Renée was determined that her father should weep no more on her account.
"Listen to me, papa," she said, the following morning. "We are going to
leave here at the end of September; that's settled, isn't it? We are
going everywhere, a month to one place and a fortnight to another--just
as we fancy. Well, _I_ want you to take me now to all the places where
you fought. Do you know, I've heard that you fell in love with a
princess? Suppose we were to come across her again, what should you say
to that? Wasn't it at Pordenone that you got those great scars?" And,
taking her father's face in her two hands, she pressed her lips to the
white, hollow places which had been marked by the finger of Glory.
"I want you to tell me all about everything," she continued; "it will be
ever so nice to go all through your campaigns again with your daughter.
If one winter will not be enough for it all, why, we'll just take two.
And when I'm quite myself again--we are quite rich enough surely,
Henriette and I; you've worked hard enough for us--well, we'll just
sell the refinery, and we'll all come here. We'll go to Paris for two
months of the year to enjoy ourselves; that will be quite enough, won't
it? Then as you always like to have something to do, you can take your
farm again from Têtevuide's son-in-law. We'll have some cows and a nice
farm-yard for mamma--do you hear, mamma? I shall be outdoors all day;
and the end of it will be that I shall get _too_ well--you'll see. And
then we'll have people to visit us all the time. In the country we can
allow ourselves that little luxury--that won't ruin us--and we shall be
as happy, as happy--you'll see."
Travelling and plans of all kinds--she talked of nothing but the future
now. She spoke of it as of a promised thing, a certainty. It was she,
now, who made every one hopeful, and she concealed the fact that she was
dying so skilfully and pretended so well that she wanted to live, that
M. Mauperin on seeing her and listening to her dreams, gave himself up
to dreaming with her of years which they had before them and which would
be full of peace, tranquility, and happiness. Sometimes, even, the
illusions that the invalid had invented herself dazzled her too, for an
instant, and she would begin to believe in her own fiction, forget
herself for a moment and, quite deceived like the others, she would say
to herself, "Suppose, after all, that I should get well!" At other
times she would delight in going back to the past. She would tell about
things that had happened, about her own feelings, funny incidents that
she remembered, or she would talk about her childish pleasures. It was
as though she had risen from her death-bed to embrace her father for the
last time with all she could muster of her youth.
"Oh, my first ball-dress," she said to him one day; "I can see it
now--it was a pink tulle one. The dressmaker didn't bring it--- it was
raining--and we couldn't get a cab. How you did hurry along! And how
queer you looked when you came back carrying a cardboard box! And you
were so wet when you kissed me! I remember it all so well."
Renée had only herself and her own courage to depend on, in her task of
keeping her father up and herself too. Her mother was there, of course;
but ever since Henri's death she had been buried in a sort of silent
apathy. She was indifferent to all that went on, mute and absent-minded.
She was there with her daughter, night and day, without a murmur,
patient and always even-tempered, ready to do anything, as docile and
humble as a servant, but her affection seemed almost mechanical. The
soul had gone out of her caresses, and all her ministrations were for
the body rather than the heart; there was nothing of the mother about
her now except the hands.