"Let us die together," answered Parpon; "we are both sad."
She snatched the poker from the fire, and ran at him. He caught her
wrists with his great hands, big enough for tall Medallion, and held her.
"I said 'together,"' he chuckled; "not one before the other. We might
jump into the flume at the mill, or go over the dam at the Bois Noir; or,
there is Farette's musket which he is cleaning--gracious, but it will
kick when it fires, it is so old!"
She sank to the floor. "Why does he clean the musket?" she asked; fear,
and something wicked too, in her eye. Her fingers ran forgetfully
through the hair on her forehead, pushing it back, and the marks of
small-pox showed. The contrast with her smooth cheeks gave her a weird
look. Parpon got quickly on the table again and sat like a Turk, with a
furtive eye on her. "Who can tell!" he said at last. "That musket has
not been fired for years. It would not kill a bird; the shot would
scatter: but it might kill a man--a man is bigger."
"Kill a man!" She showed her white teeth with a savage little smile.
"Of course it is all guess. I asked Farette what he would shoot, and he
said, 'Nothing good to eat.' I said I would eat what he killed. Then he
got pretty mad, and said I couldn't eat my own head. Holy! that was
funny for Farette. Then I told him there was no good going to the Bois
Noir, for there would be nothing to shoot. Well, did I speak true,
Madame Julie?"
She was conscious of something new in Parpon. She could not define it.
Presently she got to her feet and said: "I don't believe you--you're a
monkey."
"A monkey can climb a tree quick; a man has to take the shot as it
comes." He stretched up his powerful arms, with a swift motion as of
climbing, laughed, and added: "Madame Julie, Farette has poor eyes; he
could not see a hole in a ladder. But he has a kink in his head about
the Bois Noir. People have talked--"
"Pshaw!" Julie said, crumpling her apron and throwing it out; "he is a
child and a coward. He should not play with a gun; it might go off and
hit him."
Parpon hopped down and trotted to the door. Then he turned and said,
with a sly gurgle: "Farette keeps at that gun. What is the good! There
will be nobody at the Bois Noir any more. I will go and tell him."
She rushed at him with fury, but seeing Annette Benoit in the road, she
stood still and beat her foot angrily on the doorstep. She was ripe for
a quarrel, and she would say something hateful to Annette; for she never
forgot that Farette had asked Annette to be his wife before herself was
considered. She smoothed out her wrinkled apron and waited.
"Good day, Annette," she said loftily.
"Good day, Julie," was the quiet reply.
"Will you come in?"
"I am going to the mill for flax-seed. Benoit has rheumatism."
"Poor Benoit!" said Julie, with a meaning toss of her head.
"Poor Benoit," responded Annette gently. Her voice was always sweet.
One would never have known that Benoit was a drunken idler.
"Come in. I will give you the meal from my own. Then it will cost you
nothing," said Julie, with an air.
"Thank you, Julie, but I would rather pay."
"I do not sell my meal," answered Julie. "What's a few pounds of meal to
the wife of Farette? I will get it for you. Come in, Annette."
She turned towards the door, then stopped all at once. There was the
oatmeal which she had thrown at Parpon, the basin, and the poker. She
wished she had not asked Annette in. But in some things she had a quick
wit, and she hurried to say: "It was that yellow cat of Parpon's. It
spilt the meal, and I went at it with the poker."
Perhaps Annette believed her. She did not think about it one way or the
other; her mind was with the sick Benoit. She nodded and said nothing,
hoping that the flax-seed would be got at once. But when she saw that
Julie expected an answer, she said: "Cecilia, my little girl, has a black
cat-so handsome. It came from the house of the poor Seigneur de la
Riviere a year ago. We took it back, but it would not stay."
Annette spoke simply and frankly, but her words cut like a knife.
Julie responded, with a click of malice: "Look out that the black cat
doesn't kill the dear Cecilia." Annette started, but she did not believe
that cats sucked the life from children's lungs, and she replied calmly:
"I am not afraid; the good God keeps my child." She then got up and came
to Julie, and said: "It is a pity, Julie, that you have not a child. A
child makes all right."
Julie was wild to say a fierce thing, for it seemed that Annette was
setting off Benoit against Farette; but the next moment she grew hot,
her eyes smarted, and there was a hint of trouble at her throat.
She had lived very fast in the last few hours, and it was telling on her.
She could not rule herself--she could not play a part so well as she
wished. She had not before felt the thing that gave a new pulse to her
body and a joyful pain at her breasts. Her eyes got thickly blurred so
that she could not see Annette, and, without a word, she hurried to get
the meal. She was silent when she came back. She put the meal into
Annette's hands. She felt that she would like to talk of Armand. She
knew now there was no evil thought in Annette. She did not like her more
for that, but she felt she must talk, and Annette was safe. So she took
her arm. "Sit down, Annette," she said. "You come so seldom."
"But there is Benoit, and the child--"
"The child has the black cat from the House!" There was again a sly ring
to Julie's voice, and she almost pressed Annette into a chair.
"Well, it must only be a minute."
"Were you at the funeral to-day?" Julie began.
"No; I was nursing Benoit. But the poor Seigneur! They say he died
without confession. No one was there except M'sieu' Medallion, the
Little Chemist, Old Sylvie, and M'sieu' Armand. But, of course, you
have heard everything."
"Is that all you know?" queried Julie.
"Not much more. I go out little, and no one comes to me except the
Little Chemist's wife--she is a good woman."
"What did she say?"
"Only something of the night the Seigneur died. He was sitting in his
chair, not afraid, but very sad, we can guess. By-and-by he raised his
head quickly. 'I hear a voice in the Tall Porch,' he said. They thought
he was dreaming. But he said other things, and cried again that he heard
his son's voice in the Porch. They went and found M'sieu' Armand. Then
a great supper was got ready, and he sat very grand at the head of the
table, but died quickly, when making a grand speech. It was strange he
was so happy, for he did not confess-he hadn't absolution."
This was more than Julie had heard. She showed excitement.
"The Seigneur and M'sieu' Armand were good friends when he died?" she
asked.
"Quite."
All at once Annette remembered the old talk about Armand and Julie. She
was confused. She wished she could get up and run away; but haste would
look strange.
"You were at the funeral?" she added, after a minute.
"Everybody was there."
"I suppose M'sieu' Armand looks very fine and strange after his long
travel," said Annette shyly, rising to go.
"He was always the grandest gentleman in the province," answered Julie,
in her old vain manner. "You should have seen the women look at him
to-day! But they are nothing to him--he is not easy to please."
"Good day," said Annette, shocked and sad, moving from the door.
Suddenly she turned, and laid a hand on Julie's arm. "Come and see my
sweet Cecilia," she said. "She is gay; she will amuse you."
She was thinking again what a pity it was that Julie had no child.
"To see Cecilia and the black cat? Very well--some day."
You could not have told what she meant. But, as Annette turned away
again, she glanced at the mill; and there, high up in the dormer window,
sat Parpon, his yellow cat on his shoulder, grinning down at her. She
wheeled and went into the house.