The car was waiting at Monsieur Lorellard’s door; not a very brilliant
car to be sure, but what did that matter? It needed painting; the
upholstering had felt the war, and the chauffeur wore a cloth cap and an
old blue military overcoat. Tod looked at the tyres, and half Myonville
looked at Tod.
“They are going shopping.”
“To Paris?”
“Paris! Listen to Nanette! The child’s head is always in Paris. No;
Abbeville, ma chérie.”
“He is going to buy her a ring, perhaps?”
“Of course.”
“Look, they are going alone! Mademoiselle Josephine is not dressed.”
“Well, it is the English custom, and monsieur is English.”
“I wish I could go to Abbeville and buy pretty clothes,” said Nanette.
Tod was handing Claire into the car. She wore a plain little black hat
and a black coat and skirt, and her shoes were not new, nor were her
gloves very much newer than her shoes. A white lace collar and a quaint
little tartan tie showed at her throat. Yet everything was dainty,
distinctive, sleek, indefinably French and charming.
“How pretty you look!” said Tod.
“These clothes? I bought them in Lille six years ago. Josephine, you
traitress!”
Josephine, in apron and slippers, laughed at them from the doorway.
“No, no, I never meant to come. I should have been so unnecessary.”
André gave a push to the old car as it smoked off.
“Au revoir. Remember me to all the charming girls at Printemps.”
They did not go to Abbeville; they went to Eu; for Claire had a greater
love for that more mysterious, more steeply-streeted, and more shadowy
old town. There were scars of the war too in Abbeville, raw places that
had not healed, memories of death and of terror. And Claire was happy,
happy with the beautiful completeness of a child who rushes out to
gather flowers on a morning in June. The woman in her took the joy of a
child and held it against her heart. It was her day of days, her first
adventure with her lover.
The old car creaked and panted along the upland road, threading the
shadows of the long avenues, and thrusting its unpolished snout into the
sunlight and the broad blueness of that June day. Tod was holding
Claire’s hand. The Frenchman in the front seat kept his eyes on the
road.
“It was just here,” said Tod, pointing to the grass bank under the
beeches.
“Yes, I remember.”
“And Punch came to the rescue. Poor old Punch! I wanted to buy him, but
he got lost at the Base.”
They dreamed awhile.
“Ma chérie,” said Tod suddenly, “what sort of house would you like to
live in?”
She was lost in a new languor, the delicious sense of her new intimacy
with this dearest of men, but she came out of her dreams and smiled at
him.
“A little house, just a little house.”
“You shall have it.”
“And a woman, a sensible woman to help me.”
“Will one be enough?”
“What should I do with more? I want the little house to be my house.”
“You are not always going to be in the house,” said Tod. “I shall want
you to come out with me. I shall want people to see my charming little
wife.”
“So you would like me to wear pretty dresses, sometimes?”
“It will be a weakness of mine, I’m afraid.”
The car sailed quite jauntily down the long hill into the valley below
Eu. Tod was feeling in the breast pocket of his coat; he brought out a
rather bulky pocketcase and looked half shyly and half tenderly at
Claire.
“Now you are going to let me enjoy myself?”
“What do you mean?”
“I am going to buy things, all sorts of things.”
She resisted, because a part of the subtle and exquisite joy of the day
was in resisting, and in the ultimate surrender. A Frenchwoman loves
interplay; it is born and bred in her, and she weaves it into all the
tender activities of her life. Her exclamation, her smiles, her
retaliations are more subtilised and less obvious than those of the
Englishwoman. She has not the mental nudity of the average woman across
the water. “She is always dressed,” says the critical islander, but when
that dress is charming and a little unexpected, why quarrel with it? All
civilisation hangs in the grace of a petticoat and the set of a hat.
Tod bent forward and spoke to the driver.
“We shall stay in Eu most of the day. Take us to the best hotel and put
up the car there.”
“Bien, monsieur.”
“And make yourself comfortable, monsieur; I wish it.”
The Frenchman smiled.
There was no haste in the mood of the morning. They left the car at the
hotel and set out to wander through the streets of Eu. Claire knew all
the shops, but she remained dispassionate, tenderly reticent, leaving
the spirit of the adventure to Tod. He should discover all the wonderful
things that he desired. If necessary she could guide him without
appearing to guide, resist by choosing. But she went with him as no cold
creature, no prig, no careful woman seizing an opportunity. She was just
as excited, just as passionately happy as Tod, but she would keep her
head because this dear man had lost his heart.
“We will go in here,” said Tod, after a glance at the rings in the
_bijoutier’s_ window.
It was a great affair, the buying of that ring, but a most subtle
victory for Claire.
“Look, it is exquisite, this little one. I love it.”
The simple little hoop with its single ruby, like a soft flower with
drops of brilliant dew hanging about its petals, might not have
satisfied Tod. Nor did a difference of two hundred francs satisfy the
_bijoutier_.
“This other is a very beautiful ring, monsieur.”
“It is,” said Tod.
“Look, then!”
She put it on, closed her fist, and made a quick revelation of the
thing’s hardness, its artificiality. Then she pulled it off, and let her
hand lie softly on Tod’s sleeve.
“It suits me,” she said; “it is so simple.”
She was right. There was a spirituality in her choice.
“Your taste is better than mine,” he said.
Her eyes lifted to his.
“But does it not please you better, on the hand of this little woman who
loves you so?”
“You most exquisite soul,” he said.
They ignored the _bijoutier_; nothing mattered that day. But the
_bijoutier_ still had ambitions.
“One moment, mademoiselle; here!”
“I have chosen,” was all she said, with an air of extraordinary yet
gentle finality.
The man said no more. He had studied women.
They wandered out again, Claire glancing at her ring.
“It is so sweet,” she said, “but there is yet another sweetness in it.”
He smiled down at her, with a question in his eyes.
“Well?”
“You let me choose it, you let the woman in me choose.”
“I could not help it,” said Tod.
Twenty yards farther on he wheeled and drew up outside a costumier’s. It
was one of those particularly French shops, small, piquant, restrained,
showing a few exquisite things in the window, a dress, two hats, a
rose-coloured sash, two little grey slippers standing demurely apart.
Claire knew this little shop. It was a fragment of Paris, very
fashionable, charming, but expensive.
“I think this should do,” said the man.
She admired Tod for choosing that shop.
“My dear, it is very expensive.”
“A few good things are better than a lot of cheap ones.”
She had no answer to that.
They entered the shop, and it was Tod who spoke to a swarthy little
Frenchwoman with bright eyes and a merry smile. He stood in the middle
of the square of green carpet, his hat in his hand, his blue eyes
vaguely amused.
“Madame, have you any Paris models?”
“Everything is from Paris, monsieur.”
“Good,” said Tod. “May we see everything? My fiancée wishes to choose.”
The two women looked at each other. Claire smiled.
“A simple costume, madame, that I can wear at my marriage, and
afterwards.”
There was some subtle interchange of sympathy between the two women.
Tod, the man, was put gently on to a chair in a corner and persuaded to
be a spectator. Madame and Claire began to chatter like old friends.
“Yvonne!”
A pretty girl, like a dark pansy, appeared from behind a glass door.
Madame spoke to her with an air of mystery; and the dark girl
disappeared, to return with an armful of Parisian creations.
They were displayed, commented on, discussed as though Claire were a
daughter.
“What about that pink thing?” said Tod from his corner, the blatant and
enthusiastic male.
Madame was very emphatic.
“Oh, no, monsieur—never! Yvonne should not have brought it.”
Tod lapsed and became again the devoted spectator. And yet he was
enjoying himself intensely, watching Claire and the two women fingering
these beautiful things, Yvonne spreading the costumes over her own
figure for Claire to judge them like an impressionist. He beheld a new
Claire, vivacious, critical, yet ever charming, smiling at him from time
to time, quite capable of holding her own with these experts, betraying
an instant and instinctive knowledge of what suited her and what did
not.
“That pleases me.”
She appealed to Tod.
“But it is black,” he objected.
Madame suppressed him with motherly impressiveness.
“Black, monsieur, is the most refined, the most restrained, the most
cunning of colours. A charming woman never looks better than in black.”
“Supposing you try it on?” said Tod meekly.
The two women, the costumes, and Claire disappeared into a room behind
the shop, and Tod waited for the completion of the mystery. Half an hour
passed, and then Yvonne came hurrying out.
“Mademoiselle wishes to know if monsieur is ennuyé?”
“I am quite happy, mademoiselle.”
She smiled at him archly and hurried out into the street. Something
seemed to be lacking, some little refinement, a detail that was
necessary for the completion of a picture. Yvonne returned with an
armful of cardboard boxes, but she did not tell Tod what they contained.
Tod heard much pretty chattering in French, the blending of three
women’s voices, exclamations of delight and of admiration. Tod felt
thrilled, just as excited as the women, for was there not something of a
sacramental mystery about all this feminine ritual, this dressing of his
most dear lady? And then she appeared to him; vaguely shy, smiling in a
way that was new to her, a little, subtle, tender smile, her soft lips
ready to ask a question.
“Dear heart!” said Tod.
He stood up and gazed, and his eyes saw nothing but this little woman in
a black chiffon velvet gown cut low in the front, threaded about the
wrists and neck with twisted threads of cerise and silver, and held at
the waist by a belt of silver. On her head was a close-fitting black
velvet hat, carrying a little halo of silver filigree work, and
underlined with cerise. Grey silk stockings and little black shoes with
silver grey uppers showed below the hem of the black dress.
“Well?” her eyes asked him with a little tremble of light.
“Dear heart,” said Tod again, “it’s—it’s perfect.”
She gave him a strange melting look.
“What beauty there may be in me—is yours,” it said.
Madame clapped her hands softly, and Yvonne smiled.
“Monsieur is convinced! Mademoiselle has the beauty of simplicity.”
“It’s—it’s perfect,” said Tod once more, looking into Claire’s eyes.
And he refused to let her change that costume. It was so simple and so
charming that he felt that she could have met both Myonville and Paris
in those dainty and gentle clothes.
“The other dress can be packed, madame, and we can call for it.”
“Certainly, monsieur.”
“And now,” said Tod, “what about the other things? I’m going out for a
short walk.”
He handed his pocket-book to Claire.
“Tod—I——”
“I won’t be long,” he said, escaping out of the shop.
Claire looked at Tod’s pocket-book and then at Madame.
“I do not require anything more,” she said softly, “but a pair of
gloves, a petticoat or two, and a simple blouse.”
“But if monsieur——?”
Claire smiled with her grey eyes at the other woman.
“It is sufficient—if I am happy.”
Madame smiled back at her.
“I understand. It is an admirable feeling. Yet, mademoiselle, if you
drive in an auto——”
“Yes,” said Claire with a sigh, “I shall need a cloak. A very simple
one, one that I could wear too in the winter.”
“We have a black velour, and quite inexpensive. It will harmonise with
that costume.”
“It must be quite inexpensive,” said Claire with that softly final air
of hers.
Tod returned in half an hour, and wanted to know what she had bought.
“All that I need,” she told him, handing him back his pocket-book. “I
have paid madame.”
Tod did not examine his pocket-book until the evening, and then to see
whether he needed another cheque cashing at Abbeville. He found that he
had more money left than he expected. Claire had refused to seize an
opportunity.
From the costumier’s Tod carried her off to lunch at the hotel, a
happily proud Tod who looked all Eu in the face with eyes that said “See
what an exquisite little woman I have here. And she is going to marry
me! Wonderful, isn’t it?” They had a bottle of Pommard for lunch, Claire
drinking just one glass of it and looking as though she had been born in
that charming frock. She was rather quiet with Tod, perhaps because she
was so happy, and thought of the future without a moment of dismay.
“We have more shopping to do yet,” he told her.
“For whom?”
“For you. And there are the presents for the family.”
She resisted gently.
“Ma chérie, you have bought me so much. For the others—yes, if it
pleases you.”
“Have you a travelling trunk?” asked the practical Tod.
“A little one.”
“You will want something bigger. Let us run through the list. Answer
correctly like a good child.”
She pretended to be extremely solemn.
“Have you an umbrella?”
“Yes.”
“A raincoat?”
“No.”
Tod made a note of it.
“House shoes—pretty ones, I mean?”
She shook her head.
Tod made another note.
“Gloves?”
“Yes.”
“A little handbag for the vanities of women?”
“No.”
“That is essential.”
She held up a hand.
“Please, Tod, no more.”
There was something in her eyes that touched and restrained him.
“Ma petite,” he said, “you have let me enjoy myself. It has been the
happiest day of my life. I thank you, with all my heart.”
The day drew to a close, and the shabby old blue auto improvised a
finale when they were within half a mile of Myonville by blowing a big
burst in one of its back tyres. There was no spare wheel, only a spare
tube and tyre. The chauffeur, who had lunched very well, smiled at Tod
and asked them if they would remove themselves from the back seat as the
tools and the jack were under it.
Tod got out.
“Why shouldn’t we walk? The car can bring on the parcels.”
They decided to walk.
The sunset was behind them, and they came into Myonville with a yellow
sky at their backs and the long shadows of the trees falling across the
village. One of the high avenues of beeches led them to the end of the
village, and from the darkness of this avenue they seemed to step at
once into the evening brightness of the wide and open street. The French
folk were sitting at their doors, and the passing of Claire and Tod was
the passing of a romance.
Myonville behaved like the warm-hearted and simple little place it was.
Claire had nothing to fear from these good people. She went past the
doorways with shining eyes, the little lady of Tod’s life, so frankly
happy that she looked for no evil in the heart of this little world, nor
would she have found it had she looked.
“Bon soir, Mademoiselle Vignard; bon soir, monsieur.”
There were smiles, whisperings, a bobbing out of heads when they were
past, but not a grudging word, not a sneer, no English gawking, no
English giggles. These people were civilised, and Claire Vignard had
taught their children.
“Tiens! but what pretty clothes!”
“The Englishman has been spending his money.”
“Is she not looking charming?”
“Yes, Claire Vignard deserves it. It will not spoil her.”
“Ah, what a romance! Did you notice how he looked at her? They say the
English make good husbands.”
“No man could help being good to her.”
And then a child ran out and into Claire’s arms.
“Oh, mam’selle! Pretty, pretty!”
Claire kissed her.
“Am I pretty, ma petite, or is it the dress?”
“It is you,” said the child.
Tod bent down in turn and kissed Nanette.
“We think the same, Nanette; we are very wise people, you and I.”
The Lorellards were sitting in the doorway of the café, and it was
Josephine who first caught sight of Claire, and Josephine’s good heart
betrayed itself.
“They are coming. The auto must have broken down. Ma foi! she is lovely!
He has turned her into a little Parisian angel!”
Even the bored André leant forward over his sister’s shoulder.
“It is Printemps,” he said; “Monsieur Tod has discovered Printemps.”
Claire was embraced, exclaimed over, kissed, while Tod stood and watched
the pleasure and the playful tenderness of these dear people, a Tod who
could not be disconcerted by André’s mischievous smile. Claire had to
show her costume, her _chapeau_, her little shoes, even her silk
stockings. They were like children, very lovable, grown-up children, and
Tod knew that he was one of them.
“Ah, Monsieur Tod, but you are très, très gentil, très généreux.”
“Am I?” said Tod. “But why? I have never enjoyed myself like this
before.”
He was looking at Claire with eyes of wonder and of tenderness.
“You will spoil her, monsieur,” said André roguishly.
Madame snubbed him.
“Love never spoilt a good woman, my son. Take that to heart.”
Then Claire escaped.
“Tod is hungry,” she asserted.
“I’m not,” said her man.
“But you must be, because I am,” and she laughed back at them from the
doorway. “I shall be back in one moment, and I will help to get some
supper.”
“It is ready,” Josephine called after her: “we waited for you.”
Tod wandered out into the orchard, because the sunset was there and a
blackbird was singing, and all his happiness seemed part of the sunset
and the green leaves and the blackbird’s song. Tod had never thought
that life could be so good. He idled to and fro under the apple trees,
filled to the lips with a precious and innocent tenderness, a simple man
whose very simplicity was his strength.
Presently he heard Claire calling him.
“Tod! Tod!”
He turned and met her where a red rose bush grew by the garden gate, and
Tod stood still. She had changed her new frock and put on her simple
black working skirt, a white blouse and the little apron with the blue
pansies. It was the Claire of all his memories, the Claire of the
schoolhouse, the Claire who had won him in her daintily shabby clothes.
“Dear God!” said Tod, “nothing will ever be better than that. It’s the
woman, not the clothes.”