depths of the Marais, beyond Sallertaine.
"It is the horn of La Seuliere," cried the voice of Mathurin from
within. The two men, followed by Rousille, entered the warm room with
its blazing hearth.
Mathurin resumed:
"There's a dance at La Seuliere to-night. Will you come, Driot?"
The cripple, half-rising, supporting himself by his arms against the
table with a nervous movement, his eyes glaring with long-suppressed
desire, was alike painful to see, and fear-inspiring, as one whose
reason was tottering.
"I am not much in the mood for dancing," returned Andre carelessly,
"but it may do me good to-night."
Silently the farmer pressed his hand on the shoulder of his afflicted
eldest son, and the fevered eyes relaxed their stare, the body obeyed,
and fell back upon the bench like a sack of wheat that expands as it
touches the ground. The men ate their supper hurriedly; towards the
end of the meal Toussaint Lumineau, whose mind had reverted to Andre's
words, wishing to take those of his children to witness whose hearts
had never swerved in their loyal love to La Fromentiere, said:
"Would you believe, Mathurin, what foolish stuff this Driot was
talking to-night? He declares that vines have had their day with us;
that they flourish better elsewhere. But when one plants a vine, one
expects it to die some day, does one not?"
"Many enough have died before ours," responded the cripple roughly.
"We are not more unlucky than our neighbours."
"That is just what I say," put in Andre, and he raised his head. His
eyes were lit by a spirit of contradiction, and his silky moustache
quivered as he spoke. "It is not our vineyard alone that is played
out, it is the soil; ours, our neighbours', that of the whole
country, as far and further than you have ever been. One must have new
land to produce good results."
"New land?" returned his father. "I know none about here. It is all
cultivated."
"Ah, but there is in many a country." He hesitated an instant, then
enumerated hurriedly: "In America, the Cape, Australia, British
possessions--everything flourishes in those countries. There the earth
is prolific; while here----"
"Don't speak ill of it, Driot; it is worth the very best!"
"Used up; too dear!"
"Too dear, yes, somewhat. But feed it well, and you will see!"
"Feed it then. You have nothing to buy the stuff with."
"Only come a good year, not too dry, not too wet, and we shall have
money enough!"
The farmer had drawn himself up, as if under a personal insult, and
now awaited Driot's answer.
He, carried away by passion, rose. Everyone looked at him, even the
farm-servant, who, with chin sunk in his horny hand, was trying to
understand the situation. And there was something in the fluency of
words, ease of gesture that made all vaguely feel that Andre was no
longer like one of themselves.
"Yes," said the youth, proud of an audience, "there might still be
some work to be done here, in the old country; but we are taught
nothing of such things in our schools; that would be too practical.
Then taxes are too heavy, and rents too high; and all the time that we
are leading a miserable existence, they out yonder are having
magnificent harvests. That I hear every day. Our vineyards are ruined,
and they have wine. Wheat grows without their having to dress the
land, and they export it to us in shiploads as full as, from what you
say, the granaries of the old Chateau used to be----"
"Cock and bull stories! You have read them in books."
"Some of them; but I have seen ships in port, and sacks of wheat being
unloaded like the water of a dyke overflowing its banks. If you were
to read the papers, you would know that everything now comes to us
from abroad far cheaper than we can produce it ourselves: corn, oats,
horses, oxen; and that we have competing with us Americans,
Australians, and soon we shall have Japanese, Chinese----" he was
intoxicated with words; he was but the echo of the few pamphlets he
had read, or of what he had heard from others. La Fromentiere heard
him with stupor. China, Japan, America, the names circled round the
room like some unknown variety of bird, brought by the tempest from
far-off regions. The farmhouse walls had heard many uncouth peasant
sounds, but never had they resounded under the shock of these foreign
words.
Astonishment was marked upon the faces that, in the light of the lamp,
were turned upon Driot, who continued:
"I have learnt things, I can assure you! I learn more every day. And,
look you, when one comes home as I have done to-night, from rooting up
a vineyard, it makes one savage to think that there are parts of
America, and I could give you the names, where one can settle without
opening one's purse----"
"You be off!" quoth the ploughman.
"Yes! Government gives the agriculturist his passage free; keeps him
when he first lands; and gives him a ranch of seventy-four acres of
land."
This time the farmer shook his head, scandalised at the enormity of
his son's statement, and said in a tone of disapprobation:
"You are telling up a parcel of lies, my boy. Seventy-four acres, that
makes two hundred and ninety-six roods. I am not much of a reader, it
is true, but I do not let myself be crammed with all the stuff you
believe in like the Gospel. Two hundred and ninety-six roods.
Governments would soon be ruined if they made a present like that to
everyone who wanted it.... Hold your tongue.... It vexes me to hear
our native land talked ill of. Since you want to cultivate it with me,
Driot, do as we do, and don't talk ill of it.... It has always
supported us."
There ensued an embarrassed silence, of which the farm-servant took
advantage to get up, and betake himself to bed.
The call from La Seuliere sounded out again in the still night.
Mathurin said no word, but looked at his brother; he, ill at ease,
excited by the recent discussion, understood the mute question, and
answered promptly, in a manner that should show that he was free to do
as he chose:
"Very well. Yes, I am going."
"I will go with you as far as the boat," responded the cripple.
Toussaint Lumineau foresaw danger.
"It is bad enough that your brother should be going to La Seuliere,"
said he. "But for you, my poor boy, on no account would it do to go to
their dance. It is cold out of doors. Do not go further than the duck
meadow, and come back quickly." He followed with his eyes the cripple,
who, in great haste, with the unnatural energy given him by emotion,
raised himself on his crutches, hobbled the length of the table, down
the steps, and following Andre, was lost in the night.
His sons had gone; an icy wind blew in at the wide open door. Alas!
how difficult it had become to govern the household! Sitting on the
bench, his head on his arm, looking out into the dark farmyard, the
old man pondered the things he had heard that night, and his
powerlessness, despite his great love and long experience, to make
himself obeyed, now that interest was lessening in the work of the old
farmstead.
But it was not long before he called to his daughter, busy at her work
of washing up; the least word was such a relief in the empty rooms!
"Rousille!"
The girl opened the connecting door, and came, drying the plate in her
hands without looking at him.
"I am afraid that Mathurin may go back to see her----"
"Oh, father, he would not do that. Besides, he cannot have his shoes,
and he dare not appear at La Seuliere" ... stooping, she searched
under Mathurin's bed, then in the chest, then said as she rose:
"Yes. He has taken them ... he must have put them on beforehand ...
the first sound of the horn came at six o'clock."
The old father began pacing the room with great strides, stopping
uneasily from minute to minute to listen for the sound of crutches on
the gravel that should announce Mathurin's return.