"I cannot help it. It is necessary. Would you rather that I saw her?"
"No, no. I will try, but I dread it."
She was absent so long that he had risen to follow her, when she came
into the room again, white and trembling. "No, I have done nothing,"
she said, in answer to his look. "She only rocks herself backwards and
forwards on the ground. She never looked up--I do not know whether she
heard me; but yet she must have, for when I came away at last, I heard
her spring up and bolt the door. Nannon is out, and there she is quite
alone. It cannot matter so greatly. Fabien can wait for his papers
another day--" A shade that unconsciously crossed his face made her cry
out quickly, "They will trust you unreservedly!"
"Scarcely that, perhaps," he said, with a smile and a sigh. "Well, we
must wait; this fit may possibly pass off. I will go and ask Sister
Gabrielle to come here. Whether that poor woman will see her or not,
she will be some one in the house, for you must take Nannon with you to
the Cygne soon after twelve. You understand that it is on account of
the fever that I do not bring M. Saint-Martin here?"
"Yes, yes. But ought I to see him? You are sure there is no danger?"
she asked piteously.
"Not with the usual precautions. Can I help you in any way?"
"No, thank you. Pere Gaspard has been very kind."
Therese never knew how those hours passed. She tried to go into the
room where madame lay in her awful depth of despair, but the door was
locked, and Therese, who could not keep down the well of joy that seemed
to come dancing up from her heart, felt indeed as if this happiness
separated them more than any bolts. She called herself cruel, inhuman;
she thought of little Adolphe, the weariness, the fever, the pain; but
even while her tears fell, those glad visions would intrude themselves.
When we are quite young we are so rigorous over our sorrows that we are
impatient of comfort; it is in after life that we learn to refuse no
consolations. She scolded herself, and then when Sister Gabrielle came,
fell into her arms, and laughed and cried together. Sister Gabrielle,
who had a way of soothing people, listened quietly, and seemed to lift
that little burden of self-reproach from her heart. She dressed her,
and called Nannon, and stood on the top of the steps watching the two go
away together down the street, and under the dark archway. Charville
had broken out into its cheerfulness again; the fever was dying away,
only here and there was still the sharp anguish of recent loss like
Madame Roulleau's. Therese went off with a buoyant step into the
sunshine, and the merry jangle of voices. Sister Gabrielle turned back
into the house, took her knitting, and sat patiently on the stairs
outside the room, where the mother had shut herself in with her despair.
When Therese reached the Cygne, something of her brightness had fled.
She hung back with a little dread; it was Nannon who pushed forward, and
made Toinette show them the room which M. Deshoulieres had set apart
for them.
"There is no one there; see, mademoiselle!" she said, reconnoitring.
It had a balcony, which looked over the sycamore-trees at the lovely
spires of the Cathedral. Nannon, with quick tact, went out there, and
sat humming a little chanson, very cracked and discordant, but to her
full of memories of her girlhood. Those songs of old age are the most
pathetic songs of all. Therese in the room waited with a hundred hopes
and fears in her heart. It was three years since she had seen Fabien,
and now that he was near she began to tremble.
Meanwhile, in another room of the hotel, a stormy discussion was taking
place. It was necessary for M. Deshoulieres to greet the two gentlemen
with the information that the notary had left Charville unexpectedly,
and that it was not in his power to produce the will. M. Saint-Martin
broke out in passionate terms at once.
"So, monsieur, and this is the end! Do not suppose that I have come
here to be trifled with."
"M. Deshoulieres must be aware," interrupted the cure in his frigid
tones, "that he stands in a strange position."
"M. le Cure, I am perfectly aware. M. Saint-Martin has--not a right,
but a certain amount of excuse for what would otherwise be unpardonable
expressions. But when I have said this, I have said all. Events have
conspired to bring about this false position, and a very short time
will, I suppose, set it right. Meanwhile, I claim the courtesy and the
trust which is due from one gentleman to another."
"From one gentleman!--yes," sneered Fabien. "_Pardon_, monsieur; I was
not aware that you considered yourself beyond that pale."
Fabien, who was white with rage, would have answered fiercely, but the
cure again interfered.
"Messieurs, the interests of both require something more than a battle
of words."
"You are right," said Max, turning frankly towards him. "I regret what
I said. The delay is just as vexatious to me as to you--more so, in
fact, since it seems to create suspicions which are certainly not
agreeable for me to hear--but we had better meet it like reasonable
beings. It is possible that I can obtain the keys from Madame Roulleau
to-morrow--at all events learn where her husband is, and telegraph for
him at once. If you return to Maury, I will give you the earliest
information; if, on the contrary, you prefer to remain in Charville, you
will have the satisfaction of being on the spot, and able to adopt
whatever measures you think advisable--for the security of your
inheritance," added the doctor, with a little mockery in his smile,
which was not lost upon the cure.
Monsieur Saint-Martin, not having recovered himself, answered sharply:
"Certainly I do not choose to remain in this city of the plague. My
lawyer will be here to-day; and as to further proceedings, I shall be
guided by him. He may suggest immediate action."
"I should recommend your carrying it out at once," replied M.
Deshoulieres gravely. Fabien, who hated ridicule, looked quickly at him
to see whether he was serious or not, and could not satisfy himself.
"It is unendurable," he muttered. "After having all one's life been
pestered by the vagaries of an old man, he might at least have spared
his ridiculous restraints when he was dead, and could find no pleasure
in them."
"Is Mademoiselle Veuillot here?" asked the cure, looking up.
"She is. She is in the next room."
"What do you propose to do?" said Fabien, disregarding.
"I have already told you, monsieur. Meanwhile you may employ any spurs
with which your lawyer may furnish you," replied M. Deshoulieres
impatiently. Therese was in the next room, and this man was
indifferent.
"You ought to see Mademoiselle Veuillot at once," said the cure, rising.
"Therese? Oh, yes. She is here, you say? By all means."
She heard their voices in the passage; half rose, and sat down again,
while the colour faded completely out of her face. In the balcony,
Nannon was singing her little refrain,--
"Helas, je sais un chant d'amour
Triste ou gai tour a tour;"
an old melancholy Breton song that had somehow been wafted across from,
the quaint wild province of hills and chestnut trees to these broad
unromantic corn plains. Therese, who had not heard it before, never
forgot the little sad air. She heard the song, and the voices, and the
door opening; but for the first moment it was all confused. It was her
own name which recalled her; her own name in Fabien's voice.
"Ah, Therese, at last we meet! Believe me that I am enchanted to renew
our acquaintance. You have not quite forgotten me, I flatter myself."
She raised her eyes, not to his but to Monsieur Deshoulieres'. One
piteous, appealing glance--what was this?--acquaintance--forgotten?
Three years of hungering and hoping, and could this be her greeting at
the end? He with an overwhelming pity in his heart might not help her
by look, or sign, or word. Face to face, heart to heart, these two must
show each other the story of their lives.
"You have come at last, Fabien," she said, faintly.
"After all, yes. I have had enough of South America, as you may
imagine. It was a little more amusing than the old bureau at Rouen, but
it was becoming _ennuyant_. Variety before all. Life requires to be
tasted like wine, a sip here and a sip there before one decides. Now I
shall try the charms of Paris. And you? have you remained here since my
uncle's death? A _triste_ place, is it not?"
And she had loved him! By some subtile force of sympathy, Max knew that
she was suffering a sharper pang than any which had come to him. He was
standing with the cure where they could not see them, but he could hear
the light frivolous voice, the heartless words. He had loved in vain,
but she had loved unworthily. There is no sting so sharp as that sting.
And outside, in the sunny balcony, old Nannon was crooning over her
refrain--
"Helas, je sais un chant d'amour,
Triste ou gai tour a tour:
Ce chant qui de mon coeur s'eleve,
D'ou vient qu'en pleurant je l'acheve!"
Therese was very pale, but she had got back her self-possession.
"I am sure that poor M. Moreau felt your departure."
"Did he? Ah, that is not improbable! He should have conducted himself
differently, and prevailed on me to stay. However, I pardon him; he did
his best to atone for it by dying at the right moment. Not but what I
owe him something for his conduct even then."
"Oh, Fabien!"
"It is true, then," he said excitedly. "And M. Deshoulieres is aware
of my sentiments."
Max turned round grave and quiet.
"It is unnecessary to repeat them in the presence of Mademoiselle
Veuillot."
"_Parbleu_, and why? They will be repeated before the world very
shortly, let me assure you, if the will and certain explanations do not
reach me."
She looked inquiringly--again not at him, but at M. Deshoulieres. This
time he answered her: "Monsieur Roulleau's absence has placed us in a
difficulty. Until his return M. Saint-Martin has only my Word to rely
upon."
"A word which, unfortunately, is contradicted by facts."
Whether he was provoked by M. Deshoulieres' calmness, or irritated by
his disappointment, his tone was more insulting than it had been the
preceding night. The girl's eyes flashed.
"Are you doubting his word?"
"There is scarcely room for _doubt_," said Fabien, meaningly.