BOOK IV

I THE EPIDEMIC 337

II THE ALPETTE 358

III THE END OF A REIGN 378

IV THE HEIR 401

BOOK FIRST

THE HOUSE

I

THE KINGDOM

“WHERE are you going?”

“Oh, up to the house.”

Put this question to little girls and boys that you see along the

country roads, on their way from school or coming in from the fields,

and you will get this answer.

Their bright eyes glisten like grass after a shower; their speech,

unless they are timid, shoots straight out, like plants that claim all

space to grow in undisturbed.

“Where are you going?”

They do not answer “home”; nor do they even say “to our house.” They

say “_the house_.” It may be a wretched, tumble-down shed: all the

same it is the house, the only house in all the world. Some day there

will be others,--perhaps. But that is not so certain, after all.

Even young men and women, and quite grown persons, married folk, if

you please, use the same expression. _At the house_ they used to

do this, _at the house_ there was that. One might suppose they

were speaking of their present house. Not at all; they are speaking of

the house of their childhood, the house where their father and mother

lived, and which they have not been able to keep, or the customs of

which they have changed--it’s all one--but which in their memory is

always the same. You quite understand that there cannot be two.

I was a school-boy then; oh, just a little primary school child,

perhaps seven or eight years old,--seven or eight I think. I always

said “the house” just as people say _la patrie_ when they mean

France. Still, I knew very well that there were people who called it by

other names, names which sound grander to a child. The baby’s Italian

nurse used to call it _il palazzo_, rounding her mouth for the

second _a_, and letting the last syllable die gently away in a

lingering whisper. The farmer who brought the rent, or more probably an

instalment of it, or even a fowl of some sort, to encourage the master

to have patience, would say _the château_, with several circumflex

accents. A lady who came from Paris to visit us--you would know she

was from Paris by the lorgnette which she carried--had given it the

dignified title _your mansion_. And during the crisis of which I

shall have presently to tell, any one might read on the humiliating

bill that was posted on our front gate the words _Villa for sale_.

Villa, mansion, château, palace, how colourless are all these majestic

words, notwithstanding their fine sound! What was the use of tangling

up the truth in words? “The house” is quite enough. “The house” tells

the whole story.

It is still there: it has an ancient habit of being there. You would

have no trouble in finding it--the whole country knows the Rambert

house, because our family has always lived in it. It has been carefully

repaired--too carefully, indeed--from garret to cellar, furbished and

decorated, repainted and polished outside and in. Of course it will not

do to let houses go on forever wearing themselves out, and a decaying

homestead has poetic charm only to passing travellers. Every-day life

has its indispensabilities. But nobody cares that one’s house should be

new any more than that one’s parents should be young. If they are young

they are less entirely ours. They feel a right to an existence of their

own, whereas later, our life is their life, and that is all that we ask

of them, for we are not exacting.

Before the house was restored I was showing it to a lady, a lady

from Paris like her of the lorgnette. It is probable, quite likely,

certain, indeed, that I had previously sung its praises in no modest

tones. My description doubtless lacked neither the farmer’s circumflex

accents nor the lingering susurration of the Italian nurse. She may

have expected to see another Versailles, or at the very least another

Chantilly. So when, all alive with interest, duly instructed, and her

anticipation keyed up to pitch, she was introduced to the incomparable

edifice, she had the effrontery to exclaim in a tone of surprise, “Is

this it?”

I felt her disappointment. With the utmost courtesy I escorted her

to her carriage--even when boiling over with rage one is polite to

a woman--but I have never seen her since that day: I should not

be able to endure the sight of her. Perfect understanding with a

stranger concerning the places and things of one’s childhood is simply

impossible. It is a case of different dimensions. They are to be

pitied, for their eyes are incapable of seeing. They do not see _the

house_, they see only a house. How then are they to understand?

You come upon an iron gateway between two square granite columns;--the

gate freshly painted and in three sections, those on either side bolted

to the ground, permitting the use of only that in the centre. The three

are opened only on grand occasions, for carriages and limousines. In

old times they were opened for hay waggons. In old times, for that

matter, you had only to push a little and you could go in by any gate

you pleased, the bolts being out of commission. All sorts of unbidden

folk used to come into the court, and to me their intrusions were

highly disagreeable. Children are strongly conservative in their sense

of proprietorship.

“What difference does it make?” grandfather would say.

Grandfather detested enclosures of any sort.

The stone columns used to be covered with moss, but now they are draped

with climbing plants. The trees have been trimmed of the too-exuberant

branches that used to seem to bend in blessing above the roof, or to

tap upon the window panes. One never realises the vigour of a tree;

grant it a few square yards and it soon overshadows them, and gradually

draws nearer and nearer, like a friend who has the right of entrance.

Now that our trees have been trimmed--for the time being--the sunlight

caresses the walls of the old house, and this is better, in the matter

of hygiene. Humidity is unwholesome, especially in autumn. But here

is a puzzle; in my time, I mean in the time when I was young, there

was a sun-dial carved in high relief upon the wall. Above it was a

tarnished and half-effaced inscription, the secret of which I refused

to penetrate: ME LUX, VOS UMBBA. Father had translated it for

me and I made haste to forget it that I might still feel the thrill of

the mysterious syllables. Above it was the iron finger whose slender

shadow marked the hour all day long, and encircling it were the names

of unknown cities, London, Boston, Pekin, and the rest, intended to

show the differences in time the whole world round, as if the whole

world were merely a dependance of the house, which dictated the laws

of time to them all. But a linden tree, in an inadvertent moment, had

rendered useless all this labour of light. The linden had indeed been

pruned, but by an unlucky mischance, when the front of the house was

restored the entire dial had been covered with a coat of whitewash. Oh,

ill-starred restoration! But am not I responsible, for was it not I who

ordered it? Grown people are capable of just such profanities. They do

it without meaning any harm. No doubt I had said, carelessly, “That

poor dial is of no use.” (The trees had not been trimmed then.) It is a

mistake to let fall a thought; some one is sure to pick it up. A mason

who had chanced to hear me actually thought to give me pleasure with

his whitewash brush, and when I tried to restrain his zeal it was too

late.

As a matter of fact, all these changes which I force myself to set

down hardly affect me. Don’t think me stoical to that degree. I simply

do not see the house as it is. It might be besmeared from cornice to

foundation and I should not notice it. I always see it as it was in my

time--the time, of course you understand, when I was little. I have it

thus before my eyes for all the rest of my life.

The nice old cracks that used to look, not like wrinkles but like

smiles, have all been closed up. A wing has been added for the

convenience of the domestic economy; and as the tiles were falling off

the roof they have been replaced by slates. I have no quarrel with

slates. There are some of an almost lilac grey, like the throat of a

turtle-dove, that are very prisms for reflecting the light. But slate

roofs are flat and monotonous, uniform and without character, while

tiles, rounded, irregular, humped, seem actually to stir, to move, to

stretch themselves like the good old turtles in the garden, that sigh

for fair weather, and hump their backs in protest against wind and

rain. The colour of tiles shades from red to black, passing gradually

or abruptly through all the diminishing tones between. And those who

have eyes to see can guess at the age of the house entirely from the

degree of their incrustation.

However, its age is accurately set down on the blackened tablet in the

great chimney which is the glory of the kitchen. As soon as I rightly

knew my letters and figures, father had set me to read the date, and I

quite understood that he took pride in it, whereas grandfather sneered

at the little ceremony, murmuring in the background, below his voice by

way of not attracting too much attention, but quite distinctly enough

for me to hear, “Do leave the child in peace!”

Was it 1610 or 1670? No one could be quite certain, short of calling

together all our local academies. The stroke at the left of the upright

was too horizontal for a 1 and not sufficiently so for a 7.

“It’s not of the slightest importance,” said grandfather, to whom I

referred the matter.

However, I no longer doubted that it was 1610, when my history book

informed me that this was the year of the assassination of Henry IV.

My imagination demanded the association of a historic event with the

building of our house. “_The King left the Louvre in a coach. He

occupied the back seat, the panels of which were open. The stopping

of two carts at the entrance of the rue de la Ferronnerie, which was

extremely narrow, forced the royal equipage to halt. At that very

moment a man of thirty-two, of a sinister countenance, tall and very

corpulent, red bearded and black haired, François Ravaillac, stepped

with one foot upon the curb, the other upon the spoke of the wheel,

and stabbed the King with two blows of a dagger, the second of which

severed the pulmonary vein. Henri cried, ‘I am wounded,’ and almost

instantly expired_.” I can recall word for word the account in the

history-book which I have not been able to find. No doubt the terrible

picture of the murder which it gave aids my memory. And I was able

to appreciate the importance of the dates by the significant detail

that the rascal’s face infallibly proved that he was thirty-two years

old--thirty-two, and not thirty-one or thirty-three. The rapidity of

the drama in no wise prevented the accurate recognition of this detail.

And when the historian added that the King was hastily carried back to

the Louvre, bleeding from Ravaillac’s poniard, I pictured to myself the

procession as at the door of the house. The house was our Louvre.

The kitchen was probably, was surely, the finest, largest, most

comfortable, most honourable room in the house; banquets and balls

might have been given in it. Such had been the custom in old times,

and I should be the last to find fault with it. Though I have since

dared to transform that kitchen into a hall paved with black and

white marble, the walls handsomely done in panels of hard wood, and

well lighted by a glass bay which occupies the entire side toward

the sunset, I still find myself looking about me for stew-pans and

frying-pans, and above all for the spit that used to turn there. I

still smell the odours of ragouts and roasts, and whenever I see

my guests entering the room I have an impulse to cry out upon the

stupidity of the servants, exclaiming, “What possesses you to bring

them in here!”

Here Mariette the cook held sway. Her power was absolute. Before her

despotism people and furniture alike trembled. Happily, the wide

spaces afforded room to escape her vigilant eye. There were shadowed

corners where one could manage to keep out of sight, especially under

the vast chimney mantel. The chimney had been put upon the retired

list like an aged servant. I used not to know why; but I divine that

it was from reasons of economy, for it was capable of consuming whole

forests. Under its shelter one could make oneself quite comfortable on

the old stone fire-dogs, that were cemented into their place. Bending

back the head, one could see daylight at the top. In autumn, when

night comes early, I used to look up to watch for a star. One night

even, reluctantly crossing the kitchen, then dark and deserted, I was

terrified by a square of light lying white upon the hearth-stone like

an unfolded sheet. Was it the cast-off garment of a ghost? Perhaps they

throw them off that way, at the moment of vanishing, leaving them as an

incontrovertible witness to their visit. The moon was playing upon the

roof.

The more coming and going there was, the better Mariette was pleased.

Her tongue itched in solitude. As a general thing the postman, the

farmer, the men who worked in the garden made their appearance there at

regular intervals. Each and all were served with a glass of red wine,

which they drank with unfailing observance of the rites. They lifted

the elbow and said, “To your health,” after which it was permitted

to drain the glass; and if a second were desired, even without the

slightest interval, the same formula must be observed. Never a one of

them balked at its repetition. I have sometimes drunk in their company,

no doubt from the same glass.

Folk would come also from the mountain villages to get father when

a case was serious. Father, who was a doctor, never demurred at

going with them. I can still hear his words of greeting, at once

compassionate and resolute, when he crossed Mariette’s empire and found

it occupied.

“What is wrong now, friend?”

Mariette would scan all new-comers with a wary yet perspicacious eye,

which unmasked frauds and congealed the blood in the veins of those

unlucky wights whose arrival coincided with the sacred hour of a meal.

I have been present at many an outpouring of peasant woes. They came

out little by little, with a certain reticence of grief, as if illness

were a disgraceful thing. I did not understand this reserve; indeed, it

seemed to me simply slowness of speech.

The high-tide of the year, to the cook, was October, the vintage

season. What comings and goings through the kitchen of vintagers at

work in the wine-press! How important that their strength should be

kept up by large reinforcements of boiled beef and potatoes, and how

warm and savoury the steam that filled the kitchen from the great

kettles! We children used to make the most of the confusion to settle

ourselves upon the fire-dogs, our pockets full of nuts which the

wind had scattered over the farm lane, or which we had ourselves

surreptitiously knocked off with switches. A bit of flint served to

crack them upon the hearth-stone. If they were still in their green

husk a juice would squirt out, staining our hands and clothes with

a pigment of which not the best soap could obliterate the tell-tale

tokens. But the kernels, white as a fowl well dressed for a doll’s

dinner, would crunch most deliciously between our teeth. Or we would

stealthily pop our chestnuts on a corner of the stove, revelling in

the warmth after coming in, chilled through, from kicking dead leaves

before us in the face of the autumn winds; for in my country the winds

are harsh and rude.

Many a time, too, have I curiously watched Mariette’s movements as she

killed a fowl. Her dexterity and her indifference were alike extreme.

Like the most experienced headsman she would decapitate ducks that

continued to run around, headless, to my great admiration. One day she

asked me to hold a reluctant victim during the operation. I indignantly

refused my co-operation, whereupon she exclaimed, with the contempt

which she often affected:

“Ho! how squeamish we are! You are ready enough to eat them!”

I am not going to conduct you through the whole house. It would take

too long, for there are two stories above the ground floor, the second

being much less ancient than the first, and above that a garret and

the tower. The tower, which you reach by a winding stair, has four

windows commanding the four quarters of the horizon. This diversified

view, too extensive for my taste, never interested me much. I suppose

that children care little for things that extend indefinitely, things

that do nothing, clouds, vague landscapes. On stormy days the wind

made an infernal hubbub around the tower; one might have fancied it

a living creature, ill-mannered and strong, heaping insults upon the

walls before throwing them down. The staircase was none too light; at

nightfall it was easy to get frightened there, and as the steps were

very narrow on the side of the supporting pillar, you were likely to

get a fine _carabosse_ if you hurried. _Carabosse_ was a word

which Aunt Deen had invented for severe falls occasioned by hurrying;

falls from which one picked oneself up lame, bruised and swollen; the

word no doubt came from the wicked fairy Carabosse.

As for the garret, not one of us would have gone there without company.

A single dormer window grudgingly admitted an insufficient light,

just enough to give to the heaps of wood, faggots and cast-off things

of all sorts that gradually accumulated there to wear out a useless

existence, the appearance of instruments of torture or fearsome

personages. Moreover, it was the battle ground of hosts of rats. From

the rooms below one might have supposed they were amusing themselves

with regularly organised obstacle races. Once in a while the cat was

carried up there--a superb, lazy Angora, fond of good eating and little

disposed to warfare. He was no doubt afraid of spoiling his fine coat,

and would _meow_ in terror until Aunt Deen, whose special care he

was, released him from military duty, at no long delay.

The drawing room, the shades of which were generally drawn and which

was only opened on ceremonial occasions or on reception days, was

forbidden ground to us; and likewise my father’s study, crowded

with books, apparatus and vials. We ventured into it only for hasty

explorations, but I used to see all sorts of forlorn creatures going

in there, who usually came out looking much happier. By way of

compensation, the dining room was given over to us. It was the scene of

many a tumult, and the chairs had more than once to be re-seated and

their backs strengthened. Into mother’s room, which was very large,

we used to rush at all times. It was so centrally situated that every

sound in the house reached it, and from it our mother quietly, and

without attracting attention, watched over her whole domain; nothing

went on in it that she did not know at once. In our eagerness for

conquest we even took possession of the music room, a small octagon

parlour, of marvellous acoustic properties, which opened upon a balcony

looking southward. The family usually spent the summer evenings in this

room, on account of the balcony.

I have still to tell of the garden. But if I describe it as it seems

to me, you will think, like the lady from Paris, that it is one of

those vast domains that surround historic châteaux. I have never yet

been able to understand, as I walk in it now, how it could once have

seemed so large to me; but as soon as I am no longer there it regains

its true importance in my memory. Perhaps it is because in those days

it was so ill kept that one easily gained the impression of being lost

in it. With the exception of the kitchen-garden, the beds of which

were straight and orderly, every part of it was at haphazard. In the

orchard, where pears and peaches that our insinuating fingers were

forever testing never succeeded in ripening before they were picked,

the grass grew thick and tall, as tall as me, upon my word! Always, in

the orchard, I used to think of the virgin forests that the Children of

Captain Grant travelled through. A rose garden, the _chef d’œuvre_

of a flower-loving ancestor, bloomed in a corner whenever it felt so

disposed, and with no aid either from pruning shears or watering pot.

Mother used to work in it in her moments of rare leisure, but it really

needed an expert in the art. The alleys were overgrown with weeds--one

had to search to find a path. On the other hand, other walks that had

never been laid out appeared in the very midst of the grass plots. And

just under mother’s windows there was a fountain; you didn’t hear it

in the daytime, you were so used to it, but in the night, when all was

still, its monotonous wail filled all the silence and made me sad, I

did not know why.

I have forgotten to mention the vines that were trained against the

farm buildings, and which interested us only when we could relieve

them of their grapes. And now at last I come to the loveliest tangle

imaginable of bushes, brambles, nettles, and all sorts of wild plants,

that was our own special domain. There we were masters and sovereign

lords. There was nothing more before you reached the surrounding wall

except a chestnut grove, which was simply an extension of our own

empire. When I say chestnut grove, I mean four or five chestnut trees.

But one alone could cast a wide shade. There was one whose roots had

overthrown a section of the wall. By this open breach, which I never

approached without a sense of discomfort, I used to imagine that

robbers might come in.

To be sure, I was armed. Father had told us the stories of the Iliad

and the Odyssey, the story of Roland and various other tales of

adventure, from the hearing of which I would sally forth all on fire,

impetuous and heroic. By turns I would be the furious Roland or the

magnanimous Hector. With my wooden sword I would give mortal combat to

Greeks or Saracens, impersonated by certain shrubs, but of which the

peaceable cabbages and unoffending beets sometimes bore the brunt as I

cut right and left among them.

My arms were provided by one of the queer labourers we used to employ

in the garden or about the vines. There were three of them, each

working by himself in his corner, each with his special qualifications

but with undefined duties, though care was taken to keep them apart.

They detested one another. Where had they been picked up? Their

selection was no doubt due to grandfather’s inveterate indifference,

for he let every one, including the property, go his own way. Or

perhaps it was due to mother’s tender heart, for she was easily capable

of having fished up such pitiful wrecks of humanity as these.

The first and earliest in my memory, the one who was my armourer into

the bargain, went by the name of Tem Bossette. Both appellations

were nicknames, I suppose, and their origin is not hard to discover.

_Tem_ must have been derived from Anthelmus, who is a saint

venerated in our province. As for the nickname Bossette, I long

supposed it to be an indelicate allusion to the curve of his back, due

to long leaning over the spade. But I have found an etymology that

better suits his character, especially his laziness, and I humbly

submit it to messieurs the philologers, who will be able, according

to their custom, to consecrate to it several folio volumes. In our

country the word _bosse_ has more than one meaning; it especially

designates the cask in which the vintage is deposited for convenient

removal from the vineyard, and I can still see the bewilderment stamped

upon the countenance of a friend to whom I was doing the honours of my

native town, on reading a poster, a simple little poster, containing

the words _For sale, an oval bosse_. “Happy region,” he commented,

“where hunchbacks can carry their gibbosities to market.” He thought

himself very clever when he added, “But do they find purchasers?” I

explained to him his mistake. Now Tem was a notable drunkard. Our

cellar knew that better than any one. _Bossette_, little wine

cask; he also could contain a grape harvest; and even, toward the close

of his life, the diminutive might have been suppressed.

He used to make swords for me out of the stakes on which the vines were

tied. In recompense I used to bring him extra bottles of wine, which I

procured from Aunt Deen, who had special charge of the cellar, urging

upon her the splendour of my armament. From time to time there arose

a complaint that the vine trellises were defective and the untrained

branches trailing on the ground, absorbing dampness. But grandfather,

good naturedly indifferent, never blamed any one, and please reckon

up how many stakes were necessary to my complete equipment. I needed

them for my panoplies, I needed them for my stables. The number of my

horses bore witness to my magnificence. With a stick between my legs

I acquired an astonishing velocity, and for each battle I must needs

change horses.

Tem Bossette would have been tall if he had stood up straight, but as

to his stoutness there was no question, and his round head greatly

resembled a pumpkin. “Big head, little wit,” Mimi Pachoux used to say

of him, pursing up his lips. Mimi Pachoux was gardener, orchard man,

lamp man, smoke doctor, locksmith, cabinet maker, mender of clocks

and china, floor-waxer, wood-sawyer, errand man and I know not what

more. Oh, yes, in the winter he used to be bearer of the dead. Did any

difficulty arise, was any help needed? “Call Mimi!” grandfather would

say. And they would call Mimi--a matter of several hours, for no one

ever knew where he was, so that when he at last arrived the work would

be done; but every one gave him the credit of it.

“That Mimi, he no sooner comes than everything goes well!”

Picture to yourself a little scrap of a man, thin, clean, prompt,

lively and invisible into the bargain. Invisible, that is what I mean,

unless you would prefer to grant him the gift of ubiquity. Every

morning he would begin a half dozen days’ works; here at six o’clock,

and perhaps earlier--oh, that Mimi! What zeal!--At five past six at

another job, and before the quarter hour at a third, loudly announcing

himself at the first, running to the second, flying to the third,

slipping in here, stealing out secretly, running back furtively,

replying here, explaining there, protesting elsewhere, appearing,

disappearing, reappearing, beginning in haste, going on in a hurry,

finishing nothing, and at evening getting paid in three places at once.

Grandfather used to say that several persons among his acquaintance

could see their double. Father would observe that it was a well known

malady, requiring nothing but drink for its production. I tried it

once, but I saw everything shifting about. It was Tem Bossette who used

to drink, but our Mimi Pachoux could see his triple.

As to the third member of our force, it was essential never to lose

sight of him for a minute, because of his fixed determination to hang

himself. He had made several attempts that had ended in failure. We

used to watch him in relays. Mariette would refuse him the slightest

bit of cord, however pressing his need of it, and he was carefully

assigned to work where the uncovered spaces were largest. In early

days he used to be called Dante, but his name was really Beatrix. His

nickname was given him by the keeper of our departmental archives, a

man of wit. His face was long and woe-begone, and he was so possessed

with the desire to hie him to the lower regions that it was continually

necessary to cut his rope. By degrees he came to be called Le Pendu,

or the Hanged, and was known by no other name. Very few were willing

to employ him because of the police force requisite to ward off his

catastrophes. Mother was his providence. The heavy jobs were intrusted

to him, but he generally gave them over to Aunt Deen, who was strong,

active, and capable of moving even the heavy casks, while he looked

on with admiration, open-mouthed and with swinging arms. His mouth

contained only two teeth, which by marvellous good luck were precisely

one above the other, so that when one met the other you might suppose

that it was one tooth uniting the two jaws.

You can understand to what a degree our garden was neglected. Should

I have loved it more, blooming with flowers and fruits, than in this

lamentable condition, in which it seemed to me immense and measureless

and mysterious?

Dear old garden, with your crazy weeds, always a little too damp and

much too shady because of branches left to their own will, where I

have played so much and invented so many games, where I have known the

glory of combat, the wonders of exploration, the pride of conquest, the

intoxication of freedom; not to mention the friendship of trees and

the pleasantness of fruit gathered in secret! Who would recognise you

to-day? Raked, reduced to order, pruned, watered, your alleys sanded,

your turf cut close around the flower urns, never flatter yourself that

you can dazzle me with your beauty!

When I walk in my garden I still go as I please, trampling down the

borders, treading underfoot the grass plots, endangering the flowers,

until the new gardener--who by himself alone only too ably replaces

Tem Bossette, Mimi Pachoux, and the Hanged--cries out in a voice of

consternation:

“Do take care, sir!”

I must excuse him. He does not know that I am walking in my garden of

long ago.

To complete this portrait of the house, there still is lacking--oh,

almost nothing! Almost nothing yet almost everything, two things

indeed, a shadow and a footstep.

The footstep was my father’s; no one ever mistook it. Rapid, regular,

resonant, it was his and no other’s. Once it was heard on the threshold

a magic change passed over everything. Tem Bossette plied his spade

with unsuspected vigour, Mimi Pachoux, till then invisible, popped up

like an imp out of a bottle. The Hanged tackled the heaviest casks,

Mariette stirred her fire, all of us children came to order, and

grandfather--I don’t know why--went out. Was there a difficulty to

solve, a trouble to bear, a danger to fear? Let some one say, “Here he

is,” and it was all over, every anxiety dissipated, every one taking

a long breath as after a victory. Aunt Deen especially had a way of

saying, “Here he is,” which would have put to flight the most daring

aggressor. It was as much as to say, “Just wait! You will see what

will happen. It won’t take long: Another minute and justice will be

done!” Once aware of his presence, we felt in ourselves an invincible

strength, a sense of security, of protection, of an armed peace,

and also a sense of being under command. Each had his own part. But

grandfather loved neither to command nor to be commanded.

And the shadow--it was my mother’s, there behind the half closed window

blind, whenever all the family was not gathered around her. She is

waiting for father, or for our return from school. Some one is absent,

and she is anxious. Or the weather is threatening--she is looking at

the sky? wondering whether to light the blessed candle.

A different sort of peace emanates from her, a peace--how shall I

describe it?--that reaches beyond the things of life, that enters into

one and calms the nerves and heart, the peace of love and prayer. That

shadow, which I used to look for every time I came in, that I look

for now, though well enough I know that it is not there, that it is

elsewhere--that shadow was the soul of the house, showing through it as

thought shows in a face.

Thus were we guarded.

Beyond the house was the town, on a lower level, as was fitting, and

still beyond a great lake and the mountains, and more distant still,

the rest of the world. But all these were simply dependencies of The

House.

II

THE DYNASTY

THOSE days were in the reign of my grandfather.

A long line of ancestors must have reigned before him, to judge by the

portraits in the drawing room. Most of these portraits were now much

blackened, so that unless there was a flood of light it was pretty

difficult to guess what the frames held. One of the most defaced of

them was the one that most commanded my admiration. Only the face and

one hand were visible--they might have been a woman’s face and hand;

but I had been told of the important part their owner had borne in the

wars, and I wondered how so young and handsome a man could have fought

so much. The lady with the rose attracted me, too. No matter on what

side of her I stood, from every side she smiled upon me and showed me

her flower. I pass over certain stem faces trussed up in high collars,

swathed in huge neckcloths, as if afflicted with colds, and come to

two portraits which occupied the place of honour on the right and left

of the chimney. One wore a blue coat laced with silver, a scarlet

waistcoat, white knee breeches and the three-cornered hat of the French

Guard. The other wore the bear-skin cap and the blue great coat with

gilt buttons and red braid on sleeves and collar of a grenadier of the

Old Guard. The soldier of the King and the soldier of the Emperor were

companion pictures. To judge by their decorations, both had well served

France. Father had proudly told me of their exploits, and explained

their grade. I could not look at them without a sort of reverential

fear. They were not handsome, having more bone than flesh, and features

all out of drawing, but I should not have dared to call them ugly.

Their eyes, severely fixed upon me, troubled me. They reproached me

for not having achieved wonderful victories like that of the grenadier

at Moscow, or for at least not having undergone heroic defeat like the

French Guard at Malplaquet. For a long time these two were the only

names of battles that I knew. And I used to blush for Tem Bossette’s

wooden sabres and the laths that I bestrode. I understood that my feats

of horsemanship in the garden were not serious, were not real. Those

two redoubtable portraits sometimes puffed me up with pride and again

overwhelmed me with their importance. One day when I was gazing upon

them with some uneasiness grandfather came by, and with his little dry

smile and his most impertinent pursing of the lips, let fall the words,

“Pooh! They are only bad paintings.”

It is dangerous to teach too much esthetics to a child. I was glad that

they were bad paintings. In a moment the soldier of the King with his

three-cornered hat and the soldier of the Emperor with his bear-skin

cap lost all their fascination. Thenceforth their story was nothing to

me. I was set free from the servitude of a compelled admiration. I at

once felt my superiority over a badly painted past, and could judge the

gallery of ancestors with insolence.

One day the subject of exiling them to the garret was agitated.

Grandfather desired to replace them with engravings.

“They are of the eighteenth century,” he observed, by way of settling

the question, making the statement simply and courteously, as the most

natural thing in the world. But Aunt Deen exclaimed indignantly and

father exerted that calm authority that broke down all resistance.

Grandfather did not insist; he never insisted. But I understood him,

since they were bad paintings.

Grandfather’s government was negligent and fitful. As well say he

had no government. When I read in my history book, or in that of

my elder brothers, the chapter consecrated to the sluggard kings I

immediately thought of grandfather. He made no point at all of his

prerogatives. And yet his name was Augustus. I knew it, because

great-aunt Bernardine, she whom we called Aunt Deen, and who was his

sister, called him Augustus, though as seldom as possible, for his name

irritated him.

“Yes,” he said one day, “they named me Augustus--why the mischief I

don’t know. That’s another trick that ancestors have. They fasten a

ridiculous label upon you for all your days.”

Though of medium height, grandfather gave the impression of being tall,

because of his fine head, which he was not in the least proud of and

carried with indifference. His well-cut nose was slightly aquiline.

His white hair, which he would never have had cut but for Aunt Deen’s

abrupt interventions, curled a little, and he was continually thrusting

his fingers through his long beard,--which waved like that of the

Emperor Charlemagne in the pictures,--lest some grains of tobacco

should be caught in it, for he smoked and took snuff. On a nearer view

the impression as of a prophet which he first gave gradually faded away

and vanished. He looked down too often, or lifted upon you vague eyes

that refused to see you. You felt that you did not exist, so far as he

was concerned, and nothing is more irritating than that. He cared for

nothing and for no one. His clothes hung upon his body by the grace

of God and Aunt Deen. He never knew whether they were well or ill

fitting, and as to changing them he would gladly have worn them till

they left him first. The more worn they were the more was he at ease

in them. I fancy that he had never known the use of suspenders, and

cravats seemed to him a wretched concession to fashion. He detested

whatever restricted his movements and would have been content to wear

all day long the green dressing gown and the black velvet Greek cap in

which he felt at ease, and which he did sometimes wear to the midday

breakfast. When my brothers and I saw him appear in this accoutrement

we would be bursting with laughter which a glance from our father

forced us to smother; but the same glance seemed to include a reproof

of the famous dressing gown.

It was with great difficulty that grandfather could be induced to be

regular at meals.

“Oh,” he would say good-naturedly, “one eats when he is hungry. Rules

for meal times are absurd.”

“Still,” father would urge, evidently not pleased, but endeavouring to

speak gently--yet even in our father’s gentleness we felt an impression

of authority--“still there must be order in a household.”

“Order, order, oho!”

You should have heard his “ohos!” uttered softly, warily, in a sort

of aside, yet striking at all established order, and accompanied by a

little dry laugh. That little laugh at once placed grandfather above

his interlocutors. Nothing have I ever met in all the forms of human

expression more disquieting, more mocking, more ironical, than that

little laugh. It at once gave you the idea that you were a beast. It

produced upon me the effect of the sharp clip of the shears when the

rose bushes are pruned; _ric_, _rac_, the flowers fall;

_ric_, _rac_, there are none left. By his little laugh,

involuntarily, no doubt, grandfather offered an insult to all the world.

His presiding at table was honorary and not effective. Not only did

he not direct the conversation, he followed it but fitfully, when it

interested him. For that matter, he assumed no responsibility about

anything. When he walked in the garden, visited the vines, Tem, Mimi

and The Hanged utterly failed to extract from him any directions. He

would simply make a vague gesture which signified “Let me alone.” The

trio did not make a point of receiving instructions, for his silence

suited them, but matters went none the better in consequence.

Besides his laugh, he had another claim to superiority, his violin. Was

he not in the drawing room among the portraits, young and curly-haired,

with a guitar in his hands?

“Never in my life have I twanged that odious instrument,” he one day

protested. “But a wandering Italian felt impelled to make a daub of me.”

“You were so beautiful,” asserted Aunt Deen. “The artist was all

enthusiasm over you.”

“Oh, the artist!”

He would spend long hours in his room playing his instrument, but

he devoted still more time to examining it lovingly, handling it,

tightening or loosening the strings, touching the bow with resin, as

mowers in the fields so often spend more time whetting their scythes

than in mowing, indefinitely making music upon them with a stone.

When grandfather played he turned every one out of his room. He played

for himself alone, and in general the same airs, for I often listened

at the door; and in after years I used to recognise passages that he

played from the Freischütz and Euryanthe, the Magic Flute and the

Marriage of Figaro. Mozart’s pure rhythms were to me like that joy in

breathing that one takes in childhood without noticing it, as limpid

water takes on the contours of a vase; but Weber gave me a vague desire

for things which I could not describe. I seemed to be in the heart of a

forest, with paths stretching away interminably into the lost distances.

The pieces that he played were not all of equal merit, though I could

not know that. Everything is good to a child in the springtime of

sentiment. To this day I can not hear the overture to Poet and Peasant

without emotion. One evening at Lucerne, by the lake side, the most

ordinary of orchestras in the most ordinary of hotels began that

overture. Around me men in dinner jackets and ladies in evening gowns

went on chatting and laughing as if they heard nothing, as if they were

deaf, yet I felt utterly alone, my heart melting and I thought I should

weep. The orchestra was not playing for the public, it was playing for

me alone, no longer the mediocre art of the Austrian composer, but the

memory of my entrance as a child into the mysterious realm of sound and

dreams, in the forest whose paths stretch away into the infinite.

At the same period the singing of one of my school comrades quite

overcame me. It was at a first communion service. I had not yet been

admitted to the Holy Table and was at leisure to listen. He sang that

melody of Gounod, _Heaven Has Visited the Earth_, and quite truly

heaven was visiting me, taking me by storm, carrying me away. My

whole enraptured being made a part of that song. The voice rose high,

higher, it seemed that it must break, that it was not strong enough to

bear up those mighty notes that filled all the chapel. It seemed like

those tall fountains, so slender that the wind carries them away, so

that they never fall to earth. That voice was indeed broken as the boy

became a youth; death carried away my comrade in his sixteenth year.

Then there was a music box that father had brought me from Milan

whither he had been summoned for a consultation. When the screw was

turned it gave forth soft, thin, somewhat quavering notes, and a little

dancer would pirouette upon the cover. Gravely and in cadence with the

music she would point her toes and take her position as if she were

accomplishing a sacred rite, a sweet yet sad little spectacle. How many

times have I been disenchanted in later years when I discovered that

my partners in the ball were frivolous, when I had expected to find in

them tender sweetness, that sacred sadness of the little dancer of my

music box.

The sluggard kings in my history book were accompanied by mayors of

the palace, who, at first mere officers charged with the interior

government, became prime ministers and even masters of their masters.

In school we heard eulogiums upon Pepin d’Heristal and Pepin the

Short, who became the father of Charlemagne. Grandfather was not

a very serious king and I quite expected father to take over the

power. But why did he treat grandfather with so much respect, instead

of dispossessing him? History had taught me to expect a different

attitude. To the farmers, labourers and servant folk grandfather was

just _Monsieur_, or _Monsieur Rambert_, and father was _Monsieur

Michel_. It would never have entered any one’s head to call upon

monsieur, to consult monsieur, to ask monsieur for an order. Monsieur

would have been the first to protest. “What do you want of me? Leave

me in peace. I have no time (I could never understand why he had no

time). Go to Monsieur Michel.” Thus he himself set the example. I had

concluded like every one else that he was good for nothing. Yet once

in a while, no one knew why, he would protest against being left out

in matters of the palace--I mean to say, of the house. But whenever

a serious matter was in question, an important order to be given,

one would hear on all sides the cry, “Where is Monsieur Michel? Call

Monsieur Michel!”

I have spoken of my father’s step. There was also his voice, sonorous,

thrilling, cheery. He never raised it, he knew that there was no need.

It opened doors, penetrated to the most distant rooms, and at the

same time poured into the heart new strength, like a good glass of red

wine--as folk declare who understand such things. When he came late to

dinner because of the crowd of patients who hung upon him, there was

no need to ring the bell,--from his ante-room he would proclaim, as it

were an edict, “Dinner!”

And the dispersed family would make haste to assemble.

“What a voice!” grandfather would protest, starting as if in amazement.

I can never read expressions like the following, which occur more or

less in all manuals of history, save in those of the present day in

which battles are juggled with as if they gained themselves--_At the

voice of their chief the soldiers rushed to the assault_.--_At

the voice of their general the troops rallied_--without hearing

my father’s voice echoing through all the house. Tem Bossette, who

was fearfully afraid of it, would hear it from the uttermost vines.

The step announced a presence, but the voice gave orders. And yet the

labourers were not under my father; all the same every one of them

felt that he was the head. Everything about him conspired to give this

impression; his height, his clear cut features, crossed by a short

stiff moustache, his piercing eyes, the gaze of which one did not like

to encounter. A sort of fascination emanated from his person. Aunt

Deen, who shared the general sentiment, would say _my nephew_,

as if bursting with pride. The grenadier in the drawing-room could

not have pursed up his lips otherwise to speak of the Emperor. I had

not escaped this fascination, and even in my days of revolt I never

ceased to pay him secret worship. But the spirit of liberty impels us

to act contrary to our surest instincts, under pretext of asserting our

liberty.

Do not think he was severe with us. He became terrible only when we

were taking the wrong direction. Only, I have never known in any one

else such an aptitude for command. In spite of his absorbing profession

he found time to look after our studies and plays, and even to add to

both by the epic stories which with consummate art he used to tell us.

My memory retains them to this day, and will retain them always. It was

easy to see that he honoured the family portraits. He made the past of

our ancestors live again for us, but I could never forget that they

were bad paintings.

When we felt ourselves observed by father we understood that in his

glance, which encompassed our weakness with his strength, there was

something besides tenderness and perhaps pride, but what was it? I know

now that he was seeking in each one of us forecasts of our future. The

antiquity of our race was not enough to satisfy his love of permanence;

he would fain follow it into the obscure travail of the future and

consolidate its unity. Even our happiness was less dear to him than the

obedience of our will to the common task. The father’s glance enfolds

within it the child’s image; the child knows that well, and it is all

he needs to know.

While we were very little he taught us reverence for what he called our

vocation. From our earliest years we felt its importance. My sister

Mélanie, who was oldest of all, my brothers Bernard and Stephen had

early decided upon theirs--for Bernard the army, for the other two the

mission field. Father never thought of opposing them, although perhaps

these choices forced him to resign hopes that he had cherished. The

laughing Louise would marry, there was no hurry about that. As for

Nicola and James, they were still too little for much thought about

their future.

“And you?” my father had asked me.

As I had no answer ready, he gave utterance to his desire.

“You will remain with us.”

Thus it was agreed that I was to remain, to take charge of the

household. The part assigned to me hardly allured me; it seemed tame

and commonplace, whereas the destinies of the others were adorned with

all the glamour of leaving home. I neither confirmed nor opposed the

plan proposed for my future, but within myself I felt a wild desire to

be set free from these arrangements, from this power that dominated me.

Secret longings to rebel even against those I loved began to germinate

within me. Later they were destined to grow, under an influence at that

time unforeseen.

I ought now to tell about The Queen. Is it not her turn? Yet in truth

I can not do it and you must not ask me to. That shadow which I always

seek as I return to the house, and which our absence was always enough

to disquiet--I can only invoke her presence there. It is indeed she,

but remote and hidden. When I try to draw near her I can find no words.

Have you observed, on fine summer days, the blue haze that floats

over the hillsides and helps to bring out the delicate contours of

the earth? If I could throw a transparent veil like that over my

mother’s face, it seems to me that I should have more courage to tell

of her sweetness, to describe the pureness of those eyes which could

not believe in evil. What unknown strength was concealed beneath that

sweetness? Grandfather, who could ward off any influence merely by

his irritating little laugh, and who never laid aside this weapon of

defence even with his son, invariably abandoned it before my mother.

And my father, whose authority seemed to be absolute and infallible,

would turn to her as if he recognised in her some mysterious power.

I know now what that power was: it was God dwelling in her, whether

she had been to meet him at early mass, before any one else was up and

stirring, or whether she had offered to him her daily labours in the

house....

My brothers and sisters and I were the people. In every kingdom there

must be a people. It is true that in most houses now-a-days one wonders

what has become of the people. The king and queen, dejected as two

weeping willows, are wearily watching one another grow old. They have

no one to govern and they will not lay aside their crown. At our house

the people were numerous and noisy. If you can count, you already know

that there were seven of us, from Mélanie who was seven years older

than I, to James, who was six years younger.

Before being led into action, the whole battalion used to undergo a

preliminary inspection from Aunt Deen, who was in charge of the review

of details.

Aunt Deen was endowed with an activity which years could not abate,

and of which all the servants except Mariette shamelessly took

advantage. Always coming and going, from cellar to garret, always on

the stairs--for she invariably forgot half the things she intended to

do, or suddenly interrupted whatever she might be doing--beginning to

sweep, leaving off to hunt dust under a piece of furniture, warring

against spider’s webs with a wolf’s head--a sort of brush fastened to

the end of a long pole,--or rushing to the aid of one of us who had

cried out, she had rocked, washed, dressed, cuddled, watched over,

amused, kept busy, cared for and caressed all seven of us, and even an

eighth, who had died before I could remember.

To this imposing number must also be added grandfather, whom she

shielded from all care. He was not exacting. Provided he could have at

hand whatever he might desire he asked no favours of any one. To be

sure, the disorder of his room must always be respected; he watched

over it jealously, insisting that no one could ever find things that

had been put away. He took the indulgence of his whims as a matter

of course, paying no attention except when he was irritated by an

exaggerated degree of consideration.

As for our education and training, our moral guidance, Aunt Deen,

notwithstanding her advantage in the matter of age, placed herself

at the service of our mother, for whom she entertained unlimited

admiration and affection. Even in old age she would accept the

functions of a subaltern only. When she had said “Valentine wishes

this; Valentine says that” (Valentine was our mother), there was no

room for discussion. She herself obeyed to the very letter, without

even seeking to enter into the spirit. Not one of her thoughts was for

herself; she distributed them all, without exception, among the others.

She could see no good in scolding, and hung her head when any of us was

reprimanded, as if in protest against the harshness of authority. She

not only never carried tales about us, she found unimagined excuses

for our worst faults, such wonderful excuses as sometimes to ward off

punishment merely by the surprise which they awakened.

“That child has taken some pears.”

“The tree needed relief, it was too heavily loaded.”

“That child’s table manners aren’t nice. Did you see him put his hands

into his saucer of spinach?”

“He does so delight in green things!”

In our studies she took no interest. But she had that soul-culture

which bestows its delicate flower upon the mind. One knew quite enough

if one was well behaved and a good Catholic. Indeed it was her opinion

that our brains were too early crowded with a lot of useless knowledge.

She could find no manner of use for the history of pagans, and as for

arithmetic, she had never known how to add. But on the other hand our

health, our cleanliness, our happiness, were entirely her affair. She

sang to put us to sleep, she sang to amuse us, she sang to encourage

us to take our first steps. All my memories reverberate with the

tintinnabulation of her songs. There was one cradle song in which we

became by turns general, cardinal and emperor, and the refrain of which

was designed to encourage us to wait with patience for the brilliant

future.

“_Meanwhile wait, and on my lap_.

_Lovely cherub, take your nap_.”

The lovely cherubim, however, were seldom in haste to take their naps.

There was also the “Charming Nest” which “naughty little sharp-eyed

imps” tried to destroy, though it ought to be respected, for

“_It was the hope of Spring time_

_And all a mother’s love_.”

Sometimes it would be the prisoner Silvio Pellico who in heart-rending

strains longed for his Italian breezes. One of my earliest plays was

the escape of Silvio Pellico, though I had no idea who he was. My

favourite songs were perhaps “The Pool” and “Venice.” I call them thus

because I knew no other titles for them. “The Pool” told of a fearful

tragedy from drowning:

_Little children, have a care_

_When you run across and follow._

_There’s a deep pool hidden there_

_By the dark trees in the hollow._

_Listen to what happened there_,

_When a child with golden hair_,

_Slipped away from his mamma-a-a._

The fair child was running after a dragon-fly, and “the maiden with

golden wings” enticed him into the cold water. That would teach him

not to steal away from the maternal arms! As for “Venice,” I remember

likewise the first lines, with all their doggerel:

_If God should favor-ize_

_My noble enterprise_,

_I’ll hie me to Ven-ize_

_And spend my days in joy._

Whether from the magic of the name of an unknown city, or the

melancholy air of the ritornello, I could in those days imagine no

more enchanting journey than to go to that Venice whose gondolas I had

been shown in a stereoscope. In later years, dreading disappointment,

I hesitated long before carrying out the plan born of that far-away

music--the music that we still hear within ourselves long after

childhood’s days are past. Can it be that this is one of the surest

guardians of the home?--that a simple lullaby, sung to quiet us, is

the first spark to kindle our imaginations? And when, long after, I

at last saw the city of flowing streets and rosy palaces, I entered

it with respect, recalling to mind that my visit represented a “noble

enterprise”; as if all its wondrous charm had been enfolded in Aunt

Deen’s cradle-song.

I imagine that some of her innumerable songs were of her own invention.

Or at least, having forgotten their precise words, I suppose that she

recomposed them after her own fashion. There was especially a certain

“Father Gregory,” half recited, half sung, which is hardly likely to

be found in any collection. A charming old lady to whom I repeated it

one day assured me that Father Gregory was known also in Berry, in the

neighbourhood of Châtre, under the name of Father Christopher. The

song, a sort of rhythmical prose, was declaimed in a singsong, suddenly

bursting into a tune in the final syllables. A whole little comedy of

vanity is summed up in a few phrases. You may judge for yourself from

the version of it that I tell from memory.

_Father Gregory came out of his house this morning_. Perfectly

natural thus far; Father Gregory is going to take a walk, as is

his right; but wait till you hear a detail that characterises this

promenade: _in his hat a fine bouquet of poppies_. You must swell

out your voice with the poppies. This field flower becomes a symbol of

pomp and ostentation. Aha! Father Gregory is no longer a worthy fellow

who goes out to inhale the breezes of the country-side; he is an old

beau who puts on airs; he parades, he struts, he capers, he expects

to be gazed at and admired. But you will be punished, Father Gregory;

ill-luck awaits you!

_On the way his dog began to fight with mine_. This bit of news

is simply announced. It seems at first to be of slight importance. A

bad thing nevertheless,--a dog fight in a little town. What! you don’t

know that? You have never lived in the country? A dog fight is a matter

of special gravity. The masters intervene, they take sides, and the

defeated one swears that the matter shall not end here. Whole families

have been embroiled through a dog fight. What was the origin of the

enmity between the Montagus and the Capulets? Perhaps a dog fight. And

just this way our Father Gregory undertakes to interfere; his dog is

getting the worst of it, rolled in the dust as a dumpling in flour.

_Father Gregory, trying to part them, tumbles, nose first, in the

filth_. He rushes to the rescue with uplifted cane, his foot slips,

and behold him on the ground in a lamentable posture, especially his

nose, having made a most unlucky choice of a spot upon which to fall.

At this point it is proper to assume a melancholy tone, the apostrophe

which follows reaching a note of heart-rending grief. _Poor Father

Gregory_! A pause. He is to be pitied, for his misfortune is great.

But suddenly, pity becomes sarcasm, pointing to his pride. _See his

bunch of poppies, far from his hat_! The emblems of his vanity are

soiled. He himself may go home, and wash and brush himself, but he

can never use the poppies again, and but for them nothing would have

happened to him.

I attribute Father Gregory to Aunt Deen because of the fertility of

her imagination, which daily provided her with new stories for our

delectation. Grown persons are not often on a level with children:

they take too low a place. Aunt Deen had an instinct for what was

suited to us. Her stories kept us breathless. When I try to rescue them

from the past, for her credit, they fly before me, smiling. “No, no,”

they say--for I get close to them, only between us is a great chasm,

deep, though not wide, which is the common grave of all my vanished

years--“what is the use? You can never do anything with us. See: we

have taken the colour of that time: how are you to describe that?”

When grandfather came upon us sitting in a circle around our

story-teller, he would shake his head disapprovingly.

“_Fiddle-faddles_”, he would murmur; “_fiddle-faddles_. One

owes it to children to tell them the truth.”

We would ask Aunt Deen what _fiddle-faddles_ were, and she would

answer, by way of getting her revenge, “It’s what one does when one

plays the violin.”

Between her songs and grandfather’s violin there was sometimes a

deafening discord.

Aunt Deen possessed another marvellous faculty--that of inventing

words. I have already told you of _carabosser_, but she invented

them by the hundred, so well adapted to their purpose that we

understood them at once. I can not transcribe them--they lose their

value when written down. Indeed I don’t know how to spell them; spoken

language is not the same as written language, and her picturesque

words had all the savour and crispness of popular speech. Aunt Deen

also used rare words--where she found them is a mystery for she seldom

read--strange and sonorous words and phrases that seemed her special

property, and which since then, to my surprise and amusement, I have

discovered in the dictionary, where I should never have thought of

looking for them. Thus, to call down my pride, she one day called me

a hospodar, and another day, “the purveyor in chief of mustard to the

Pope.” I did not know that the hospodars were the tyrants of Wallachia,

and that to believe oneself purveyor of mustard to the Pope meant to

have a high opinion of oneself. These strange titles with which she

invested me used to make me think of some big man, all in red, issuing

commands in a loud voice, and I did not enjoy being likened to him.

Dear great-aunt Deen, let me apostrophise you after the manner of

poor Father Gregory! If my early childhood rings musically in my

memory, as if it were mounted upon one of those mules all bedight with

sleigh-bells, that can not move without giving forth a multitudinous

jingle from far away as if to announce the approach of a great train, I

owe it to your stories and your songs. As soon as thought summons it,

and that is daily, here it comes, loudly ringing its joy-bells, because

of which I shall never have reason to complain of fate. Before I see

it, I hear it--that merry procession of memory; and when, at some turn

of the road that leads from the past to the present, it suddenly comes

upon me, it bears in its arms all the flowers of the springtide. You

well deserve the bouquet of them that I pick for you, even a bouquet of

poppies, as a guerdon for all the stories that you added to your care

and prayers. For you were always praying audibly, on the stairs or in

church or even under the banner of the wolf’s head itself. Silence was

painful to you. That is why, dear Aunt Deen, I break it this evening

and talk to you.

Aunt Deen kept strenuous watch outside of the house. To get inside you

had, like the wolf in Hans Christian Andersen, to show a white paw like

a sheep. She designated by the name of _they_ the invisible foes

that were supposed to be investing it. For a long time these mysterious

_they_ terrified us. We used to look around whenever she spoke of

them. By dint of never meeting them we at last came to laugh at them,

little thinking that this laugh disarmed us, and that thus disarmed we

should surely meet them later in flesh and blood. Her loyalty was never

caught napping. The moment the family was in question she would insist

upon a meed of praise being at once awarded it, failing which she

promptly assumed the defensive, ready for battle. A certain person who

ventured to speak of it in colourless terms found himself scanned from

head to foot, and to mask his sense of defeat took refuge in sarcasm:

“I forgot,” said he, “that your house was the Ark of the Covenant.”

“And yours Noah’s Ark,” she retorted with a _tic_ for his

_tac_, knowing that her interlocutor harboured all sorts of shady

folk.

In those days the bread was made in the kitchen in a kneading trough

nearly a hundred years old, before being carried for baking to the town

oven. Aunt Deen, who loved all sorts of cookery, used to oversee the

operation, and even at times take a hand in it herself. One day when I

was looking on, at the moment when the servant was about to mingle the

flour, water and leaven, my aunt suddenly gave her a vigorous shake.

“What are you thinking of, girl?”

“Mixing the bread, miss.”

“You are forgetting the sign of the cross.”

For in serious houses no one omitted the sign of the cross over white

flour that was on the point of being made into bread. At table, before

cutting the loaf, father never failed to trace upon it a cross, with

two strokes of the knife. When it fell to grandfather to cut the bread

I was quick to notice that he did nothing of the kind.

That was one of my first surprises. From my earliest days I understood

the importance of differences of opinion in matters religious.

Grandfather played his violin whenever he pleased. But he did not like

to be disturbed. We learned this by experience. My sister Mélanie and

my brother Stephen, who had retained from their first communion an

ardent and somewhat aggressive piety, had built up a little chapel in

a cupboard in that octagon parlour which we used to call the music

room because in former days concerts used to be given there, and an

old grand piano still stood there. It had been agreed among us that

when Mélanie and Stephen were grown up they were to evangelise the

savages, just as Bernard was to be an officer and win back Alsace and

Lorraine, and Louise, the second sister, always generous, was to marry

a champagne grower so that we might always drink as much as we chose of

that sparkling golden wine to which we had never put our lips except on

occasions of family festival. Thus the future was beautifully arranged

for, except my own personal career which remained uncertain. Mélanie

had been named for the little shepherdess of Dauphiny who at that time

was much in people’s minds; the mystery of La Salette was talked of

in guarded words. Sometimes I would ask her if she was not afraid of

being eaten by cannibals, the existence of which had been revealed

to me by my illustrated geography. Far from cooling her zeal, this

frightful prospect simply warmed it. Stephen aspired no less ardently

to martyrdom, notwithstanding that an unlucky adventure had happened

to him in school: his comrades, admiring his devotion, had counted

upon his performing a miracle on the day of his first communion, and

the miracle not coming off, he was consequently held in some slight

contempt.

I can never remember what sort of vespers or complines we used to say

before the cupboard. The ceremonies consisted of hymns vociferated in

chorus. Notwithstanding my tender years I was invited to share in these

clerical manifestations. On that occasion we used to hold forth with

all the energy of neophytes. Mélanie in particular would pitch her

voice in its highest key, her piety being proportionate to the noise

she made. Unluckily the music room was near grandfather’s chamber.

All of a sudden, as we were at the utmost height of fervour, the door

opened and grandfather appeared. He never used to pay much attention

to us, though when we came within his visual angle he would look

affably upon us. But this time he appeared to be greatly irritated.

His dressing-gown flowing behind him, his Greek cap awry, his beard

all disorder, gave him a fearsome aspect, greatly in contrast with his

usual manner. He exclaimed harshly, “It’s impossible to have a moment’s

peace in this house. Shut that cupboard, quick!”

We had disturbed his siesta, and his usually even temper was the worse

for it. We hastily closed the cupboard. And we knew in that moment

all the horror of arbitrary decrees and special laws. The devotion of

Mélanie and Stephen was but increased, as always happens in time of

persecution, but mine, less lively, or of younger growth, was cooled, I

greatly fear.

Not long after it experienced another blow. In our town the Fête-Dieu

was celebrated with incomparable pomp and display. People came from

afar to take part in it. Where shall we have again such nobly imposing

and magnificent spectacles? They have been replaced by gymnastic

contests, or processions of mutual aid societies, the bad taste of

which is heart-breaking. I pity the children of to-day who have never

had opportunity to feel, amid popular acclamations and universal

emotion, the imminent presence of God.

The town was divided in rivalry of its wayside altars; each quarter

felt its reputation at stake. They were composed of moss and flowers,

lilies, hortensias, geraniums and violets arranged in the form of a

cross, or ingeniously combined in pious designs of a more complicated

nature. All the gardens and groves were ruthlessly despoiled on their

account. The finest one was always promoted to the terrace overshadowed

by ancient trees that overlooked the lake.

When the morning came every window was watching the daybreak, imploring

heaven for favourable weather. The streets were bordered with pines and

larches which the peasants, on the previous evening or the one before

that, had brought from the mountain in their ox-carts. Wreaths hung

upon ribbons were thrown across the street like light cables above a

stream, so that one walked about under hundreds of improvised triumphal

arches. Here and there, the better to adorn the house fronts, some

one had set out a table covered with a white cloth bearing pictures,

vases, statuettes with a lamp, and had made ready baskets of roses for

the refreshment of the angel battalion. In the poorest alleys the good

wives set forth before their houses all their precious possessions,

even to daguerreotypes of relatives, or their most artistically

decorated caps, the better to honour the passing of the Holy Sacrament.

Thus the entire town adorned itself, like a bride for her marriage.

Every one gathered before the church; the confraternities in costume

with their banners, the brass band, their well polished instruments

shining in the sunlight, the school children, girls and boys, the

very smallest of them waving banners and all the population massed

behind these official groups, all drawn up in good order. Then, upon

the pavement before the church slowly advanced the sacred procession,

while all the bells rang together; angels with wings of silver paper

strewing the way with flower-petals drawn from little baskets suspended

from their necks, clerks and sacristans in red cassocks, swinging

censers whence arose blue smoke and a spicy odour, surpliced priests,

canons in ermine rochets, and finally, upon a dais the colour of pure

gold, or of ripe wheat, its four corners decorated with tufts of white

plumes, escorted by four black-coated notables holding its cords, came

Monsignor arrayed in a golden chasuble and bearing upon his breast the

great golden monstrance.

It was a solemn moment, and yet there was one even more impressive.

After having traversed the entire town, the procession would draw up

for the last benediction upon the open place that forms a terrace above

the lake, upheld by the walls of an ancient fortress. It would be

near noon. The rays of the sun, falling directly upon the lake, were

mirrored back, brightening all the colours, and flashing out in stars

from every fleck of gold. Around the flower-decked altar the various

bands were grouped, their standards all unfurled. Around these stood

the soldiers in a large circle, the troops taking part for the last

time in a religious ceremonial. They closed up, and at the command

_genou terre_! they fell upon one knee, the officers waved their

swords, and the clarions sounded loudly over all the fields. Many an

old woman wept with joy as she prostrated herself, needing to see

nothing more to know that God was there. Yet there was more; a priest,

mounting upon a stool, drew the monstrance from its flower-decked niche

and handed it to Monsignor, and the august officiant, lifting it high

in air, traced above the great congregation the sign of the cross.

The tremor with which I was at that moment shaken thrilled through

the entire crowd, a great wave of emotion, such as reveals to a whole

people that they are one in faith.

When I went home in my school-boy uniform I was still all a-thrill.

Mother was waiting for me. She perceived what I had just been

experiencing, and I saw tears rush to her eyes as she proudly kissed

me. She, sacrificing herself, had not witnessed the ceremony. Some

one must take care of the house and prepare for the guests who always

came to us on that day. But she had come out and knelt before the

door, hidden by the pines, when the procession went by. I had seen her

through the branches. For a short moment she had united Mary’s part

with that of Martha.

Father presently came home, warm and tired. He had had the honour of

being chosen to hold one of the cords of the dais, and though he was

bald, he had remained bareheaded, at the risk of a sunstroke.

“Dear wife!” he said simply, pressing mother to his heart. He had never

given expression to his love for her before me, and that is why I

remember this. He too was stirred with high enthusiasm.

Then came grandfather, smiling, spruce, his frock coat buttoned awry

and his black hat a little on one side, but except for these minor

matters dressed with almost irreproachable care.

“Well!” mother asked him in gentle triumph, “were you there this time?”

It appeared that in former years he had gone out for a walk and had

not returned before evening. I had already perceived, from a thousand

slight indications, that there was not absolute agreement in religious

matters in our house and that the subject was usually avoided.

Grandfather could not repress the little sardonic laugh which he seldom

bestowed upon my mother:

“Superb, superb!” he said. “One might have thought oneself at the

festival of the sun. The pagans could not have done it better.”

Mother’s face crimsoned. She turned and sent me away on some pretext of

an errand. As I was going I heard my father’s clear voice:

“I beg you not to jest upon this subject before the children.”

And the sarcastic voice replying:

“But I am not jesting.”

In the street the nearest extemporised altar was already lying on

the ground, like the useless shell of a firework. Everything had

disappeared but the scaffoldings, crosses of flowers, moss. Candelabra

had been hastily put under cover because of the threatening rain, for

clouds had suddenly overspread the sky, and also because every one had

gone home to dinner. My enthusiasm had fallen too, beneath a word of

doubt.

At the Feast of the Epiphany every one had to imitate the acts of the

king who had been designated by the bean. If he drank every one cried,

“The king drinks,” and each one seized his glass. If the king began to

laugh every one burst into laughter. Ought not a king to know when one

should laugh and when he should keep his face straight?

III

THE ENEMIES

THERE was one Saturday evening, I remember....

I can not fix the precise date, but I know it must have been a Saturday

because on coming home from school I met at the door Oui-oui, shaking

his head, and Zeez Million counting the amount of her interest, on her

open palm.

Saturday was the day for the poor. We usually watched the procession

under shelter of a closed window, for Aunt Deen, who was a stickler for

class distinctions, prudently kept us shielded from their verminous

contact. Zeez, or Louise, was a crazy woman to whom was regularly given

every week the modest subsidy of fifty centimes, which she called her

interest. Insanity did not affect her exactions: a new servant, not

sufficiently instructed having insulted her by doling out two sous, had

received back the inadequate money in her face. Her reason had been

affected by the expectation of a large prize in the lottery. She now

spoke only of millions and the name had stuck by her.

As for Yes-yes, he owed the soubriquet to his nodding head, the

weight of which he could ill sustain, and which incessantly wagged

up and down like those articulated animals exhibited at bazars, their

motions extolled by artful merchants by way of increasing their price.

My sister Mélanie and I had incurred his wrath, under memorable

circumstances. Mélanie having read in the gospels that a glass of water

given to the poor would be paid back a hundred fold, conceived the idea

of offering one to Oui-oui. In the goodness of her heart, she was even

willing to let me participate in her beneficence. I held the caraffe,

ready to offer a second draught. But he considered our gift an insult.

Grandfather, when he heard of our ill-starred effort, completed our

discomfiture:

“Offering water to that drunkard! He would rather never wash again than

touch water.”

And in our presence he tendered to Oui-oui a glass of red wine, which

was swallowed at a draught, followed by a second and a third till the

entire bottle was gone. If grandfather was to receive back his offering

a hundred fold, his thirst would be copiously quenched in the celestial

kingdom.

Whenever grandfather, going out for his daily walk, met beggars at the

door, he would desire that bread and not money should be given them.

“Money is immoral,” he would insist. “Let us share our bread with these

good folk.”

I could not understand how money could be immoral. And we always found

at the foot of the stone columns, broken into bits, all the bread that

had been given, the poor having received it with contempt.

It must have been a Saturday in June. It was still broad day, though it

was past seven o’clock when I came back to the house, and on the edge

of the garden there was still a haycock which Tem Bossette must have

mown, taking plenty of time. I just muttered, “How d’ye do, Yes-yes;

how d’ye do, Zeez,” without so much as waiting for their reply; did

not close the door which they had left open, and slipped into the

passage that led to the kitchen, for I had lingered on the way home

from school to play with some schoolmates in a narrow street that we

called “behind the walls,” because it bordered a row of houses shut in

like fortresses. I had no quarrel with this unsocial way of shutting

every one out, though I preferred such fences or hedges as permit one

to satisfy his curiosity, and do not so abruptly shut off the view; but

grandfather, when he passed that way, never concealed his disgust. “The

earth is for everybody, and they mew her up as if they feared she would

run away!”

He spoke of it as of a living person. Except for our house I should

have been quite willing to do away with all enclosures. Did not the

earth belong to me?

“Behind the walls” we used to have great games of marbles in the very

middle of the street, certain of not being disturbed. If a chance cart

should enter the street, the driver, held up by our protests, would

wait patiently until we had finished our game, sometimes he would even

interest himself in the process; after which he would go on his way.

Nobody was in a hurry in those days. At the present time that road

is the Boulevard of the Constitution, and one has to look out for

automobiles. I have no idea where children go to play now-a-days.

My haste was not due to fear of being scolded for being late. I

was sure that no one had so much as thought of me. But merely by

approaching the gate I had felt the strange uneasiness which at that

time seemed to pervade the house like some formal guest whose presence

makes every one feel ill at ease. Domestic tragedies make their

approach felt long in advance by signs somewhat like those of a coming

storm: a breathless atmosphere, intermittent showers of tears, the

distant murmur of recriminations and laments. There was electricity

in the air. My mother, who never failed to light her blessed candle

as soon as thunder began to growl, was praying more often than ever,

and I could see that she was anxious, for her pure eyes could never

hide anything. Aunt Deen tore up and down stairs with feverish, almost

war-like, ardour, inflamed with a rage that gave her an invincible

strength, amazing The Hanged, and making those spiders that thought

themselves just beyond reach suffer the ruthlessly avenging wolf’s

head. She was continually uttering threats against invisible enemies.

Ah! the wretches! They would soon know with whom they had to deal!

“They” were certainly getting vigorous castigation in advance. Even

our father, generally so self-controlled, appeared absorbed. At table

he would sometimes throw back his head as if to drive away troublesome

thoughts. And more than once I had perceived him conversing in a low

voice with our mother, giving her documents on blue paper to read, the

words of which I did not understand. Every one was on the alert for

something to happen, perhaps a bulletin of victory or of disaster, such

as comes to a country where the armies are on the frontier.

Alone among these secret parleyings, these evident anxieties,

grandfather maintained the most complete indifference. Evidently the

approaching event was no affair of his. He played the violin, smoked

his pipe, consulted his barometer, inspected the sky, predicted the

weather, as if nothing could be more important, and he went regularly

for his walk. Nothing was changing, nothing could change for him except

the clouds across the sun. As for things of earth, they were utterly

without importance.

Once father attempted to ask his opinion, or present to him the peril

of a situation which I could not in the least understand. His words

were supplicating, moving, pathetic, yet full of a respect which in no

degree lessened their emphasis. Eying on the floor with my school book

I lost nothing of the conversation, instead of studying my lesson.

But I could catch only detached words which by degrees filled me with

terror: “careless administration,” “responsibility,” “mortgage,”

“sentence,” “total ruin,” “auction,” and at last the terrifying

conclusion, like the blow of a cane on my head.

“Then we must leave the house?”

Leave the house! I can still see grandfather lifting his arm wearily,

as if to drive away a fly, letting it fall again as he replied with a

great gentleness which at first deceived me as to his thought:

“Oh, as far as I am concerned, it’s all one whether we live in this

house or in another”; adding with his everlasting little laugh:

“Ha, ha! when one hires a house one can ask for repairs. In one’s own

house one never gets any.”

At that moment father perceived me. His eyes were so dreadful that

I was terrified and broke out into gooseflesh; but he simply said,

without raising his voice:

“Run away, child. This is no place for you.”

I ran away, stupefied with a gentleness that was in such contrast with

his face. Now I recognise it as a witness to his tremendous mastery

of himself. I rushed out into the garden, carrying, like a bomb under

my arm, the formidable utterance, _Whether we live in this house

or another_. The idea had never occurred to me, could never have

come to me, that we could live in another house. I felt as if I had

been witnessing a sacrilege, but at the same time the sacrilege found

harbour in my brain because it had had no immediate sanction, had been

accompanied by no solemnity, was like any indifferent act, like an act

of no consequence at all. Was it possible that such words could have

been uttered as a mere aside, negligently, even smilingly!

For the first time my notions of life were turned topsy-turvey. I

confided my bewilderment to Tem Bossette, who was ruminating, leaning

upon the handle of his spade. He lent me a complaisant ear, but took

the opportunity to impart to me a bit of his personal history:

“I had a son in the hospital. When I saw that he was going to die, I

rolled him up in a quilt and went away with my bundle. He died at home.”

I could not grasp the immediate applicability of his story, which

he had told proudly, as if recalling an act of heroism. He shortly

condescended to explain:

“It’s your lawsuit that is worrying them.”

Our lawsuit? We had a lawsuit? I had no idea what it was, and though I

felt shame for my ignorance I asked the vinedresser:

“What is a lawsuit?”

He scratched his nose, no doubt in search of a definition.

“It’s something about justice. One loses, one wins, just as it happens.

But when one loses it’s a great bother. On account of the sheriffs, who

walk into your house as into a mill.”

The sheriffs were to walk into our house as into a mill! In an instant

I pictured them under the guise of gigantic insects, enormous mole

crickets swarming into the garden through the breach made by the

chestnut tree, advancing in serried ranks to invest the house. I

was particularly afraid of mole-crickets, which have a long clammy

body and two antennae on the head, and enjoy a detestable reputation

in agricultural circles: all sorts of misdeeds are attributed to

them--they ravage whole garden beds. I had actually seen some crawling

through the breach, and in the face of their invasion not all the arms

manufactured by Tem Bossette sufficed to reassure me. I had turned

tail, so to speak, upon my riding pole.

“It’s all Monsieur’s fault,” concluded the labourer, upon whose heart

the affair hung heavy. “But what will you have? He doesn’t care for

anything, and when one doesn’t care for anything nothing goes right.

It’s lucky there’s Master Michael.”

Then, on one side there were the mole-crickets and on the other there

was my father. A fearsome battle was to take place of which the house

was the stake. And during the battle grandfather, indifferent, would be

looking in the air, according to his custom, to see which way the wind

blew. Up to that time I had supposed that, like the sluggard kings,

he had nothing to do, but behold, he could bring about catastrophes!

With one word he could close chapels, belittle ancestral portraits,

and above all, it was quite the same to him to live in one house as

in another! Why not in a _roulotte_, one of those waggon houses

overflowing with bronzed gipsies, such as I had seen passing the gate,

to the great terror of Aunt Deen, who used to call us in hastily, and

give orders to bolt all the doors and look after the vegetables and

fruits.

I was going in, greatly depressed by this conversation when I ran

against Aunt Deen herself, whose assistance had been invoked by The

Hanged for some arduous task requiring nerve and muscle.

“The lawsuit,” I cried, by way of relieving my mind. She stopped short.

“Who has been talking to you?”

“Tem Rossette.”

“That fellow must be sent away. Beatrix and Pachoux will have to do by

themselves.”

She did not count herself. She simply called Beatrix by his right name.

Did she perceive from my tone or my face the inward tragedy through

which I was passing? She shook me, laughing:

“Child, when your father is here, there is never anything to be afraid

of--do you hear?”

And I was at once consoled.

She was already hastening after the labourer with a ball of red string

in her hand which Mariette had doubtless refused to intrust to him. As

she went she tossed her head proudly, like a horse that snuffs the

wind and I heard her muttering to herself.

“Well, I declare, if that isn’t the last drop!”

By what signs, that Saturday evening, did I discern that the battle

had been fought, that we were only waiting to learn the result? In

the kitchen there was no Mariette over the stove. She was debating,

vehemently, with Philomena, the waitress, who was carrying the soup

tureen all awry, at great risk of spilling its contents, and with my

old friend Tem, redder even than usual, who was doing his best to

reassure the household by a word of prophecy.

“No, no, things will go well. To begin with, for my part, I will not

leave the garden.”

As soon as they saw me there was silence, and Mariette quickly

recovered her usual coolness and began to scold me.

“You are late, Master Francis. The second bell has rung. You will be

scolded.” And to Philomena:

“Why are you standing there like a stock?”

Thus were we dispersed. I was counting upon meeting Aunt Deen in the

vestibule before the dining-room; she was always the last to come to

table because on the way she would find thirty-six different things

to be begun or finished, and dash upstairs and down an indefinite

number of times. My tactics succeeded. To forestall inquiry I took the

offensive:

“What about the lawsuit?”

“Hush; we are waiting to hear.”

“To hear what?”

“It is being decided to-day in the Court.”

She uttered the words “The Court” with instructive stateliness, that

reminded me of the Court of the Emperor Charlemagne, in my history

book. A grand personage, a king with a golden crown on his head and

wearing a golden chasuble like Monsignor the bishop in the procession,

was concerning himself with our matter. It was awe-inspiring but

flattering.

Under Aunt Deen’s shadow I slipped into my seat, endeavouring to put

on a natural air. In the spirit of good fellowship my brothers and

sisters refrained from calling attention to my arrival, so that I could

swallow my soup without being noticed. Usually our mother came into the

dining-room before us, to serve the soup. Philomena’s loquacity had

interfered with this preliminary operation and I reaped the benefit of

it. In fact, my parents paid not the slightest attention to me, from

which I could infer that something was going on. I hastily gulped down

my food, and my plate emptied, I cast a comprehensive glance around the

table.

In the seat of honour, grandfather, the reigning king, was leaning

over the table in order to drop no soup upon his beard, the precaution

evidently quite absorbing him. I should learn nothing from him; nor

anything more from my father, who commanded the table from one of

the corners, and whose glance made me drop my eyes, for I could see

distinctly that he was aware of my fault. After having inquired of

one another as to his occupations during the day, he tried to make

the conversation general. But he was almost the only one who spoke.

His calm, his cheerfulness, soon completely restored the confidence

which two or three spoonfuls of warm soup had already begun to awaken

in me. Aunt Deen, who could not remain inactive during the intervals

of the service, was busying herself in advance by mixing the salad,

which she considered her special function, although there had often

been some talk of withdrawing it from her because of her prodigality in

the matter of vinegar. She tossed the green leaves and muttered vague

exorcisms against bad luck. My sister Louise was teasing the little

priest, the absent-minded Stephen, whom one might serve indefinitely

with the same dish. But Bernard and Mélanie, the two eldest, often

turned their eyes in one direction, and mine followed them: they were

looking at our mother and our mother was looking at our father, upon

whom in this hour all our safety seemed to depend.

The lamp had been lighted but it was not yet dark out of doors. Only

the trees seemed to draw nearer, their branches to grow thicker and to

cast a deeper shadow. Through the open windows a fresh breeze came from

the garden, bringing on its wings pellmell, the odour of flowers, and

a cloud of night-moths, which, attracted by the light, wheeled about

under the lamp shade. I watched their flight, at times more deeply

interested in them than in the disturbed expression of the faces around

the table.

The meal was drawing to a close; the dessert was already being served.

I had begun to think that nothing was going to happen. Suddenly

Mariette rushed into the dining-room, a telegram in her hand. She had

not waited to put it on a tray, she had not given it to the maid who

served at table, but brought it in person just as she had received it

from the postman. She, too, scented important news in the air, and

would learn what it was without delay.

“It is for Monsieur Rambert,” she said.

She passed by grandfather’s place, and crossed the entire length of

the room, as if she was but doing her duty in handing the blue paper

to father, who was on the side toward the windows. Father took it from

her, but handed it at once to the actual addressee.

“Do you want it?” he asked.

“Oh, no thank you,” said grandfather with his little laugh. “Open it

yourself.”

Nevertheless I caught him casting a quick, alert glance upon the

telegram. His little laugh at once recalled to my mind a rattle which

had been taken away from me because it disturbed everybody. That little

laugh was the last sound. An almost solemn silence ensued, so complete

that I could hear the tearing of the envelope. How could father open

it with so little impatience? I imagined myself opening it in his

place, err--err ... it was done. All eyes converged upon the deliberate

motions of his two hands--all except those of grandfather, who quite as

peacefully removed the crust from a bit of cheese, and seemed to take

pleasure in the trifling task. Father felt our anxiety and doubtless

wished to relieve it at all hazards; instead of reading he raised his

eyes to us.

“Go on eating,” he said. “It does not concern you.”

Then turning to the cook who had remained behind his chair, leaning

over like an interrogation point:

“Thank you, Mariette, you may go.”

She went, vexed, knowing nothing, but sent in Philomena who learned no

more than she.

Finally my father read. Deliberate as he had been in the preliminaries

he was quick enough in reading. He must have taken in the whole at

a glance. He was already putting the telegram in his pocket without

a word, without the movement of a muscle, when he looked around the

table, and under his gaze we bent our eyes upon our plates.

“Come, come, children!” he exclaimed almost gaily. “It is still light.

Make haste to finish your dessert and run play in the garden.”

He spoke in his usual tone, at once cheery and commanding. It was so

simple that for a moment our mother quite brightened up. I saw that as

I raised my head, but it was only for a moment, like the afterglow

upon the mountain tops after sunset. Then the shadow again swept over

her face, and I even saw in her eyes two water drops that glistened and

disappeared without falling. She had understood, and after her and by

her I understood, too. The mysterious Court had decided against us. The

lawsuit, the terrible lawsuit, was lost.

We were all in consternation without knowing precisely why; we had felt

the wind of defeat pass over us.

Still, our father manifested no trouble, no sadness, and grandfather

after his gruyère was dipping his biscuit in his wine, as he

particularly liked to do because of his teeth, which were bad. He

seemed to have paid no attention to the affair of the telegram. The

nerve of the one amazed me as much as the aloofness of the other. By

different ways they had reached the same calmness. As for Aunt Deen,

she was biting viciously into a peach which was unripe and crackled.

We left the table and went into the garden into which darkness was

stealthily creeping. I tried to linger behind, but was drawn along

by my sister Mélanie; she divined that our parents wished to talk by

themselves.

I could find no pleasure in any play, and I was soon flocking by

myself, my imagination revelling over the approaching ruin. “They”

were driving us from our house as the angel drove Adam and Eve out of

Eden. “They” were coming into our house as into a mill. “They” were

dividing our treasures among themselves as the Greeks divided the

spoils of the Trojans. “They?” Who? Aunt Deen’s “they”; I knew no more

than that. And in this catastrophe one remark kept coming back to me,

incomprehensible, terrifying, and yet not to be put away: _What’s the

difference whether one lives in one house or in another_?

These words of my grandfather, revolting and at the same time

stupefying, almost mesmerized me by their audacity, almost made me

giddy. How could one consent to abandon his house without defending it

to his utmost ability? In my heart I cried to arms. By way of acting

out what was going on within me, I seized one of Tem Bossette’s swords,

bestrode my favourite pole, and notwithstanding the rapid approach

of darkness, extinguishing the last rays of twilight, of which I was

greatly in dread, I rushed at a gallop to the very top of the garden,

to the chestnut grove, to the breach in the wall. The shadow of night

had already entered by it, and after it all the shadows. They were

creeping along, climbing the trees, swarming over the paths, filling

the clumps of trees. There was a whole army of them. They were the

mole-crickets, giant mole-crickets, the enemies of the house. With all

my might I tried to scatter them to right and left with great sword

thrusts. But I met nothing, and that was the worst of it. Then, in

desperation, I took to my heels. I was conquered.

It was a comfort to hear a voice coming my way, my mother’s voice

calling,

“François, François!”

That call saved my honour; my hasty return ceased to be a flight.

My bedroom, the vast proportions of which distressed me, but which

happily I shared with Bernard and Stephen, was near our mother’s

chamber. It was long before I could sleep. Beneath the door of

communication I could perceive a streak of light. The lamp must

have burned very late and I could hear the alternating sound of two

carefully subdued voices,--my father’s and my mother’s voices. With all

calmness the destiny of the family was being discussed close beside me.

IV

THE TREATY

WHEN one is a child one imagines that events are going to rush one upon

another like the two opposite camps of a game of prison-bars. The next

morning I expected something extraordinary to happen, the first result

of which would be a holiday from school. Surely no one would work when

the house was threatened! I was astonished on being called at the usual

hour, when I was settling myself to make up my lost sleep, and sent to

school just as usual. Stephen, always absent minded and absorbed in his

prayers, had noticed nothing. But Bernard, the eldest, appeared to me

to lack his usual high spirits; no doubt he considered me too young to

share his dejection. None of us exchanged any confidences on the way to

school.

This silence was the beginning of forgetting. I soon recovered from

the alarm of the preceding evening, and very soon, as we continued to

live in the house, I concluded that our enemies had beat an unexpected

retreat.

“They wouldn’t dare,” Aunt Deen had declared.

Nevertheless, a few days later, happening to be in mother’s room, she

received a visit from her dressmaker, a maiden of a certain age with

mahogany coloured hair, such as I have never seen on any other head.

Mother excused herself for having summoned her for so small a matter,

simply a making-over, and not a new gown.

“When one has seven children,” she added prettily, “one must be

reasonable. And besides I am no longer very young.”

“Madame is always young and beautiful,” protested the artist.

From my corner I considered this protest misplaced. Neither the age nor

the face of my mother belonged to this lady of the mahogany hair, but

well and duly to me and my brothers and sisters. Whether she was pretty

or ugly, young or old, concerned us alone.

“So,” concluded my mother, “here is a gown which you can easily alter a

little. You are so clever.”

“Madame has worn it a good deal already.”

“Precisely, I am attached to it.”

This time I thought the dressmaker was right, in putting on a

disdainful air as she accepted the work so unworthy of her. Without

question the gown in question had been often worn.

At the moment I saw no connection between this episode and our domestic

drama. My mother would always be beautiful enough, and clothes could

make no difference. Family discussions, however, usually took place in

the octagon parlour, which could only be entered by passing through

our bedroom. It was quite isolated, and one could be sure of not being

interrupted. We hardly ever went there except for our music lessons,

since the cupboard chapel had been put out of commission.

It was there that I had lost my faith in the Christmas miracle. It is

true that grandfather’s dry laugh, whenever the descent of the little

Jesus was anticipated, had prepared me for incredulity. The morning

of the festival day desired and expected by all children, we used to

find in this room a pine tree, its branches bent down under the weight

of toys, and lighted up by blue and pink candles. At the foot of the

tree a wax baby would be lying upon straw, holding out to us his little

arms. The ox and the ass were there, too, but the child was larger than

they. Their smaller proportions simply put them in their proper place

of subordination. Without seeking to penetrate the mystery I always

supposed that the tree grew there of itself during the night, with all

the strange fruits, which were quite enough to distract my curiosity.

But on the night of December 24, lying awake from curiosity, I saw my

father and mother pass through the room, walking on tiptoe, only in old

houses there are always planks that cry out and betray the presence of

people. It even happens that they cry out when no one is there, as if

they were supporting invisible persons, the steps of all those who had

trodden upon them while living. My parents were laden with all sorts

of packages. From that time I understood their collaboration with the

little Jesus.

Now, I again believe in the miracle, though like Jesus himself it

descended from heaven upon the earth. It was a miracle of love.

How did our father and mother manage to realise at one time all the

dreams of our excited imaginations and distribute to each one the

paradisaical things that he longed for? How, above all, did they manage

to diminish nothing from the divine generosity which they represented

during the sorrowful times that we were soon to know? My wonder never

ceases when I see, on Christmas day, in the quarters where the poor

live, children running about with their hands full of gifts. They are

only cheap little toys, but they bear in themselves the virtue of a

miracle....

Of the secret consultations in the music room, notwithstanding its

remarkable acoustic properties, I could hear nothing. Neither of the

two spoke above a low murmur: they were always of one mind. Yet I

divined that they were talking of the lawsuit. Something serious was

lurking in the darkness. Preparations were being made to repel the

enemy. And I wondered why the enemy did not make his appearance.

One morning--it was a Thursday--as we came home for the midday

breakfast, my brothers and I, what was our stupefaction, our horror, on

perceiving on one of the stone columns into which the entrance gates

were set, an enormous bill, which bore the outrageous inscription:

VILLA FOR SALE

We looked at one another, all alike indignant.

“It’s an insult!” exclaimed Bernard, who already had a sense of

military honour.

“No, it’s a mistake,” affirmed Stephen, with unbounded amazement.

Absent-minded and unobservant, he had not for one moment reflected

upon the trifling incidents which Bernard and I had been observing,

and which, inspiring us with a holy horror, had prepared us for this

catastrophe.

We should not have felt more overcome with shame if we had all three

been slapped in the face. Bernard, the boldest of us, tried to tear

down the bill, but it was glued fast and resisted the attempt. Like a

reinforcing army we rushed into the besieged house, which I expected

to find full of mole-crickets. The first person we met was Aunt Deen,

gesticulating and talking to herself. We had hardly opened our lips

when she perceived our agitation and at once her fury put ours into the

shade.

“Yes, _they_ want to rob us of everything! _They_ propose to

take possession of our property. I would rather have died than live to

see this.”

On her lips the word _property_ took on a solemn grandeur. Then

they had passed through the breach; _they_ were advancing upon

us in serried ranks. Beyond this assurance it was needless to expect

anything more intelligible from Aunt Deen.

We turned for further explanation to grandfather, coming in from his

walk. He waved us off with a gesture of superb indifference; he seemed

to us to be soaring in a region far above our agitations. Had he not

declared that it was all one to him whether he lived in one house or

another? He had been out for a walk on this fine July morning, when the

whole sunny country-side seemed swimming in light; he looked healthy,

radiant; why should he permit us to spoil his pleasure by inopportune

remarks? On the contrary he proposed to share some of his pleasure with

us.

“I love this good summer sun,” he said. “And no one can rob us of it.”

His remark was not calculated to quiet our alarm. Its singularity

struck me: in such a moment as this, when all our combative energies

were not enough to resist the danger that hung over us, he would draw

our attention to a simple source of happiness which had no lawful owner

and was beyond attack. When one is a child one never thinks that the

sun is something he may enjoy.

Mother was clasping my two elder sisters in her arms, trying to

console them and not succeeding, for she shared their sorrow. At her

feet the two little ones, Nicola and Jamie, were lamenting themselves

indiscriminately. Imagine the effect upon us of this weeping group!

Even Louise, the laughing Louise, was abandoning herself to tears.

“Here comes your father,” suddenly exclaimed mamma. “Stop crying, I beg

of you. He has trouble enough already.”

She had been the first to hear his step. The effect of her words was

instantaneous. We all controlled ourselves as quickly as we could, and

went down to the dining-room with faces in good order.

At table The Father began to be absorbed in his thoughts, the course

of which we followed. We used to call him _the father_ among

ourselves, as we used to say _the house_. Did he see the anxiety

in all those faces turned toward him? Did he read in our eyes the

dishonouring inscription, _Villa for sale_? He looked us full in

the face one by one and his frank smile reassured us. Come! He still

had his air as of the chief who commands. We had the feeling that he

could not consent to such a downfall. Peace and appetite returned to us

at the same time, and seldom was luncheon more gay than this one. We

enjoyed the relief to our strained nerves, under the shelter of that

protecting strength.

After the meal, while my brothers, whose studies were already of

importance, completed a task, I ran into the garden; the afternoon was

mine. The figure of Tem Bossette emerged from the vines. I went to him.

He was tying the too luxuriant branches to poles with bands of straw,

but he asked nothing better than to interrupt his work which, to judge

by the number of branches already tied, was not making much headway. An

empty bottle at his feet bore witness to the obstinate struggle against

the heat which he had maintained.

He evidently saw my approach with satisfaction. I could hear from a

distance his hoarse voice muttering to himself like Aunt Deen. At a

later time I understood better the secret reason of his indignation. He

was acknowledging to himself, not being as stupid as Mimi Pachoux, his

rival, insisted, that his whims and his drink habits would make him of

no use anywhere else; his destiny was closely allied with the destiny

of the house. So he lost none of his rage and did not cease to lift up

his head, his great pumpkin shaped head, against the reigning king,

whose idleness, whose home and foreign politics and above all, whose

financial condition he never ceased to deplore. As soon as I was near

enough to hear him, he put into words the griefs which were obscurely

struggling within him:

“You have read the bill, Master Francis?”

“To be sure I have read it.”

And I added, bitter with family pride,

“What is that to you?”

The question suffocated him. His eyes started from his head. “To me? To

me?” he exclaimed, foaming at the mouth with fury.

The ancient habit of respect recalled him to himself, and in a

lamentable tone he began to set forth his own claim to a part in the

family sorrows.

“I have chopped wood here for forty years (he exaggerated everything).

It was I who planted these vines and this garden.”

As a matter of fact there was not much to be proud of in that. Our

garden sometimes looked like a field and sometimes like a forest, and

the prematurely yellowed leaves of the vines revealed a chlorotic

condition which would doubtless have been the better for a vigorous

medication. But grandfather and his gardener were of one mind in

distrusting medicines, as well for plants as for people.

“Where should I go if I left you?” Tem continued frankly. “I might as

well throw myself into the water and done with it.”

It would have been his only opportunity to take a good drink of it.

Would it then be necessary henceforth to watch him, too?--as if we

hadn’t enough with the tiresome propensity of The Hanged? I confess,

however, that I did not take this threat very seriously. I had indeed

no difficulty in convincing Tem of the advantage of continuing to live.

Then his lamentation took another turn.

“What need had Monsieur (that was grandfather) to plunge into all those

schemes? Paving the town, and dealing in slates, and agricultural

credit. Agricultural credit! As if any one ever paid when you gave them

credit. What would be the use of credit, then, if you had to pay in the

end like any one else? Not to speak of other bad luck here and there,

when all he needs is the sun and the fresh air. Won’t do to undertake

to manage things when the third or the quarter is all the same to one.

The thing is to keep quiet in a corner with one’s income and let other

folks work for you. If it were Monsieur Michel, that’s another pair of

sleeves; Monsieur Michel, that’s all right, he’s one who understands

governing things. With him there’s nothing to fear, everything goes as

if on wheels. But what’s to be done when the other won’t see it?”

I began confusedly to understand that grandfather’s philanthropic

enterprises and the unfortunate results of his administration were

ending in the ruin of us all. Tem’s long harangue, uttered without

interruption, had at once comforted him and made him thirsty. He gazed

upon the empty bottle that lay at the foot of a vine and constituted

his sole supply for the day. Taking advantage of the respite, I tried

to understand more about our discomfiture.

“But why should the house be sold?”

“Why, it’s the lawsuit. When you lose a lawsuit they seize you, they

arrest you, they strangle you, they turn you out of doors, they take

possession of your house, and you are good for nothing but to throw to

the dogs.”

This deplorable picture was not calculated to reassure me. And far from

being sorry for us, Tem, perceiving my grandfather who was majestically

coming down the garden walk, cheerful, erect, flourishing his cane,

grew doubly irritated with him, as the cause of all the trouble.

“All right--all right! When one has got himself into a mess he is

prosecuted, arrested, condemned. No good to embrace every one like a

brother when one has good land to look after. One has bother enough

with the land--there are plenty of folk to prowl about it. Just look at

him! He doesn’t even see us--it’s all the same to him--everything’s all

the same to him.”

As a general thing Tem had no desire to be observed. Now he was making

a great racket to attract attention and not succeeding. This failure

completed his disgust--his failure combined, I think, with the prospect

of finishing the afternoon without a drink. He deliberately laid down

the straw of which he made his ligatures, and deserting his post he

abandoned me into the bargain.

“I won’t see it! I won’t see it!” he exclaimed as he went, irritated

and discouraged.

See what? The invasion of the mole-crickets? Neither did I want to see

it.

I followed the deserter as far as the gate, where I read the bill three

or four times over the better to understand the extent of our disaster,

and then came slowly back. What could I do now? My horses--the

poles--my wooden sword, my plays, were no longer anything to me. For

the first time in my life, perhaps, I let my arms hang useless by my

sides. By this feeling of the vanity of all things I was being born

into grief. I was learning to separate myself from things. Since that

moment I have always felt the pang of separation as soon as I see it

coming and long before it actually reaches me.