For two years Claire René's days had been very much alike. It was a dull
routine, full of heavy tasks, in the tiny crumbling house, in the
shrunken garden patch, and grand'mère--there was always grand'mère to
care for. Often in the afternoon Claire René wandered in the forest for
an hour. She was used to the silence of the tall trees; the silence in
the house frightened her. All the people in her land were gone away; the
great noise beyond had taken them. Sometimes the noise had stopped, but
the silence in the house, the silence in the garden, and the silence of
grand'mère never stopped. It was hard for Claire René to understand.
There was no one left in her land except grand'mère and Jacques. Jacques
lived in the forest and cut wood; in the summer time he shot birds, in
the winter time rabbits; Jacques was a very old man.
Claire René thought about a great many things when she walked in the
forest in the afternoons. She wondered how old she was. She knew that
she had been seven years old when her three brothers went away a long
time before. She would like to have another birthday, some day, but not
until Clément and Fernand and Alphonse came home again. Then they would
laugh as they used to laugh on her birthdays, and catch her up in their
big, strong arms, and kiss her and call her "Dear little sister."
Clément was the biggest and strongest of all; sometimes he would run off
with her on his back into the forest, and the others would follow
running and calling; and then at the end of the chase the three
brothers would make a throne of their brown, firm hands and carry Claire
René back to the door of the tiny house, where grand'mère would be
waiting and scolding and smiling and ruddy of cheek. Grand'mère never
scolded any more; she never smiled, and her cheeks were like dried figs.
Claire René didn't often let herself think of the day that such a
dreadful thing had happened. Many days after Clément and Fernand and
Alphonse had gone away, grand'mère had started to walk to the nearest
town four miles distant. She was gone for hours and hours; Claire René
had watched for her from the doorway until dusk had begun to fall; the
dusk had been a queer color, thick and blue; a terrible noise had filled
the air. Then the child remembered that her three brothers had told her
that they were going away to kill rabbits--like Jacques. At the time she
thought it strange that they had cried about killing rabbits. But when
she heard such a thunder of noise she knew it must be a very great work
indeed.
She was just wondering how there could be so many rabbits in the world,
when she saw an old, bent woman coming through the garden gate. It was
grand'mère; Jacques was leading her; she was making a strange noise in
her throat, and her eyes were closed. Jacques had stayed in the house
all the night, looking at grand'mère, lying on the bed with her eyes
closed. In the morning, Claire René had spoken to her, but she hadn't
answered. After days and days she walked from her bed to a chair by the
window. She never again did any more than that; grand'mère was
blind--and she was deaf.
Jacques explained how it all happened; Claire René didn't listen
carefully, but she did understand that her three brothers were not
killing rabbits, but were killing men. She knew then why they had cried;
they were so kind and good, Clément and Fernand and Alphonse; they would
hate to kill men. But Jacques had said they were wicked men that had to
be killed. He said it wouldn't take long, that all the strong men in
France were shooting at them.
Claire René had a great deal to do after that. She had to bathe and
dress grand'mère; she had to cook the food and scrub the floor and scour
the pots and pans. She kept the pans very bright. Grand'mère might some
day open her eyes, and there would be a great scolding if the pans were
not bright. Claire René also tended the garden; Jacques helped her with
the heavy digging. He was very mean about the vegetables; he made her
put most of them in the cellar; and the green things that wouldn't keep
he himself put into jars and tins and locked them in the closet. When
the summer had gone he gave Claire René the keys.
"Ma petite," he said, "you learn too fast to eat too little. You must be
big and well when your brothers come back."
All the winter long Claire René watched for her brothers. Once a
telegram had come, brought by a boy who said he had walked all the miles
of the forest. In the memory of Claire René there lay a hidden fear
about telegrams. Years before, grand'mère had cried for many days when
Jacques had brought from the town just such a thin, crackling envelope.
And Claire René knew that after that she had no longer any young mother
or father--only grand'mère and her three brothers.
Grand'mère had enough of sorrow. The telegram was better hidden in the
room of her brothers. Grand'mère would never find it there; it was far
away from her chair by the window, up the straight, narrow stairs, under
the high, peaked gable. Then, too, there was a comfort in that room for
Claire René; it was quiet; the great silence of downstairs was too big
to squeeze up the narrow way. Each day she would stroke and tend the
high white bed; each week she would drag the mass of feather mattress to
the narrow window ledge and air it for the length of a sunny day.
At evening she would pull and pile high again the snowy layers, as
quickly as her tired back could move, as quickly as her thin, blue
fingers could smooth the heavy homespun sheets and comforters. Quick she
must be lest Clément and Fernand and Alphonse come home before the
night fell over their sleeping place. When she placed the telegram under
the first high pillow (Clément's pillow) it made a sound that frightened
her.
In the evenings grand'mère's chair was pulled to the great hearth fire.
Claire René would watch the flamelight spread over the stonelike face.
Sometimes bright sparkles from the rows of copper pots and pans would
lay spots of light on the heavy closed lids.
Claire René would spring from her chair and kneel beside the dumb
figure. "Grand'mère!" she would call. "Do you see? Have you the eyes
again?"
Then the lights would shift, and her head would drop over her trembling
knees, and she would look away from the dry, sealed eyes of grand'mère.
She never cried; it might make a noise in the still, whitewashed room to
frighten her. Grand'mère might find the tears when she raised her hands
to let them travel over the face of her grandchild. It was enough that
once grand'mère had shivered when her fingers found the hollows in
Claire René's cheeks. After that the child puffed out her cheeks while
the knotted hands made their daily journey. Grand'mère's fingers would
smooth the sunny tangled hair, touch the freckled upturned nose; they
would pause and tremble at the slightest brush from the eyelashes that
fringed the deep, gray eyes.
Claire René would pile more logs on the fire and wonder what thoughts
lay in grand'mère's mind; wonder whether she knew that they had so much
more wood in the shed than they had food in the larder. She was clever
about cooking the roots from the cellar. But grand'mère's coffee was
weaker each day, and only once in a long while did Jacques bring milk.
Then he used to stand and order Claire René to drink it all, but she
would choke and say it was sour and sickened her; only thus could she
save enough for grand'mère's coffee in the morning.
There were many things to think about, to look at on the winter evenings
by the firelight: Clément's seat by the chimney corner, where he
whittled and whistled; Fernand's flute hanging on the wall; the books of
Alphonse on the high shelf over the dresser. Claire René found that her
heart and her eyes would only find comfort if her fingers were busy. She
would tiptoe to the dresser and bring out a basket, once filled with the
socks of her brothers. She would crouch by the fireside, first stirring
the logs to make more light for her work. It was long since the candles
were gone. It was the only joyous moment in the day when she handled the
dried everlastings that filled the basket. Always she must hurry, work
more quickly, select the withered colors with more care. The wreaths for
her three brothers must be beautiful, must be ready on time. Clément and
Fernand and Alphonse must be crowned, given the reward when they came
home from killing wicked men to save La Belle France!
All the months of the summer before she had watched and tended the
flowers. The seeds she had found in grand'mère's cupboard. Jacques had
scolded about the place that had been given them in the garden patch.
But Claire René had stamped her foot and strong, strange words that
belonged to her three brothers when they were angry came to her lips.
Jacques had looked startled and funny and had turned his head away; in
the end he had patted Claire René on her rigid shoulders and she thought
his eyes were just like wet, black beads.
On the other side of the hearth, away from grand'mère's chair, she
twined and wound the wreaths. No one must know. The Great Day _must_ be
soon! And in her heart she believed that on that day grand'mère would
open her eyes.
In the spring Claire René finished the wreaths. The very day she placed
them on the highest shelf in the dark closet under the stairs there had
come a knock at the door. She was stiff with terror. Jacques never
knocked; there was no one else. She clung to a heavy chair back while
the same boy who had come before entered slowly and placed a second
telegram in her numb fingers.
"I am sorry, mademoiselle," was all he said.
She watched him disappear through the garden gate; she listened until
his steps died in the forest. Grand'mère stirred in her chair by the
window; Claire René thought a flicker of pain traveled over the worn
face; she thought the closed eyes twitched; Madame Populet stretched out
her hands.
Claire René flew up the straight, narrow stairs; she placed the telegram
under Fernand's pillow; she pressed her fists deep into the feathers;
the crackle of paper made her heart stand still. There were tears
starting in her eyes; she held them back. Grand'mère had enough of
sorrow; she must never know of the second telegram in the house.
Thoughts came crowding into Claire René's mind. Why not tear up the
white-and-blue envelopes or why not show them to Jacques--in some way
throw away the fear that was eating at her heart? Then the great silence
of the house below seemed to creep up the narrow stairs and lay cold
hands on Claire René. Oh, why was it all so lonely! Where were her three
brothers? Why must the telegrams make so great a trembling in her heart
for them, make her kneel and pray that the Holy Mother would hold them
in her arms forever?
Her knees were stiff when she arose; her eyes were bright, but not with
tears; her back was very straight, her head held high, for was she not a
grandchild of Madame Populet? A sister to Clément and Fernand and
Alphonse, and through them, a child of France! She stood on her toes and
dropped three kisses on the pillows of her brothers. She was big enough
to keep the secret of her fear about the telegrams. It was better so.
She went downstairs singing. The sound was strange in her throat, but
she must finish the song. She stood behind grand'mère's chair, and laid
her hands on the still white head. When the last, high, treble note fell
softly through the room she looked out of the window into the forest.
There were threads of pale green showing on the tall trees; there were
tiny red buds starting from the brown branches of the pollard willow
that swept across the window ledge.
Claire René suddenly wanted to shout! She did shout! There was spring in
the world! There was spring in her heart, in her feet, in her tingling
finger tips.
She danced to the dark closet under the stairs. There they were, the
wreaths, for her three brothers! The deep golden one for Clément--he was
strong and square like a rock; the light golden one for Fernand--he was
pale and slight; the scarlet one for Alphonse--he was straight and tall
like a tree in the forest.
Claire René touched the three wreaths; they crackled dryly under her
touch; she turned away and shivered. What did they sound like? Oh, yes;
the crackling of the thin paper on the telegrams!
She shut the closet door softly, and went to kneel beside grand'mère's
chair and looked again into the forest. The buds on the sweeping willows
said "Yes"; the pale-green winding gauze through the tall trees
whispered a promise. She stood up and held out her arms; she had faith
in the forest; she believed what it said. Through a patch of flickering
sunlight she thought she saw three forms moving toward the cottage. It
was only the viburnum bushes dipping and swaying in the March wind,
against the sturdy growth of darkened holly.
The noise died away entirely as the spring advanced. The silence grew
greater and greater. There were few seeds for Claire René to plant in
her garden; there was little strength in her arms to work them. Weeds
covered the flower patch of a year ago. A few straggling everlastings
showed their heads above the tangle. Claire René had plenty of strength
to uproot them angrily and throw them into the overgrown path.
The three wreaths were still on the shelf in the dark closet under the
stair. Their colors were dimmed, like the hope in their maker's heart;
their forms were shrunken, like the forms of Claire René and grand'mère
and Jacques.
Grand'mère lay in her bed most of the day. Sometimes, when the sun shone
and the birds sang, Claire René would make her aching arms bathe and
dress grand'mère and help her into the chair by the window. Then she
would sit beside her and try to run threads through the bare places in
her frocks.
At times she thought of making frocks for herself out of grand'mère's
calico dresses, folded so neatly in the cupboard. But grand'mère, she
argued, would need them for herself when the Great Day came, when
Clément and Fernand and Alphonse would come with ringing laughter
through the forest--laughter that would surely open grand'mère's
eyes--and her ears. When the birds sang and the sun shone Claire René
believed that day would come.
Jacques was always kind. But he had become a part of the great silence;
almost as still as grand'mère he was. For hours he would sit and look at
Claire René bending over her sewing, over her scrubbing, over the
brightening of the pots and pans. Sometimes his shining black eyes
seemed to lie down in his face, to be going away forever behind his bush
of eyebrow.