"Oh what a tangled web we weave
When first we practise to deceive."
Are you feeling well enough to entertain the old man to-night?" said the
plaintive voice of Alphonse de Maistre, as father and daughter resumed
their seats on the verandah, after the simple evening meal was over.
"Oh yes," Fifine answered quickly, "my foot scarcely pains at all now,
it will be nothing serious, I think, after all." Then in her sweet low
voice she commenced to read to her blind old parent who sat in a
listening attitude with his hands folded in his lap.
Suddenly the firm voice of the young girl wavered, she stammered and
grew distracted. There were footsteps in the distance that made her
heart beat violently. It was three days since her accident in the wood,
and she was anxiously looking forward to a second interview with her
lover. A moment after, her face was suffused with blushes as she found
herself confronted by the handsome stranger.
"Pardon, Monsieur," he said addressing the old man, "I have taken the
liberty to call on you, to solicit permission for myself and some
friends to pass through your grounds on our way to the upper woods."
The voice startled the old man. The words were few and to the point; the
speaker had evidently not sought a pretext for familiar intercourse, but
his voice had too much of the city cultivation about it to please him
entirely. His first thought was of Fifine.
"Are you there, daughter?" he asked stretching forth his hand, to make
assurance doubly sure.
Fifine caught it in her gentle grasp and drew nearer to him.
"Tell this stranger in his native tongue," he said slowly, "that your
father is blind and cannot see him, but that he will trust him and grant
the permission he asks, if he will leave immediately, Preston can show
them the road."
"I will spare mademoiselle the painful recital," interrupted the young
man, now speaking in French, "for I have understood Monsieur her
father."
"Who is this man, Fifine?" De Maistre asked nervously. "Is he from the
village?"
"I know not, _mon pére_," she answered, trying to be calm, and then to
the surprise of all, a loud laugh echoed in the evening air, and the
voice of the truant parrot called out from the cage above their heads.
"Ha, ha, ha! he kissed her in the wood, Fifine, give Poll his cracker,
polly wants a cracker." The girl's face was dyed with scarlet--and the
young man's eyes looked daggers at the mischievous bird. There was an
awkward silence for a moment and then "Bijou" with characteristic
diplomacy exclaimed:
"What an amusing bird, he speaks uncommonly well, though his words are
not very appropriate, certainly."
A shadow passed over the face of the blind listener, a momentary pang
shot through his breast, he clasped his hands convulsively, then turning
to the stranger he said in a steady voice:
"Never mind the bird, he says queer things at times. Sir, I grant you
the permission you come to seek, my gardener, Preston, will await you at
whatever time you appoint, and conduct you through. Good-evening, Sir."
Taking this for dismissal, "Bijou" raised his hat, slightly pressed the
hand of the beautiful Fifine, and the next moment he was gone.
A strange and awkward silence followed his departure. Much might have
been said on such an unusual occurrence as this, yet neither chose to
speak.
At last the evening sun as though weary of the quiet scene, gathered all
his truant rays out of the tree tops and from the purple mountain
summit, and sunk to rest behind the sombre clouds that twilight spread
across the sky. Then Fifine who longed to be alone, kissed her father
good-night and retired to her own little room, after telling the servant
to light a lamp and take her father to his chamber.
The story of Fifine de Maistre's life, from the time of her adventure in
the wood, until six months after, would be to the unsympathetic, the
most monotonous series of details imaginable. There is no bore like a
man or woman who is in love, to those whose precious privilege it never
can be, to be guilty of such a natural offence. A man never tires of any
one so quickly as he does of some fellow who is "mashed," and girls who
are not engaged never count her who is, as strictly one of themselves.
This therefore may be constituted as a plea for refraining to dwell upon
the time so laden with exquisite joy to Josephine de Maistre, the time
that made up the days and nights of this period of her life at Sleepy
Cottage. She had worked out such fallacious reasonings as justified her
in the end, in holding clandestine meetings with her romantic lover, and
so, each night when she had finished reading to her father, she stole
quietly away to the rustic gate, at the end of the shrubbery, there to
lend a willing ear to protestations of love and devotion, from the lips
upon whose threshhold she knew, hung the words of her future destiny.
Things had gone thus far, when one night, Fifine in her old humor, was
grumbling against the loneliness of her existence, and giving expression
to her discontent in most touching terms. Her chivalrous adorer looked
the picture of intense sympathy, as he lay stretched in the long grass
at her feet.
"Fifine," said he, and something in his voice and eyes thrilled her to
the very heart, "my darling, your words are loaded with pain for me; why
do you grumble who should be happy amidst these surroundings. If your
life were as blank and prospectless as mine, you might have good reason
indeed to sigh and complain. You see, a man has to rough it with body
and soul. It's not so hard to keep our bodies up, but the task is for
the heart. Men should have no hearts, or else some one to love them
always and well. I could gather so much courage in a worthy love."
The girl, poor simple child, was touched. She drew nearer to Bijou whose
handsome head lay nestling against the rustic bench where she was
sitting. He was watching the quick, nervous heaving of her breast, and
he could see a slight tremor in the well-curved lip. She fell upon her
knees before him, and as she spoke, two large round tears flowed over
her pretty checks.
"But Bijou, do you not know that I love you as worthily as I know how,
that life with you is all the world to me, and without you it is a
miserable blank."
Then she laid her bowed head on his shoulder, and sobbed convulsively.
There was a curious expression in the man's face, as he raised the girl
and made her sit beside him. Then taking both her hands in his, he said,
in a low tone--
"Fifine, I was only waiting those words from your lips. They fill my
vacant life with sweet and pleasant dreams, but in our case, as in all
others, 'the course of love can not run smoothly.' You see I gave up my
college course after I had met you, and since that time I have been
thrown on the world's mercy, almost a penniless waif. I have no wealth
to offer you, no luxury of any kind, no abundance, but love and
devotion, and that cannot satisfy you."
"O Bijou!" the girl cried out in a passionate tone, "you wrong me, you
do indeed. Give me your full heart and your empty hands. I am rich in
the world's wealth, let me share it with you; give me that abundance of
love you speak of, and I will be--Oh! so satisfied!"
A sinister smile passed over the averted face of the stranger, but the
next moment, his arm stole around the slender waist, and raising the
tear-stained face to his own, he pressed a long lingering kiss on the
warm lips.
"If you will have it so," he said, "my love makes me selfish enough to
comply, we can make each other happy by following such a course, is that
not enough? If I had sufficient means at my disposal, I could complete
all arrangements immediately, and there would be no further suspense for
either of us."
"But, Bijou, see how fortune has favored us. Last Tuesday was my
birthday, and papa, to reconcile me to my fate, gave me a cheque for my
whole dowry, which I was not to have had for two years more. You can see
how circumstances favor our attachment."
"It looks like it darling; I hope we are doing the right thing," and his
voice implied a painful sense of conscientiousness.
Before parting they agreed to meet once more. Fifine persisted in
offering her wealth, and Bijou did not decline. She might bring him the
cheque at their next meeting and trust to his fond affection for the
rest. He then bade her a tender farewell, and as she watched his
departing footsteps, she was delighted when he turned a last time,
sajing gayly, "_Au revoir, ma petite, à demain._" Then he disappeared in
a bend of the road, and she walked slowly back to the house, lost in the
delicious labyrinths of loves young dream.