The subject soon became a theme for cheap pleasantries. Every one

in the café began to talk of Father Rambert’s end of the table,

Father Rambert’s garret. He would shrug his shoulders and take it all

laughingly.

“Really, isn’t all that true, Father Rambert?” asked Martinod one day.

“Why, to be sure it is true in a sense. If you make a point of it, it

is true. But what is it that is true?”

As if everybody didn’t know what is true and what is not true!

Grandfather was rather fond of dark sayings. That same afternoon we

went home together, he gay and sprightly, I downcast because I had not,

even at a distance (which I preferred), seen Nazzarena. At the top of

the steps we met father, who was waiting for us, and who seemed much

disturbed. He had a newspaper crumpled up in his hand, and handed it

without a word to grandfather, who made no motion to take it.

“Do you know who wrote _that_?” he asked. How contemptuously

he pronounced the word _that_! I felt that he was controlling

himself, but that something serious was going on at our house.

“How should I know?” asked grandfather. “I never read the local papers.”

“Very well, read this one.”

“No, thank you; I’m not interested.”

“Then I’ll read it to you.”

“If you insist upon it.”

I saw them go together into father’s consulting room, leaving the

door open, and I had no notion of going away. Grandfather sat down

resignedly in an easy chair, and father began to read at once. I felt

ill rewarded for the curiosity which had kept me there, for I couldn’t

understand a word of that dull, prosy and ill-worded article, which

seemed to leave a bad taste in your mouth like grated cheese that melts

in onion soup and turns into a sticky glue that clings to your gums.

It was about the approaching elections, and a certain omnipotent and

despotic personage, eager to rule the public with a rod of iron as he

ruled his household. After this there was something about a garret

full of rats, exposed to all the winds of heaven, yet good enough, it

appeared, for the miserable old man who had been relegated to it, and

who was expiating his social kindliness by being treated with contempt

and forced into the meanest position in his own house. The article

closed with a warm appeal to justice and sympathy. No name, no place,

was mentioned. How could I have understood the illusions? It was too

complicated an act of perfidy for a child to see through.

“Is that all?” asked grandfather when the indignant voice was silent.

“It seems to me that it is enough.”

“Oh, there isn’t enough there to whip a cat for--mere vague

generalities.”

“Is that your opinion?” asked father. “Don’t you feel how venomous, and

how dishonouring to me it all is? Have not you always been well treated

here? Whose wish was it to sit at the end of the table? Who took

possession of the tower chamber in spite of all we could say? Which of

us has ever been lacking in respect to you? When has any one neglected

to care for you most tenderly and deferentially? Of whom, of what, do

you complain? Father, I entreat you,--tell me; this is a grave matter.”

Entreaty followed entreaty, hurrying one upon another, in a voice which

gave them a pathetic intonation that thrilled me from head to foot.

The obscure article suddenly became clear to me, and I grasped its

entire significance. Some one was accusing my father of harshness to

grandfather. The scene of the abdication rose up before me, and the

morning in which I had borne a part by carrying the pile of _Limping

Messengers of Berne and Vevey_.

“I am not complaining,” said grandfather; “I have never complained.”

“And of what could you have complained? This house has continued to be

yours. I have taken upon myself only the duties and expenses which were

a burden to you. But these calumnies have not been invented.”

“My dear Michel, all these stories bore me to death. I don’t read the

newspapers, and get along very comfortably without them. I advise you

to follow my example.”

“Because it is not you who are attacked. Because I shall never permit

any one to attack you. This attack upon me comes from the Café of the

Navigators. I am sure that you still go there, though I have informed

you that it is the headquarters of our enemies. But you place in those

people all the confidence that you refuse to me.”

“As for that, I go where I please and I see whom I like.”

“You are free, father, without the slightest doubt. But in a family all

the members stand or fall together. Whoever aims at you strikes me.

Whoever defames me insults you.”

“I have no such narrow views as to the family. I have never opposed

you; do the same to me.”

At that moment father saw me through the half-open door, and a

suspicion must have crossed his mind, for he cut the discussion short,

and pointing to me said,

“I hope you never take that child there!”

“Where, pray?”

“To the Café of the Navigators.”

And turning to me father added in a tone which admitted of no reply,

“Go away!”

So that I did not hear the reply.

I have forgotten no incident of that scene and am certain of having

reconstructed it in its integrity, and if not in the same words

at least in equivalent ones. As I had been successively born into

a mysterious longing by a word of the shepherd who was leading his

sheep to the mountain, into the knowledge of liberty by a walk with

grandfather in the wild forest, into the sense of beauty by having

met the lady in white, into the disquietude of love because Nazzarena

had told me with a laugh that I was her little lover, so now I was

born into a knowledge of human wickedness, to which all my childhood

had been a stranger. Aunt Deen’s famous they, at whom I scoffed after

having vainly sought them around me, did then exist, and Martinod was

one of them, and the gentle and gay Casenave, whom my father had cured,

and the old photographer Galurin, and the two artists!

This unexpected revelation completely upset me. People went to the café

to enjoy themselves and not to hatch plots. They drank vari-coloured

drinks and made jokes the while. No, it could not be possible! A doubt

swept over me, both because of grandfather’s calmness, and because the

“go away” which dismissed me had been somewhat brusque and aroused in

me a desire to take the other side. Perhaps that scrap of paper was

indeed not worth reading.

The next day I was in mother’s room when father came in with his hat

on, coming straight in from outside without stopping in the vestibule.

He took off his hat hastily, and we saw that his face was animated and

suffused with colour. He had his grand air of a battle, and he laughed

as if pleased.

“I have slapped Martinod’s face,” he said simply, as if he had said, “I

have been to see such and such a patient.”

“Oh, dear, oh, dear!” murmured my mother; “what will he invent against

you now?”

I heard Aunt Deen running heavily, shaking the floor, rushing in like a

whirlwind. She had heard my father’s words from a distance.

“Well done, Michel; well done!” she cried, all out of breath. “They

are beaten; well done!”

There was one who didn’t haggle over the defence of the house!

I made the most of the unusual excitement to steal away. I had no

objection to Martinod being slapped, so long as I profited by it in

some way. I had been feeling myself more closely watched; opportunities

to slip away were becoming rare. With all speed I made off to the

street and rushed in the direction of the town. But as soon as I

reached the Market Place I began to walk slowly, even putting on

an unconcerned, indifferent manner, as of a loiterer who has no

special point in view and doesn’t quite know where he is going. Thus

I proceeded toward the circus, and started to walk around it, being

careful to look about me carelessly, to show plainly that I was

walking without a purpose. No one could be mistaken. How many times

had I executed this little manœuvre and not always with success! If

Nazzarena was there, occupied with some household duty, that was no

reason why I should approach her, or even greet her. As a general

thing I went past her without speaking, stiff as a poker. Our first

conversation had exhausted my courage, and moreover I did not know

what to talk about next. Sometimes she would laugh at me as she saw me

pass--for when it came to playing with me or mocking at me she would

lay aside her professional gravity as a horsewoman. Sometimes she would

call me. I always went to her at her call, but not for worlds would I

have spoken first.

That day she was leading her horse to water at the public fountain.

Seen without his trappings and the blaze of torches with which the tent

was lighted during performances, this steed appeared to me singularly

like our farmer’s old blind mare that I had occasionally bestridden; it

was a long bony beast, continually wrinkling his skin all over his body

to shake off the flies. But I immediately closed my eyes to so pitiful

a sight, and imagined in its place the red roan steed of the Romance of

the Swan’s Nest which, in my book of ballads, bore the Knight to the

young girl sitting in the grass by the river side, her bare feet in the

water.

My adored one was absorbed in her work, or pretended to be, and did

not deign to observe my presence. There was nothing for it but to keep

on my way, since she would not turn her eyes toward me. And that horse

kept on drinking, as if he were capable of drinking the fountain dry.

It was enough to make one desperate! At last she turned her head. She

was laughing. The naughty girl! She had seen me then! But in her most

natural tone, as if she had suddenly discovered me, she bade me good

morning.

Having given up hope of her speaking, I found nothing to say. My

discomfited face no doubt betrayed my feelings, for she seemed not

displeased with my silence, and even spoke of it:

“So, you are dumb to-day?” she asked, laughing all the more heartily as

she added, “Aha! so you aren’t my little lover any more?”

I hung my head to conceal my embarrassment. Not love her any more!

The foolish question! When one loved it was for always. The word

_always_, which my lips could never have uttered, made a strange

music in my heart, so sweet that nothing sweeter could ever be heard in

the world.

Reassured as to my condition, and no doubt as to the effect she

produced upon me, she calmly pulled the halter. Her horse had ceased to

drink and from his moist nostrils drops of water were falling back into

the basin.

IV

MY BETRAYAL

BECAUSE of that word _always_, continually singing in my heart,

the days that followed were at once delicious and bitter, like the

fruit that I used to gather too early in the garden. I was sure of the

future and indeed of all eternity, enjoying to the full the love that

as yet asks for nothing outside of itself. For the slight distress

that I had felt at the contact of Nazzarena’s cheek when our heads

had been jokingly bumped together had soon passed; nothing indeed was

lacking to fill the cup of my happiness but never to see my beloved;

my embarrassment returned whenever we met. If at least I had not been

obliged to speak to her! I could not have endured to kiss her--I never

so much as touched her hand. Each of us--so I think now--perhaps

believed in the superiority of the other: she because my house was so

solid, and I because of her horse, her golden robe, her talent as a

horsewoman, her wandering life, and that indefinable something with

which love endowed her. She soon perceived that the two sides were

not equal: she could appear in public and be applauded; I was a mere

spectator.

Conscious of her domination, she no longer shrank from laying commands

upon me. She would ask little services of me,--to buy her a thimble in

town, or gold thread and needles to mend her fine robe; and to ask for

things used by girls and not by boys made me blush in the shop. If I

Had to add some complementary explanations, I didn’t know where to turn

to hide myself. She made me help her peel potatoes and delighted in my

embarrassment when she saw me casting furtive glances toward the open

square.

“Don’t worry, little man; no one is passing,” she would say, robbing me

at a blow of all the benefit of my heroism.

Every day, either morning or evening, I would somehow manage to come

home from school by way of the Market Place where she was living.

What stratagems were mine to avoid suspicion! Sometimes my parents

would come to walk home with me, or, the distance not being great,

would merely meet me a few steps from the gate. How did I manage

not to arouse their misgivings? One or another of my school fellows

having discovered my manœuvres tried to make fun of me, but Fernand

de Montraut’s intervention spared me the vexation of practical jokes.

As the boys urged upon him that I refused to talk about the little

horsewoman he pronounced my silence chivalrous; and this opinion, from

so competent a judge, filled me with pride.

The same tawny young man who had knocked our heads together, finding me

one day in conversation with Nazzarena, jabbered something again in

their jargon, pointing his finger at me, and both burst out laughing.

As for me, I could have cried.

By degrees this passion, greater than I, and too serious for my

fourteen years, made a chasm between me and my family, all unawares

to myself. I forgot the elections, and the newspaper article, and

Martinod’s slapped face, which had brought about none of the immediate

results that mother had dreaded. At the same time I would gladly have

made a confidant of grandfather, because of our visits to the pavilion

and also because of the lady in white, the memory of whom, until then

somewhat vague, was now definitely fixed in my mind. Like a bouquet of

fresh flowers I breathed in all the romance of our former walks. Their

charm mysteriously affected me--was it not to them that I owed the

precocious emotions of my excited sensibilities? But for them I should

probably have been thinking only of playing tricks upon my teachers, or

at most of enjoying these first days of spring without knowing why.

One Thursday afternoon--our holiday was Thursday--as I had with some

difficulty escaped to the circus, to enjoy the performance and gaze

upon my horsewoman, who that day did not deign to notice me, not

knowing how to go back to the house without attracting attention, I

decided to go to the Café of the Navigators, where there was some

chance of meeting grandfather. The discussion between him and my

father on this subject had already slipped my mind, and my only object

was to get home without questionings, with no thought of Martinod and

his acolytes. I half opened the door with beating heart; it was the

first time that I had entered such a place alone. Grandfather was

there; I was saved! So long as I went home under his protection no

questions would be asked, and my absence would be justified by the very

fact.

I seated myself in a corner to wait until he was ready to go. Near me

Martinod was talking with the head of the establishment. I knew him,

for he used to mingle familiarly with the patrons, and even in his days

of prodigal humour, he would treat them all round.

“You see,” he was saying in a tearful voice, “the bill has been running

several years.”

“Send it to the son,” Martinod advised.

“It is not his affair.”

“All the same, you’ll see that he will pay it. That I can guarantee.

It’s a good trick to pay him against the elections. And besides, the

boy has had some.”

Whom was he talking about? I had not noticed. But suddenly Martinod

gazed at me, and under that gaze I at once remembered the slap he had

received. I even felt a vague remorse at being in his company; but

grandfather had surely kept on going with him. After all, he had

received and not given the slap, and here he was, raising his arm to

heaven as if some one had committed an unpardonable crime against me:

“That child has nothing to drink!”

I should never have believed him so solicitous with regard to me.

Everybody had neglected me for a long time, and in fact, but for the

passion which absorbed me, and inclined me to privations for the

very love of suffering, I should have observed the infrequency of

the glasses of syrup. The oversight was immediately repaired. The

materials generally reserved for full grown men were set before me; I

was solemnly offered a _verte_--of course an attenuated, diluted,

inoffensive _verte_.

“I will mix it myself,” declared Martinod.

“I’ll leave it to you,” observed grandfather indifferently,

interrupting himself in a heated discussion with Gallus as to the

Andante of Bach’s second sonata for piano and violin. “And no practical

jokes.”

“Father Rambert, don’t you worry!”

Certainly that Martinod was a good fellow, agreeable and slow to take

offence. His cheek was perhaps still warm from that slap, and he was

caring for me as for his own youngster!

He didn’t mix it the same way grandfather did. The superimposed lumps

of sugar were melted; now he might pour the absinthe. Upon my word! He

surely was treating me seriously and not like a baby gorged with milk!

That brew must be extraordinary!

I tasted it and pronounced it delicious, without knowing why, the

better to play my own part; and this gained me the suffrages of

Casenave and Galurin.

“That’s the first,” they declared, “but it shall not be the last.”

I was almost the object of an ovation, and in gratitude I turned upon

Martinod a humid eye. But why did he look at me in silence with that

compassionate look? Had I a papier-mâché countenance? He finally leaned

over me and whispered in my ear a few simple words that completed my

disquietude:

“Poor little fellow!”

Why under the sun did he call me poor little fellow? Did I look as

wretched as that? No doubt I hadn’t succeeded in seeing Nazzarena the

whole day long. Yes, to be sure, I was unhappy, since everybody noticed

it. Only no one ought to notice it. This was a secret, hidden in the

very bottom of my heart, and no one had any right to speak to me of it.

I at once assumed a repellant face, intended to discourage sympathy.

But I couldn’t keep up this attitude. Ever since I emptied my glass,

I felt, as it were, a veil before my eyes, and a warmth through all

my body, an enervating torpor, and a sort of longing for confidence

and affection. Furthermore, I had been mistaken as to Martinod’s

intentions. He was not thinking of my love, he knew nothing about it,

and with small respect to consistency I began now to regret that I

didn’t hear him pronounce Nazzarena’s name. He was fascinating me with

his gaze, as the serpent in my natural history must have fascinated the

birds, and in a voice of caressing inflections, insinuating, coaxing,

he gave me to understand that in my family I was misunderstood. In

ambiguous words, with all sorts of circumlocutions, hesitations,

reticences, he revealed to me that my father cared more for one of his

older sons than for me. Which one? Stephen or Bernard? At this distance

of time I do not remember which one he indicated. Was it Bernard, for

his military air, his decided manner, his gaiety, his enthusiasm, and

his resemblance to father? Or Stephen, for his fine and even temper,

his good marks, his application, even his absence of mind? Upon my word

I can not say which, now. Our parents treated us without the slightest

difference, and each one was the object of special attention which he

was free to consider a favour. Still, I did not hesitate to believe

this stranger who did not know us, who had never set foot in our house,

and who, I knew, had been chastised by my father for his perfidy.

Yes, I was misunderstood by my family. Imperceptible proofs started

up from the shadows, and grew like clouds chased before the wind.

My father was always talking about the absent ones, and when he

received news of them he was radiant. Their letters were bulletins

of victory. He wore paternal pride upon his forehead. I, I alone,

was systematically kept in the background, I was of no consequence.

How severely, the other week, he had cried “go away!” Did he know

that I was frequenting the circus in spite of his prohibition, and

that I peeled potatoes in the public square? If Bernard or Stephen

had been the offender he would have come to know it, and would have

scolded them, whereas he treated me with outrageous contempt; I, who

was bearing the burden of so noble a love, I was treated only with

humiliation and insult. Worst of all, worst of all, my father did not

love me--nobody loved me. Everything conspired to make me think so,

since I had not once met Nazzarena that whole day long! There was only

grandfather, and grandfather was absorbed in his conversations, his

music, in smoking his pipe, in his telescope and his almanacs.

I cast an imploring glance in his direction. Now he was waxing warm

with Gallus over a quintette by Schumann. At such a time the world did

not exist for him.

I would have consented to get along without the existence of the world,

provided he would concern himself with me. I had the horrible sensation

of being abandoned by every one, and that this man close at hand who

insinuated his sympathy in a moved and compassionate voice had just

informed me of an irreparable misfortune. I could have cried, but in

the face of curious looks I kept back my tears. But on that bench, in

that café, I learned to know the sadness of being misunderstood, of

solitude in the midst of a crowd, of despair. Life is made up of many

griefs; have I ever experienced a more intense pain than this imaginary

despair?

Thus disarmed by the very tenderness that bared my sensibility to the

quick, and fascinated by the serpent, I unconsciously entered into the

plot which was being concocted against my father. Having accomplished

his purpose--more easily than he had believed possible, for he was

unaware that love was his ally--Martinod repeated in a heart-rending

tone,

“Poor little fellow!”

My stifled sobs were suffocating me. He might blazen his triumph

abroad, for he had succeeded even beyond his hopes; the seed of his

suggestions was destined to spring up later and bear noxious fruit. But

had he not found an easy prey?

I was still too unsophisticated to know that hate can flatter and

smile, look pleasant, appear sympathetic or compassionate, and enwrap

its object in fine phrases as bandits bind ropes about the man they

would render powerless. Hatred of this sort, which with affected

sympathy addresses itself to the friends and relations of the man it

pursues, certain of wounding him on the rebound, can not always be

denounced even later. There are few sentinels like Aunt Deen to keep

guard over the sacred ark of the family.

It has been said that circumstances conspired to further Martinod’s

plan. One Sunday afternoon, as I was idling at the window instead of

finishing a task--I usually preferred grandfather’s tower chamber,

but he was absent--I suddenly beheld a wonderful, a terrifying sight!

The circus troop was invading our garden! They had come through the

gate, which, notwithstanding Aunt Deen’s vigilance, had been left open

because of the more frequent comings and goings of a holiday. The whole

company was swarming over the grass plats and shamelessly trampling

the flower borders. There were ragged women with babies in their arms,

there were the two clowns whom I had in time come to identify, there

was the grey-headed rope dancer and there--oh, woe! there was Nazzarena

herself! Nazzarena without a hat, her hair unbound and her dress in

rags. For the first time I realised that she was poor. In our garden,

in the carefully tended alley, one might have taken her for a poor

country girl.

Dumb with amazement, I dared neither hide nor lean out of the window.

Terror at what was sure to happen paralysed me. Why had they come?

What did they want? What ill wind had brought them? Our garden was not

a place for wandering folk, bohemians, people whose only knowledge of

land was to walk upon it. If only it had been the old-time garden,

overgrown with weeds, never pruned nor watered! Or if only grandfather

had been there to receive these suspicious guests! Nazzarena,

Nazzarena, hasten back to your _roulotte_ and the white tent in

which you reign! I assure you that this is no place for you!

I was actually undergoing martyrdom on seeing them thus shamelessly

making merry over our grass and flowers. I longed at heart to cry out,

to warn them, but I could not. And in infinite agony I measured the

distance which separated the house from my love.

One of the clowns was already ringing the door bell. My God! what would

happen next? They had hardly begun to parley with Mariette, whose

uncompromising humours I knew, when the catastrophe fell upon us. Aunt

Deen came flying to the rescue and stoutly made head against the whole

band. The dialogue was distinctly audible at my window:

“What do you people want?”

A chirping voice replied:

“This is Father Rambert’s house, isn’t it?”

“What do you want with Father Rambert? Go about your business. Get out!”

What abominable injustice! All the beggars of our town were always

kindly treated by us; they even had their days, like society ladies,

and Zeeze Million, who was crazy, and that drunkard Yes-Yes received

a regular allowance at our door. Then why not give these honourable

acrobats a chance to explain? Aunt Deen, always so charitable and

ready to help, was turning them out with harsh words merely because

they were strangers!

Thus ignominiously ordered out, they rebelled, and poured invectives

upon their persecutor, who, I must admit, was not mute.

An infernal uproar arose. The rope dancer yelled, beating her sides.

At last I resolved to intervene in behalf of my friends, Nazzarena’s

friends. Suddenly, at the very moment when I was about to quit my

post of observation to fly to the fray, my father, no doubt drawn by

the uproar, appeared upon the scene. Without so much as opening his

lips, with a single gesture--but how unanswerable!--he pointed to the

entrance. And the whole roaring troop retreated, crowding between the

two pillars that supported the gate, and fled, immediately and most

astonishingly.

I was furious at so sudden and complete a rout. Since it was thus,

I, by myself alone, would resist that authority which no one ever

dared to brave. All my new-found enthusiasm again sweeping over me, I

rushed to the stairs, flew down four steps at a time at the risk of

_carabossing_ myself, to overtake my beloved.

“Where are you going?” asked father, still at his post, and barring my

way.

I was silent. My enthusiasm was already falling flat.

“Go back at once,” he went on. “I forbid you to go out.”

Unhesitatingly, but swelling with wrath, I went upstairs, gnawing my

fists with rage. Was no one to resist him, then? I, too, like those

others, had been immediately vanquished, overthrown, petrified, merely

by having faced him. People think it is easy to revolt against the

powers that be: I had just learned that that depends upon the character

of the government. Again and again I went over Martinod’s insinuations.

How true they were! _He_ understood; _he_ was a true friend!

I had only obeyed in appearance. I had hardly reached the tower when

I began to listen for the sound of closing doors, and no sooner was I

convinced that my father had gone back to his study than I furtively

crept down and slipped out of the house. Once beyond the gate new

courage inspired me: I straightened up and breathed freely. This

time, I had no thought of taking a roundabout way, putting on airs of

indifference, deceiving any whom I might meet, but ran by the shortest

road to the Market Square. The gipsies were rolling up the tent,

piling up the benches, the Sunday loiterers looking on with interest.

This raising of the camp boded ill--I saw Nazzarena at last; she was

gathering together the scattered household utensils. This was no time

to be bashful: it called for heroic resolution. In the very face of all

the spectators, most of whom doubtless knew the Rambert boy, I flew to

my beloved, like one of the knights of my ballads. When she saw me she

cast a heart-broken glance upon me.

“They drove us out of your garden,” she said before I had spoken a word.

How reply to this grievous statement? No doubt she included me among

her persecutors.

“It wasn’t I!” I cried, hasting to separate myself from my family.

“Of course it wasn’t you,” she replied philosophically. “You are

too little. We went to tell your grandfather that we are going away

to-morrow. To-morrow morning.”

“To-morrow!” I repeated, as if I had not heard, or had not understood.

“Yes, to-morrow. See for yourself. They are loading the things on

the waggons now. The Marinetti brothers have left us. There’ll be no

matinée to-day--that’s one good haul lost.”

To my surprise, she was not angry with me for her expulsion, and even

in my grief I observed an unexpected reversal of parts: she was showing

an unaccustomed consideration for me, and I was taking on a little

protecting air. The prestige of power was doing its work all unawares

to myself. Thus she did not suggest that I should help her in her work,

though the day before she would not have failed to do so.

One of the old hags stuck her long yellow face out of the nearest

waggon, and upbraided her for wasting her time.

“I must go,” said Nazzarena. “Such a job to get ready for moving!

Good-bye, good-bye, my little lover! I wish you another sweetheart;

you’s cute; you’ll find one.”

She did not offer her hand; perhaps she dared not, because of the

respect for me which the sight of the house had inspired in her. And

I found no words in which to reply to her. I smiled foolishly at her

strange wish for me: it seemed abominable and sacrilegious, though

the affectionate way in which she uttered it was as sweet to me as a

caress. Her departure floored me--seemed to cut my legs and arms and

empty my brain. I stood there like a dolt. Time and place were nothing

to me--she was going away!

I saw her in the distance, stumbling under the heavy trappings of her

horse, and she made a little gesture of adieu as she disappeared behind

one of the waggons. It seemed to me as if she was already far off, and

I managed to walk away.

Where should I go? Associating the cruelty of my family with

Nazzarena’s departure, I could not go back home. What consolation, what

support would I have found there? Father had forbidden me to go out: I

could judge of the reception which awaited me. I wandered up and down

the streets among the people in their Sunday best, absent-mindedly

bumping against one or another, who hurled at me the epithet of

blockhead, or boor. I almost enjoyed it, so tempestuously did I long

to change the character of my pain. Powerless to direct my steps, I

automatically found myself at the Café des Navigateurs. Grandfather

would understand me; grandfather was the embodiment of that security

for which that dear Martinod was working.

The room was crowded, and I suddenly felt comforted by the atmosphere

of tobacco and anise, the stir and movement. I lost the immediate sense

of my grief, I was even able to perceive distinctly that something

solemn and unusual was going on. A decision of capital importance had

been arrived at, and from the way they were talking it seemed to me

that this was one of those historic events that by and by boys would

study in school. Grandfather was the object of a thousand testimonials

of honour and admiration. They were crowding around him, congratulating

him, shaking hands with him, though this he resisted. And champagne was

being brought--highest favour! Champagne on a day like this! I began to

feel deeply moved, all the more that no one offered me any.

“A goblet!” cried Martinod, that dear Martinod who certainly _was_

good to me; “a goblet for the little fellow!”

And lifting high his own, with a grand gesture he proclaimed,

“To the election of Father Rambert! To the victory of the Republic!”

“Bravo!” exclaimed the faithful Galurin.

Callus and Merinos were overflowing with happiness: no doubt they were

foreseeing that era of Beauty which they had so often anticipated in my

hearing. As for Casenave, he was supporting the weight of his head with

both hands, his vague eyes perhaps fixed upon some vision. The barmaid

was inclining the bottle over his glass: he may have seen in her one of

those beautiful ladies in empire gowns who used to come down through

the ceiling of his garret to give him drinks and visit him openly.

“_Ziou_!” he exclaimed, sitting up.

As he gazed upon the frothing beverage, and the golden stream, he was

seized with a convulsive shudder. His trembling hands failed to grasp

the goblet, and he hiccoughed with impotent greed.

Grandfather alone showed no enthusiasm nor even pleasure. His

ill-humour was evident. He found small enjoyment in popularity or

applause. All this open-mouthed, drinking, shouting crowd got on his

nerves. I am sure he would rather have been somewhere else--in the

country--for instance, eating strawberries and sweet cream. Still, he

was constrained to yield before the general enthusiasm.

“After all, it is perhaps well,” he conceded. “No tyrants, above all;

liberty!”

No, indeed; no tyrants! In an instant the vision of my father rose

before me, standing on the doorstep, his extended arm driving away

those poor gipsies. And by way of protest, I emptied my goblet.

At that precise moment--so long as I live I shall never forget the

sight--father entered the Café des Navigateurs. Unheard-of act! My back

was turned to the door, so that I could only see him in the mirror.

But it was Martinod’s face that told me of his presence. Martinod

had suddenly turned pale, and the hand which held his glass trembled

like that of Casenave, so that a little champagne slopped over.

Father, before whom every one hastily gave way as before an important

personage, or as if in fear, was already at our table. He raised his

hat, saying most courteously,

“Good day, gentlemen. I have come for my son.”

No one spoke. There was utter silence, not only in our group but all

through the room, every one attentive to the incident. The apparition

of Nazzarena in the circus upon her black horse would not have aroused

so much interest. The only sound was the exclamation, “Oh!” uttered by

the proprietor, who, napkin in hand, stood motionless behind the bar.

Grandfather was the first to regain self-possession. He remarked,

calmly, almost impertinently:

“Good afternoon, Michel. Will you take something with us?”

The offer was received by the bystanders with mocking little laughs and

all tongues were unloosed. But the diversion was of brief duration.

Father merely replied, “Thank you, I came for my son. It is nearly

dinner time, and we are expecting you both.”

Thus he invited grandfather to go with us. Perceiving that his

invitation was not accepted, he turned to Martinod, who was giggling,

and measured him from head to foot.

“See here, Monsieur Martinod, since I have removed my hat, I beg you to

remove yours.”

It is true that Martinod had kept his hat on, but I knew that it was

the custom in the café. Far from complying with the order--no one could

mistake that it was an order, notwithstanding the “I beg you”--he

hastened to pull his hat lower on his head. Interested and enthralled,

every one in the room was watching, and a wag in the corner ejaculated:

“He will. He will not.”

My father took a step forward, and to me he seemed a very giant. Alone

among them all, it was he who spread terror. In that clear voice that

I so well knew, the voice that moved Tem Bossette in the depths of his

vines and brought the whole household together in an instant, he said:

“Do you wish me to knock off your hat with my cane, Monsieur Martinod?

For my hand will never touch you again.”

This time the laughs ceased. The case was becoming tragic: one might

have heard a spider spinning her web. Grandfather saved the situation.

“Come, Martinod,” he said; “one must be polite.”

“Then it’s for you, Father Rambert,” Martinod replied, suddenly

uncovering. His face was bloodless, and no one could doubt of his

defeat.

My father, having conquered, turned to Casenave, lost in his dreams.

“You, too, friend, would do well to go home.”

The terrified Casenave cried in a melancholy voice which broke the

tension, so droll did it seem.

“I haven’t been drinking, Doctor. I swear I haven’t.”

Thereupon we went out, father and I; I behind him, and though the

crowded tables were full of company, I moved between them without

difficulty, so large was the place respectfully made for my guide. By

way of not resembling Martinod, whose cowardice disgusted me, I forced

myself to hold up my head and appear indifferent. At the bottom of my

heart I was in unspeakable dread of what might happen in the street,

when we were alone. Never, save perhaps in my earliest childhood, had

my parents inflicted corporal punishment upon us: self-esteem was a

part of our education. But now I expected it. If only he didn’t slap

my face like Martinod! Martinod was an enemy of the house and I had

drunk his champagne. Little did I care for the house, however; like

grandfather, I proposed to be free. Hadn’t grandfather taken a gun

when he had failed _in the blood of the days of June_, against

the prohibition of his own father, the magistrate, the nurseryman,

whom he held in such slight esteem? They might beat me, might abuse

me, but they should get nothing out of me. I braced myself against the

terror which was gripping me, until I at last came to feel a sort of

insensibility, a strength of resistance which enabled one to endure

anything without uttering a complaint.

I had, however, no occasion to make use of the provision of energy

which I was laying in against my martyrdom. As we walked along father

merely asked me, without raising his voice,

“Have you often been to that café?”

“Sometimes.”

“Never set foot in it again.”

I felt that indeed I never could set foot in it again. But would that

be all my punishment? We were walking side by side, very fast. Though

he gave no sign of what he was thinking, I understood,--I can not tell

how--that a great tempest was inwardly agitating him. He had it in

his power to crush me, to break me in two, and he kept silent. Thus

we crossed the Market Place, and I seemed to myself like one of those

criminals whom I had seen escorted to prison by a gendarme. If only

Nazzarena did not see me! To me she represented the life of liberty, as

I was slavery in person.

At last we reached the door of the house. Before opening it father

turned to me, covering me from head to foot with a look, under which I

hung my head in spite of myself, like one guilty.

“Poor child!” he said--it was Martinod’s very expression--“what are

they trying to make of you?”

In my tense condition this sudden pity conquered my rebellion, and I

was on the point of throwing myself into his arms with tears. But he

had already regained his self-control, and in his tone of command he

went on:

“You simply must obey. You simply must.”

I at once hardened my heart again. He was affirming his authority: and

though he had certainly not abused it, there was for me only the sacred

war for independence.

Mother, whose anxious shadow I had distinguished behind the window, was

watching for our return, and came to the top of the steps to meet us.

“He was there,” said my father simply. “I was not mistaken.”

“Oh, my God!” she murmured, as if she could not have imagined so tragic

a misfortune.

Aunt Deen, who was close behind her, lifted up her hands to heaven:

“It’s not possible! It’s not possible!”

Beyond this I was not scolded. With his will or against his will the

prodigal son had been brought back. But, far from being grateful for

this indulgence, which now I better understand as being due to the

uncertainty of my parents as to the influences to which I had been

subject, and the best way of winning me back, I tried to revive with

all my recovered strength the love-pain which had been dulled by all

these incidents, saying over and over to myself,

“Nazzarena is going to-morrow. Nazzarena is going to-morrow.”

V

THE DOUBLE LIFE

I HARDLY slept that night, and in my half slumber I confused the holy

war for independence with my loss of Nazzarena. My love was a part of

that liberty which grandfather vaunted, and for which he had carried a

gun. When morning came it found me firmly resolved not to go to school,

but to take my last chance of being present when the circus troop

departed. The farewell of the evening before had been disappointing.

Not being prepared, I had found nothing to say. Surely, things couldn’t

end that way.

I complained of a headache, and found ready credence. I understood that

I was supposed to be upset by the scene in the Café of the Navigators.

Aunt Deen even brought me secretly a frothing and tasty mulled egg,

good for headaches, and so delicious that I enjoyed it in spite of my

grief--at which I was inwardly humiliated.

“You’ll stay in bed till noon,” she said, as she carried away the cup,

adding--she, too!--

“Poor child!”

At which my gratitude to her immediately vanished, for I had no idea

of being considered a child any longer, since I was in love.

As soon as she was gone I dressed hastily, but not without a certain

care, and ran up to the tower chamber, where grandfather received me

with surprise, and some signs of pleasure.

“They let you come up?” he asked.

Why should he ask? I had asked permission of no one. He merely shrugged

his shoulders and became the philosopher once more--“Oh, it’s all the

same to me.”

The four windows of the tower commanded all the roads. It was my plan

to watch from this lookout for the train of waggons. They were loaded,

they would advance slowly. I calculated that I should have time to

overtake them. Which way would they go? I had no notion. I imagined

that they would take the road for Italy, and I watched that one

especially.

I had stationed myself before one of the windows, half hidden by a

piece of furniture, when there came a knock at the door and father

entered. I thought he had come for me, and I at once knew that in

spite of my resolutions I should not resist. He had the same calm and

irresistible air of authority that he had had the evening before;

but, absorbed in his purpose, he did not so much as see me, and as he

walked directly to grandfather he even turned his back to me. Unless I

intervened he would not know I was there. After a brief but courteous

salutation he showed the newspaper he had in his hand--a local journal.

“This paper announces that you are presenting yourself for election at

the head of the list of the Left. Is that so, father?”

I could divine under the interrogative form of the simple phrase that

he was inwardly boiling with restrained anger.

At the gate of the town there was a blank wall overlooking the lake,

which was always swept by waves on windy or stormy days. My school

fellows and I used sometimes to amuse ourselves by running across

between two waves, at the risk of being wet by spray or even drenched

by some larger wave. On certain days when the storm, was severe, such

bravado was impossible. We used to say then that the tempest-tossed

lake was smoking. I had the sensation now that my way would be barred

in the same manner.

How can I have forgotten one traitor word of the conversation that

followed? Grandfather, according to his habit, merely replied--at once

gently and bravely (he detested scenes and usually avoided them, but

Martinod’s cowardice was not his style):

“I am free, I suppose.”

“No one is free,” replied my father, with a determined evenness of

voice which chilled me to the marrow. “All of us depend upon one

another. And you are aware that you are presenting yourself against

me.”

This time grandfather’s retort was more sharp. He would not give way,

he would defend himself. At last!

“I am presenting myself against no one,” he replied. “I simply present

myself--that is all. And I hinder no one from presenting himself. I say

again, Michel, every one is free to act according to his good pleasure.”

With an eloquence which gradually grew warm, and which he then

interrupted, as if determined not to depart from the most respectful

form of speech, constantly struggling to control himself against the

vehemence of his own words, father sought to convince him by a line of

argument which even at this distance I believe I can recall. Why this

candidacy at the last moment when grandfather had never dreamed of

taking any part in politics, and when he knew that his son was the head

of the conservative party? How was it that he did not see that this was

a manœuvre of Martinod, who was only too happy to take revenge for the

blow he had received, and to effect the disintegration of the Rambert

family? Surely no one would allow himself to be taken in Martinod’s

coarse trap!

“And besides,” he concluded, “we can not be candidates against one

another.”

Grandfather’s little laugh accompanied his answer: “Oho! Why not? It

will be something new, and for my part I see no harm in it.”

“Because a family can not be divided.”

“A family! A family! You always have that word in your mouth.

Individuals are of some account, too, I suppose. And besides, why

aren’t your convictions the same as mine, since you are my son?”

“You forget that my convictions are the same as those of all our family

down to your father.”

“Yes, the nurseryman. You forget the soldier of the Emperor ...”

“He served France. France comes first. I do not include those who

emigrated.”

“And your great uncle Philippe Rambert, the _sans-culotte_?”

“Don’t let us speak of him; he is our shame. Every family has its

tradition. Ours, until you, was simple and fine. ‘God and the King.’”

“Well, liberty is enough for me. Once for all, I leave you your way;

let me have mine.”

“But I repeat to you that the solidarity of our name and our race lays

an obligation upon you. Besides, your liberty is a mere chimera. We are

all in a state of dependence. Will you force me to remind you that I

have accepted this dependence with all its cost? The very house which

shelters us, and which I have saved, is a witness to the permanence and

unity of the family under one roof.”

By degrees the conversation became a battle. Father seemed to me so

big and powerful that he could have crushed grandfather with a snap of

the finger, and yet grandfather held out against him, with his sharp

little voice, and with a vigour such as I hardly recognised in him.

To see them thus drawn up against each other frightened me and gave

me horrible torment. In my new-born rebellion against authority my

heart was with grandfather. I pictured to myself, under Nazzarena’s

features, that liberty of which they were speaking in attack and

defence. It seemed to me that I should be committing a cowardly act

like that of Martinod in the Café des Navigateurs when he took off his

hat in obedience to orders, showing his white, terrified face, if I

did not intervene in behalf of my companion, my comrade in walks, who

had transmitted to me as a brilliant inheritance--the only one he had

to give--his love of simple nature, of the wandering life, of that

independence which proudly refuses to submit to rule, and perhaps also

that love of love which by itself alone includes all these. I did not

conceal from myself the risk I was running. I foresaw the punishment

which would follow, and yet I came forward like a little martyr asking

for death.

“Grandfather is free!” I cried at the top of my voice.

I had thought to utter a tremendous shout, but I could hardly hear my

own voice, and was astonished and vexed that I had not made more noise.

Nevertheless, I perceived the immediate effect, which though quite

enough to satisfy me, was far from reassuring. My father had turned

suddenly, amazed at my presence and audacity. This time the road was

closed, like that of the lakeside on stormy days. He gazed at us both

by turns as if to discover some complicity, some understanding between

us. Face to face with him we were really just nothing at all. He was

strong enough to crush us both. His eyes flashed fire; his voice would

roll over us like thunder; the storm that was about to overwhelm us

would be terrible.

Why did he keep silent? What was he waiting for? Still he said nothing,

and the silence became more distressing, more tragic. I could hear my

own terror like the tick tock of a clock.

Having taken time to regain his self-control, by what must have been a

superhuman effort, he turned from me that gaze that so terrified me,

and spoke to grandfather:

“Very well,” he said, so calmly and gently that it disconcerted me; “I

am no longer a candidate. We will not amuse the city with the sight of

our divisions. But I will permit myself to give you one bit of advice.

By my retirement Martinod will have secured what he wants; that was

all he was after; now do not permit yourself to be any longer the tool

of the man who has slandered me; do you on your side give up this

candidacy, which is not at all in your line.”

If grandfather was surprised by this change of tactics, he did not show

it in the least.

“Oh, it would be a great mistake for you to retire. You would perhaps

have been elected, and as for me, it’s all one. My principal object

is to disavow your political opinions. The family can’t command our

ideas.”

Father seemed to hesitate a moment as to resuming the subject before

deciding to let it go. He let it go because there was another matter

even nearer to his heart.

“Let us say no more about it,” he said. “Something of far greater

importance has been going on in my house, something that I can not

tolerate. You have robbed me of this child whom I entrusted to you.”

The conflict was suddenly taking another form, and I had become its

object. In a flash arose before me the scene when I was setting out

for my first walk after my convalescence. We were all three upon

the doorstep. Father was putting my hand into grandfather’s with

the bewildering words, _Here is my son--it is the future of the

house_. And grandfather answered with his little laugh, _Don’t

worry, Michel, no one will rob you of him_. What did they mean? How

could any one rob him of me?

“How absurd!” grandfather was saying. “I never robbed any one of

anything. So I am accused of stealing children, am I? Why not of eating

them?”

Mockery and irony were, however, too weak a weapon not to be broken

in the attack that followed. Not one detail of that scene has faded

from my memory. I can see them both, one strong and high-coloured, in

the fulness of strength and vigour, and yet uttering such a groan as

trees give forth under the woodman’s axe, the other so old, fragile and

shrivelled, and yet all insolence, holding up his head and jeering, and

I between the two like the stake in a game they were playing.

“Yes,” father replied; “I gave you my son to make him well, not to

lead him astray. You yourself promised to do nothing which might one

day put him in opposition to our household and religious traditions.

Have you kept your promise? I have for some time been doubtful as to

what was going on in this little head. I spoke to Valentine about it,

and learned that she too was fearful of this misfortune, though in

her respect for you she dreaded to make the mistake of attributing an

unfortunate influence to you. I do not know how you have managed to

take possession of the child’s mind. But I can not but know that you

have been taking Francis to the very place where our opponents are in

the habit of meeting, and where they take advantage of your weakness

and your generosity.”

“I can’t permit you--” grandfather tried to interrupt.

“Of your generosity,” the voice went on more firmly, “or of mine. This

morning I received a bill from that place. It is a large one. Martinod

no doubt thinks it a joke to treat his heelers at my expense.”

“Who sent you the bill?”

“The proprietor of the café. To whom should he send it? He brought it

himself, and by way of argument he simply said, ‘The boy had some of

it.’ My son was a partaker as well as my father; I am responsible,

since, for my part, I believe in the solidarity of the family. I paid

for Casenave, whose body bears already the promise of a drunkard’s

death; for Gallus and Merinos, poor wretches, incapable of the

slightest work; for that idle Galurin and that scoundrel Martinod.

Paying is of no consequence--I have been through worse than that, as

you know. But what errors have you taught this child? I must know all,

now, that I may uproot them from his heart like weeds from the garden.

Where is he going? What will he make of his life with that utopia of

liberty to which every hour of real life gives the lie--without the

stern discipline of home, without our faith? Don’t you know that what

maintains our race, every race, is the spirit of the family? Has not

life taught you that?”

I was moved by the tone in which he spoke. Always sensitive to the

melody of words, I caught them as they were uttered, and by them I can

now easily rise to the ideas which they expressed but which then passed

over my head.

“Have you finished?” asked grandfather, with an impertinence that moved

me to admiration.

“Yes, I have finished. I beg pardon for having raised my voice in the

presence of this child. He should at least know--you can bear witness

to that--that I have always been a respectful son.”

“Oh, you have paid my debts. And you are still paying them.”

“Is that all? And have you not at all times had the support of my

filial affection?”

“Of your protection.”

“My protection is extended only to shield you from those who desire

your ruin. And can’t you understand that in withdrawing this child from

my authority, disarming him for future conflicts, you are preparing the

way for the ruin of us all?”

Grandfather exclaimed, “Oh! oh!”--and went on in his turn:

“I should like to know what you are blaming me for. I took the boy to

walk when he needed it, and instilled into him the love of nature.”

“And not the love of his home.”

“Is it my fault that he prefers my society? I never try to teach,

for my part--I don’t go about preaching at all times and seasons

subordination, tradition, the principles of religion. I simply have

respect for life, for liberty if you prefer the word.”

“But liberty is not life. It destroys everything that should be

preserved.”

“Oh, don’t let us go over that discussion. What has happened to your

son happened to mine.”

“To me?”

“Yes, to you. When you were little another influence was substituted

for mine. The magistrate, the nurseryman, the lover of roses--”

“Your father.”

“Yes; he gave you a taste for trimmed trees, raked alleys, for laws,

human and divine, and what more!”

“Why do you lay it up against me that I am like all our race?”

“I saw you changing under my very eyes. Do you know whether I too did

not suffer to see it?”

“Oh, you were always so detached from me, and from--”

My father did not finish his sentence, and I shall not finish it now,

though I am only too fearful of having discovered its meaning. The

respect which he then maintained lays its command upon me, even at this

distance. They had both laid bare a hidden wound, which had never quite

ceased to bleed. They stood there face to face with that memory between

them, terrified perhaps with what they were discovering in the past,

not wishing to go farther before me, when an unexpected relief arrived.

Mother came in. She had probably heard their voices from her room and

had hastened, all a-tremble, to prevent the conflict going farther.

With her came the household peace.

“What is the matter?” she asked gently.

Her mere presence had parted them, and it was impressed upon me that

the conversation would have no further interest for any one.

“I am here to claim my son,” said father.

“Take him, take him,” said grandfather, abandoning me to my fate. But

he could not refrain from adding, defiantly:

“Take him back if you can.”

“He ought not to be parted from God,” said my mother simply,

remembering the time I had failed to come to Mass. Then, feeling that

this was not the place for me, she pushed me toward them, as a token of

reconciliation, with the words:

“Kiss them, and go down to Aunt Deen.”

I obeyed, and after being negligently or reluctantly kissed I rushed

down stairs, not caring how the peace was made, thinking only of

Nazzarena who was going away. A little later I heard some one in the

garden calling me, but I did not answer.

I flew to the chestnut grove on the edge of the domain, and scrambled

upon the wall, near the breach that one of the trees had once made

merely by the push of its roots, and which had been closed by a

grating. From this point I could see the road to Italy. Only one chance

was left to me--would the circus troop go that way? I waited long, but

not in vain.

They are coming, they are coming! First the waggons carrying the tent,

the benches, and all the accessories. What wretched horses were drawing

them! I looked about for Nazzarena’s black courser, but he was not

to be distinguished from the rest of the sorry jades. Then came the

_roulottes_ that the folk lived in. Smoke was rising from one

or another of the slender chimneys. They were getting dinner ready

for the long journey. On one of the rear balconies an old woman was

combing a little girl’s hair, the well known parroquet beside them. I

was looking, with all my eyes I was looking, for the blond hair of my

beloved.

Ah, I saw her at last! It was she, there, bareheaded--her clear-cut

face and golden tint. She was herself driving one of the waggons. A

mission of importance had been entrusted to her. She held her whip

upright in the air, but she loved animals too much to strike them. She

was sitting very straight, holding her head proudly--how lovely were

the lines of her throat! Why had I never noticed that before? I had

never really seen her, so to speak--I must see her, I must see her!

When she emerged from the shadow of the chestnuts the sun made a golden

nimbus through her curly hair, that seemed to blend with the light,

so that one could not tell where her curls began or the light ended.

Beside her on the seat sat a little boy. They were talking to one

another, laughing together. I saw her white teeth, but her glance, her

golden glance, would she not turn it toward me? Nazzarena, Nazzarena,

don’t you feel that I am here, so close to you, perched upon the wall,

this wall just above you?

She laughed, she was passing, she had passed. Now the roof of the

_roulotte_ hid her. I had not called her, she had not looked at

me. Was it possible that I no longer saw her face, nor her eyes, nor

her golden colour? Is it possible that so tremendous a thing lasted

only a tiny little minute?

My heart was bursting in my breast, and I sat there motionless. Why did

I not leap from the wall to the road? Why did I not run after her? Was

I nailed to my place? Now I knew that she was lost to me; now I knew

that she was always lost to me. Like the shepherd leading his flock to

the mountain, whose chance word taught me to know desire, so she, only

by going away, taught me the pain of love-partings.

The pain of love-partings is fixed for me in that picture, a little boy

astride of the wall of his ancestral home, and a little girl who in the

morning light goes away along the road, goes away without turning her

head....

How fast we hold to our memories! Long after, when I had become the

master, the farmer came to ask permission to cut down that tree which

had covered her with its shadow that last time. “Monsieur,” he urged,

“the leaves are rusty, it is all rotten inside, it bears no more fruit,

it is losing value every day, and before long it won’t bring anything.”

I resisted his entreaties, alleging vague reasons. How make an honest

farmer understand that one would preserve a dead chestnut tree merely

because a little gipsy passed under it, so many years ago that one

dares not count them? If there are inexplicable things, this surely is

one.

My man wouldn’t give up. “Monsieur, Monsieur, one of these fine days

it will fall and break down the wall.” I opine that a wall may be

replaced. “Monsieur, Monsieur, one of these fine days it will crush

some one passing by.” Come, that’s more serious. A passer-by can’t be

made over again. Oh, well, let’s be reasonable. If it falls, it will

crush nothing but my heart.

I gave the order to cut down the witness of my first love sorrow. I

leaned over the hole which its torn-up roots left in the earth, and

was not surprised that it occupied so much room. Now the newly-built

wall has closed up the breach, and I feel myself more than ever shut

up within my property. As one advances in life, it seems that the

surrounding walls draw in.

Nature changes before we do. Nature dies before we do. Little by little

we lose all that gave the past its character. Nothing is left to bear

witness to the truth of our memories. Little by little other shadows

than those of trees descend upon us. And it is hard to believe that one

has been--as perhaps every one was once--a boy astride of a wall, not

knowing whether he will jump over, to the free life, to the young girl

who is laughing, to love, or whether he will go back, like a good boy,

to The House....

VI

A WALK WITH FATHER

DURING my long convalescence, as I was not permitted to read all the

time, I had constructed, with the aid of Aunt Deen, who used patiently

to put on her glasses, which she was not fond of wearing, in order to

be more accurate in the use of her big scissors, which sometimes gave

an unlucky slip in the cardboard--all sorts of edifices, châteaux,

farmhouses, cottages, and even cathedrals. I used to set them up on a

great table which had been appropriated to me. The whole represented to

my mind a town which my lead soldiers were to besiege. These soldiers,

some of them a legacy from my brother Bernard, who even as a small

child had begun to make a collection of uniforms, others which had

been brought to me some Christmas Eve by the war-like Little Jesus,

were innumerable; there were whole regiments of them, large and tiny,

thin and plump, infantry, cavalry and artillery. Among the cavalry

some were of one piece with their horses, others were detachable, a

sharp pointed appendix in their rear permitting them to be fixed at

will upon the perforated backs of their horses. One evening there was

a tragic assault. The detached general (he was one of those provided

with an appendix) had been the first to enter the breach, after which

he remounted his chestnut charger, which had been by I know not what

subterfuge hoisted into the interior. In the excitement of victory I

set fire to the four corners of the conquered city, and when I sought

to check its ravages it was too late. In another minute the fire had

consumed everything, and all those houses that had cost me so many

weeks’ work, and upon which I had so prided myself, were only a heap

of black ashes. I was severely reprimanded for having so nearly burned

the furniture, and yet I just sat there in stupefied amazement at the

rapidity of the burning, compared with the time it had taken me to

build.

The abrupt end of my first love affair, that poor little minute in

which it was given me to see Nazzarena in the sunlight--caused me

a like amazement, a like discouragement. Day after day I had been

building up within myself my love story, so vague at first and then

so rich and serious, continually adding something to it--a smile, a

word, a meeting, and even a bit of scoffing on her part; now it was

admiration for her feats of horsewomanship--now that I had merely

passed through the Market Square and seen her _roulotte_. She had

filled a larger place in my life than I suspected, and now nothing more

happened. This void, so new to me, was harder to bear than real pain.

Unavailingly I tried to shake it off, for I could not as yet imagine

how much of comfort one may have remembering things. How should I

have known that it is possible to live outside of the present moment?

All that was left to me of Nazzarena gone, Nazzarena forever lost, it

was less the thought of her than an all pervading lassitude caused by

her absence--a lassitude which was dear to me, in which I seemed to

find her again, and which made me incapable of taking an interest in

anything whatever.

This condition of mind prevented my paying much attention to the

changes which were taking place at our house. I accommodated myself to

them without effort and every one spoke of my yielding disposition.

Since the tower scene a certain embarrassment had existed between

my father and my grandfather, which only my mother’s tact rendered

endurable to either. Though I had not been formally forbidden, I ceased

to walk out with grandfather or even to go to his room. He would

shut himself up a good part of the day to play on his violin. When

we assembled at table he made no attempt to come near me,--it was as

if he had entirely given up our intimacy. That seemed to me somewhat

ungrateful, in view of the important part I had taken in defending

him. Meal times became stupid. One held aloof, another was absorbed

in thought. I understood that both of them, by a tacit understanding,

had retired from the municipal campaign. No one dared to speak of the

elections, which were close at hand, but the notices posted on the

walls which I read on the way to school, told me how things were.

Martinod’s name appeared, and even Galurin’s, but Pour-the-drink and

the two artists had been left out. Aunt Deen talked to herself on the

staircase of extraordinary events and horrible traitors. In the end

Martinod had accomplished his purpose: the candidate whom he dreaded,

the only one he dreaded, had refused to run.

I also understood that grandfather had not gone again to the Café of

the Navigators, either by way of observing the truce, or to avoid

entreaties to which he would doubtless have been inclined to yield.

When he heard that father had been called to the bedside of Casenave,

who was delirious, he seemed surprised and even moved; he had therefore

not seen that old companion.

“Casenave ill!” he exclaimed. “He must have drunk too much.”

At luncheon father announced to us that Casenave was dead.

“I warned him,” he said. “He ought to have given up the bottle long

ago.”

“He chose for himself,” said grandfather.

He chose for himself! That was enough to excuse and justify all

actions, good or bad, and so I understood it. I saw a reply spring to

my father’s lips, but he repressed it, and merely added:

“I have warned Tem Bossette. He will come to the same end, if he does

not take care. It is already pretty late for him.”

“All of them drunkards,” summed up Aunt Deen, who liked to deal in

generalities.

Election Sunday came at last. I knew it by the multicoloured posters

which decorated the fronts of buildings and the greater affluence of

those that I had to wade through on the way to the School Mass. At

the house no one had made the slightest allusion to it. After the

spiritless luncheon grandfather put on his hat and grasped his cane.

“Where are you going?” asked Aunt Deen.

“Into the country.”

“You have voted already?”

“Indeed I have not.”

“It’s a duty.”

“That’s all the same to me.”

“After all, so much the better,” my aunt added; “you would have been

capable of voting for those scoundrels.”

She deemed it useless to designate them more definitely.

He had almost “solicited the suffrages of voters,” to quote from the

posters, and he didn’t even vote. He chose for himself and I could see

no reason to object. Every one had a right to do as he chose and to

change as he fancied,--otherwise what would become of liberty? As he

was going out he suddenly turned to me and proposed that I should go

with him.

“Just let me get my cap,” I cried, starting up, as if I had totally

forgotten the scene in the tower.

Father, who was observing us, checked my enthusiasm by saying:

“Thank you. To-day I will take him for a walk. I am at leisure.”

He very seldom allowed himself leisure. His patients were more and

more absorbing him. His reputation must have extended far and wide,

for he was sent for from great distances; his absences, his journeys

multiplied.

“I am no longer my own master,” he said to mother. “And life is

passing.”

“My dear,” she murmured. “I beg of you don’t overtire yourself so.”

She was always devising ways of caring for him, of finding means for

him to rest. To reassure her he would laugh, drawing himself up to

full height, rounding out his chest. He never needed rest. His robust

shoulders might have borne up the world; and in fact did he not

carry the burden of the house and of our seven futures? By a strange

complication of feeling, though inwardly I was always in a state of

revolt against him, I never ceased to admire him. I could not imagine

him beaten, or complaining. Life was for him one perpetual victory.

I admired him only at a distance. The prospect of this walk with him

appalled me, and I remained on the stairs, waiting for some unknown

event to interpose an obstacle.

“Come,” he said encouragingly, “run get your cap--make haste. The days

are long--we can take a good walk.”

There was no harshness in his sonorous voice, but rather that

encouraging tone that always brought hope to his patients. In fact,

neither when he took me home from the Café of the Navigators, nor in

the tower chamber, had he treated me harshly. But his kindness had

no softening effect upon me. I was not in the least grateful for it,

but still considered him as a ruthless tyrant bent upon keeping me in

fetters. As soon as he appeared I ceased to be free. Had he taken me to

the wildest, most desolate place in the world, I should still have seen

walls rising up around me. With grandfather it always seemed to me as

if all enclosures disappeared, and the enfranchised earth belonged to

every one--or to no one.

Why did my father impose upon me this long walk with him, the mere

prospect of which chilled me? Hadn’t Martinod’s revelations showed me

what his preferences were? He was proud of Bernard and Stephen, he was

always thinking of Mélanie. I had sometimes seen him looking at her

with a strange earnestness, as if he had never seen her before, or as

if he were imprinting her upon his memory; as for me, I didn’t count.

With all the power of my will I was determined to be a misunderstood

son, an unhappy, unjustly neglected child. It was necessary that I

should play this rôle, to keep alive the love-sadness in which I found

my chief pleasure.

Therefore I set out reluctantly, and let him see that I did. He on

the contrary made every effort to be gay. Perceiving that he desired

to put me at my ease, I became all the more reserved, in a spirit of

opposition.

We were off at last, not with the slow pace of idlers who have no

particular point in view, as grandfather and I were in the habit of

walking, but with a light, quick step as if to military music.

“If we walk fast,” he said, “we can do it in two or three hours.”

Desiring him to understand that I was not in the least interested in

the walk, I did not inquire where we were going. It would surely not

be that secluded place where the ferns grew thick, where furze clung

to the rocks, where, apart from the rest of the world, far from houses

and cultivated fields, I had been introduced to wild nature by the soft

music of a cascade.

I remember that as we were passing through a village I gave a great

kick to a fragment of an old drain tile that lay in the road. In an

instant all the dogs were howling at our heels. Somewhat terrified by

their wide open mouths and the great hubbub that I had aroused, I drew

near to my companion.

“Let them bark,” he said reassuringly. “You will see that it is just so

in life. As soon as one makes a little noise in the world all the dogs

rush upon you. If you turn against them you make yourself ridiculous.

The best way is to take no notice, and just let the dogs bark.”

Somehow I knew that he was thinking of Martinod and the slap he had

given him. As soon as we were beyond reach of the dogs I was vexed with

my father for having noticed my movement of fear.

We began to climb a hill by a good mule path. By degrees as we went up

into a purer air, he recovered his fine spirits. It was a lovely day

in late May or early June, warm but with a good breeze. Spring comes

slowly in my country, and vegetation starts suddenly into life. It

might have begun the day before, or the day before that, so bright were

the leaves, so rich the grass, so gay the flowers. We crossed a grove

of oaks, beeches and birches; the ruddy brown oaks formed the pillars

of an immense vaulted temple, hiding the sky.

“Ah,” said father, pausing for breath, and taking off his hat, the

better to feel the coolness that fell from the trees, “how good it is

to be here, and what a beautiful day!”

I wondered at his raptures over so common a thing, which I had so often

enjoyed, not considering how seldom he had an opportunity for such

enjoyment. But he went on:

“It is terrible to be so busy! Not to have time to enjoy the sunshine

and the wide spaces, nor to talk with one’s sons as often as one would

wish. Do you remember the old times, Francis, when I used to tell you

about the wars in the Iliad and the return to Ithaca?”

I had not forgotten, but those epic stories seemed to me to belong

to a far-away and outgrown childhood. They dated from before that

convalescence which had changed my heart. They dated from before my

walks with grandfather, from before liberty and Nazzarena, from before

love. So I cared for them no longer. Hector had fought to guard his

home, and Ulysses had braved tempests to return to his, the smoke from

which he had seen afar, from the sea; but I was looking forward to my

individual future, when I should not be dependent upon any person or

anything.

We soon made our way through the cover of the trees and reached the

top of the hill. It was crowned by the ruins of an ancient fortress,

which, to judge by the broken and crumbling fragments of walls, and by

the height of the still upright and loop-holed towers, must have been

of considerable extent. Brambles and ivy were growing among the ruins,

which seemed to be standing out against the last assault, that of

vegetable growth, greedy to overwhelm them.

“I do not care much for ruins,” observed my father. “They are poetic,

but they weaken the desire for action. They remind us of the end of

things, and the object of life is to build up. Still, they have their

part to play, evoking the memory of a past of conflict and glory. This

was once the fortified château of Malpas. It commanded the road to the

frontier. What attacks and sieges it has endured! In 1814, when France

was assailed by three armies, though it was then entirely dismantled,

cannon were set upon the walls to resist the Austrians.”

I might have known that we were going there. The place is celebrated

through the entire province. For what it was celebrated I only vaguely

knew. Grandfather had never taken me there; he detested places that

every one visited, “where,” he used to say, “whole families go on

Sundays, places full of memories, great men, battles and greasy papers.”

Father grew animated when he talked of battles. Had not he too defended

the house against our enemies, against Aunt Deen’s they, so fiercely

bent upon its overthrow? Won to him for a moment, I had almost asked,

“And where were you during the war, father?” I knew that he had entered

the army and braved the snow with his company during a bitter winter.

But the question did not pass my lips. To have asked it would have

been to own that I was yielding to his influence, and I braced myself

to resist him. I would have given all this forest of oaks, birches and

beeches, all those ruins, so picturesque against the sky-line, for the

chestnut tree under which Nazzarena had passed.

He led me to the edge of the terrace that had once been the court of

the château, the wall of which had been thrown down. From here one

dominated the whole country; there was the lake with its indented

shores, its graceful little gulfs, its green promontories, the town

rising in terraces above it, easy to trace by its open squares and

public gardens; there were the villages of the plain, half hidden

in greenery, like flocks of sheep at rest, those on the hillsides

grouped around their sentry-like churches; and closing in the view, the

mountains, here clothed with forests, there rocky and bare. The pure

afternoon light, shimmering over all, sharpened their outlines. Here

and there a slate roof reflected back its arrows of gold. The various

crops could be distinguished by their different colours, by the various

shades of green, and all the boundaries of the indefinitely divided

properties, hedges, walls or fences, and the little white cemeteries

with their square plots, near the groups of houses, stood out clear.

Father named over all the inhabited places, and then the hills and

valleys. His way was not in the least like grandfather’s. Where

grandfather and I would have looked for such traces of nature as

we could find still surviving in its pristine simplicity between

the havoc wrought by plough and axe, the changes brought about by

agricultural toil, he, on the contrary, was pointing out the constant

intervention of man, the results of the toil of generations. Instead

of the free earth, it was the earth disciplined, constrained to serve,

obey, produce,--the earth that in the past had been watered by blood,

traversed by armed troops, protected by force against the foreigner,

as was meet for a frontier province of France, blessed by prayer. For

a very saint, a popular saint who had brought miracles into every-day

life, our Saint François de Sales had knelt upon this earth and offered

it to God. It was feeding the living; it was giving repose to the dead.

Glorious, fruitful, sacred earth, the eulogy of its threefold greatness

fell from his lips with such lucidity that in spite of myself I was

moved with him.

“And the house,” he concluded, “don’t you see the house?”

I looked for it without interest, realising that I had lost the habit

of looking in that direction. It was, however, easy enough to discover,

on the edge of the town, standing alone, and at its back the lovely

rural domain by which it joined the country.

Like the spirals of a soaring bird, father’s words had covered the

entire country, and now, drawing in its circles, had suddenly dropped

down upon our roof. He went on to describe the house in detail, as one

describes the features of a countenance.

It had not all been built at one time. At first there was only the

ground floor.

“You have seen the date on the tablet in the kitchen chimney--1610.”

“Or 1670,” I thought to myself, almost repeating, like grandfather,

whose reflection recurred to my mind: “It’s a matter of no importance.”

But I dared not risk this comment openly.

A century later our ancestors, having improved their fortunes, had

added a story and built the tower. Limited in one direction by the

town, the property had been extended toward the plain, then covered by

woods. Trees had been cut down to make room for the garden, for fields

and meadows. It had been a constant and oft repeated struggle against

difficulties, against mischance and against other foes. Did father,

then, believe in Aunt Deen’s _they_? I had almost smiled, but he

did not give me time. Each generation had brought its effort to the

common task, and one or another--that of the garde-français, that of

the grenadier,--its contribution of honour; the chain had not been

broken.

I felt a strong desire to object--“How about grandfather?” What would

he have said to that?

He answered without my question, with no bitterness in his voice,

when he went on. Sometimes the chain had been stretched almost to

the breaking point, and the house had seen bad days. He pictured it

ploughing the waves like a strong ship that has an unerring pilot at

the helm. His voice, which in the old days had so joyfully related the

exploits of heroes, seemed now to rise, with growing exaltation, into a

sort of hymn to the house. It was the poem of the land, the race, the

family, it was the history of our realm, our dynasty.

Through the years that have fled since then, the memory of that day,

far from weakening, has grown more full of meaning to my eyes. My

father had measured the length of the road which I had followed

in separating myself from him, and was endeavouring to recall me,

to overtake me, to attach me to himself again. Before resorting to

authority he was trying to kindle my imagination, awaken my heart, free

them from chimeras and set before them an object capable of moving

them. Only, hemmed in on all sides as he was by the pressure of daily

duty, he had felt the need of haste, he had only this one day, a part

of which was already gone, only a few fleeting hours in which to effect

my transformation. He was hoping to regain his lost son by a single

effort, counting upon his incomparable art of winning men, of subduing

them to himself.

Now, so late, I realise that all he was saying to convince me, to

awaken in me an emotion which should free me from my bonds, must have

been as noble as a Homeric song. Even then I had some inward intuition

of it. I do not know if ever more eloquent words were uttered than

those he spoke to me upon that hilltop, while evening was slowly

beginning to paint the sky and breathe peace upon the earth. I can find

no other words to express it,--he was paying court to me like a lover

who feels that he is not loved, who yet knows that his love alone can

bestow happiness. The affection of a father descends, calls to ours to

rise to it; but his, by a unique privilege which in no sense lowered

its pride, rose to me, enveloped me, implored me.

Yes, I really believe that my father was imploring me, and I remained

apparently unmoved while I should have interrupted him with a cry in

which my whole being was outpoured. Yet I was not in fact unmoved.

There was too much pathos in the tone of his voice not to thrill

through my early awakened sensibility. But by a singular inconsistency,

that in me which was moved by his voice was precisely the very desire,

all the desires, that he was trying to eradicate from my heart. That

voice was chanting the stones of the house that had been built to

triumph over time, the shelter of the roof, the unity of the family,

the strength of the race which maintains itself upon the soil, the

peace of the dead whom God has in his keeping. And while this canticle

was thus making melody I was distinctly hearing another, sung for me

alone by the music of the vagabond wind, the immensity of unknown

spaces, the words of the shepherd on his way to the mountain; the

apple blossoms showered upon my face the first day of my love, and

Nazzarena’s laugh, and the hopeless shadow of the chestnut tree under

which she had passed.

For one moment my father thought that he had conquered. His piercing

eyes, always studying me, discerned my emotion. An impulse of sincerity

moved me to turn away without speaking, and he understood that I was

far from him. His voice ceased. Surprised by the sudden silence I

looked at him in my turn, and I saw sadness sweeping over him like a

shadow, that heart-breaking shadow that rises from the hollows of the

valleys and slowly climbs the mountains as night draws on.

... Father, now I can interpret your sadness. Alone I have once more

made the pilgrimage of Malpas, and alone there, I could understand

you better. You were thinking of your two elder sons, who, burning

with sacrifice, would soon be far away, for the service of God and of

the fatherland. You were thinking of your dear Mélanie, who, drawn

by the severe serenity of the cloister, was awaiting the hour of her

majority. The main branches of the tree of life that you had planted

were detaching themselves from the trunk. You had been counting upon

me to continue your work and I was escaping you. By yourself alone you

had sustained the tottering house, and the house, overwhelming you

with labours and cares, was separating your own from you. It is the

penalty of material necessities,--they do not leave time enough for

the guardianship of souls. But you were thinking of triumphing over

time by the mere power of your virile love for me, and your eloquence.

In one walk, one conversation, you had hoped to regain the ground you

had lost, without violating the respect due to your father. The heart

of a child of fourteen years is an obscure heart, especially when love

has entered it too soon. I did feel the importance of what you were

teaching me, and yet I was considering how to shake it off. The less

clearly I understood the word liberty, the more it fascinated and

drew me. All the music to which I was listening was the music that it

made....

My father’s disappointment found expression in a gesture. Grieved at

his inability to win me he suddenly seized me by the two arms as if to

lift me from the ground, and prove that he possessed me.

“Oh, understand me, poor child,” he exclaimed. “You must indeed

understand me. Your whole future depends upon it.”

“Father, you hurt,” was my only reply.

I lied, for his grasp had merely surprised me. He tried to make light

of it.

“Oh, come, that’s not true! I didn’t hurt you in the least.”

“Yes, you did,” I insisted with temper.

He replied kindly, almost apologetically, “I did not mean to.”

Ah, I might well be proud of myself! That strength which I dreaded had

entreated instead of breaking me: it had not conquered me.

He laid his hand on my head, no doubt to clear my mind of any mistaken

interpretation of his former act, and though he did not lean hard upon

it, I felt it heavy upon me. A few years earlier, grandfather, by the

same imposition of hands, had invested me with the ownership of all

nature.

“Let us go back,” said my father. “Let us go back to the house.”

He said “the house,” like me. Until then the expression had been too

familiar to make an impression. This time it did impress me.

On the homeward way we heard the detonations of small cannon, fired in

honour of the elections.

“So soon!” he said. “The Martinod list is elected.”

The frustration of his public hopes had followed hard upon his paternal

disappointment. For a moment he bowed his head, but it was only for a

moment.

The church bell of a neighbouring village rang the Angelus. Another

replied, and then another, breathing over all the country-side the

serenity of evening and of prayer.

My father stood still to listen, and he smiled. Through this peaceful

reminder of the Annunciation God was speaking to him, and through it he

regained composure.

“Let’s walk fast,” he said, “your mother may be anxious over our delay.”

I was thinking within myself: “One of these days I shall go away. One

of these days I shall be my own master, like grandfather.”

VII

THE FIRST DEPARTURE

A FEW days after this disappointing walk--perhaps even the next

day--I went to my mother’s room to get a forgotten school book. I was

already turning the latch of the door when I heard two voices. One, my

mother’s, was familiar to my ear, but its tones were almost new to me,

by reason of the firmness now mingled with its habitual gentleness;

when we were little she had sometimes spoken to us in that tone to

require more attention and earnestness in our little duties, or our

lessons. As for the other, it must have been that of a stranger, even

of some one asking for alms, for it came to my ear hushed, veiled,

melancholy. What visitor was this whom my mother received in her room

and not in the drawing-room? I dared neither go in nor let go of the

latch, lest in falling it should betray my presence. Hooted to the

spot, at once by timidity and curiosity, I listened to the dialogue

going on within.

“I am sure you are mistaken,” my mother was saying. “The child is

going through a crisis, but he is not different from his brothers and

sisters; he is not estranged from us.”

“The chasm is deeper than you think, Valentine,” replied the other

voice. “I feel that I am losing him. If you had seen him at Malpas,

how inflexible he was, how he resisted my exhortations, almost my

entreaties.”

“He is only a child.”

“Too mature a child. I can not yet be sure what it is that estranges

him from us, but I shall find out. Ah, poor dear, there is no use in

trying to reassure me; three years ago my father completed his cure by

keeping him out of doors, but he did not give back to us the same child

that we had entrusted to him: he has changed his heart, and it is in

childhood that the heart is formed. This child is no longer ours.”

_This child is no longer ours_. The statement lifted me up with a

sort of vanity. I belonged to no one. I was free. That liberty which

grandfather had not been able to command, even in the blood of the days

of June, had all of a sudden become mine!

I had recognised my father’s voice, and my parents were talking of

me. But why had they so interchanged their attitudes that I had not

at first recognised them? I had always supposed that they could not

change. Mother was always anxious about nothing at all--when the wind

blew or the thunder growled, even far away, she never failed to light

the blessed candle; or her shadow behind her chamber window told us

that she was watching for the return of the absent ones. She was never

wholly at peace, unless we were all grouped around her, except, indeed,

when praying, for she lived very near to God. It sometimes happened

that father would laugh at her for her endless anxieties. During my

illness, and longer ago, when the house had been put up for sale, it

was he, always he, who kept up her woman’s courage, who assured her

of the future, reminded her of the constant protection of Providence.

I had never imagined them otherwise, and now behold they had changed

parts,--it was mother who was uplifting father in his discouragement.

I should have been disgusted with myself if I had listened at doors.

Urged by self-esteem, mingled with a sense of honour, I should not have

hesitated to enter the room but for the next words, which were uttered

by my father, and which nailed me to the spot, the latch still in my

hand, powerless to go in or to draw back, so greatly was I impressed

and captivated.

“The same thing took place between him and me that long ago took place

between me and my father--the same family tragedy.”

“Oh, Michel, what do you mean?”

“Yes, my father was right when he recalled it the day that I found

Francis in his room, the day when Francis took his part against

me--unhappy child! When I was little, I, too, had felt the influence of

my grandfather. Only it was exercised in the other direction. He had

been president of the Chamber at the Court. Returning home at the age

of retirement, he amused himself with cultivating the garden. It was he

who planted the rose-garden. He taught me the importance, the beauty,

yes, the beauty of the order to which man may subject not only himself,

but nature. Perhaps it is to him that I owe it that I have been able to

direct my life, to dominate it. But my father, who was interested only

in his music and his utopias, used to laugh at us. ‘He will turn that

child into a geometrician,’ he used to say. It is he who has turned my

child into a rebel.”

He added, bitterly, “A father, in his own house, should never yield his

own authority to any one. To withdraw Francis from that influence which

has gained the upper hand of mine, I should not hesitate even to send

him to boarding school. It would only be anticipating by a year or two

the method we adopted for the older children. And in fact our school is

hardly advanced enough for him now.”

“It would be one more expense,” objected mother.

“Money is a small thing compared with education.”

Thus I learned that they were proposing to arrange my future without

consulting me! Boarding school--prison--was to punish me for my

independence. For the moment I was crushed,--then, in my pride I

refused to admit that I was crushed. Would not that be to admit the

attractions of the house? Since they were considering the possibility

of sending me away I would get ahead of them, and would myself ask to

go. Yes, that should be the punishment I would inflict upon my parents.

Upon my parents only?

But I could not remain there at the door and be surprised--and besides,

I was ashamed! I therefore finally turned the latch and went in. I went

in like an important personage, steeling myself against the emotion

which was getting the better of me.

“I have come for my book,” said I, by way of justifying my entrance.

Father and mother, sitting opposite one another, looked at me and then

exchanged a glance. I found my book--which a careful hand had put in

order upon the table, seized it hastily and turned to go.

“Francis,” said my mother.

I turned to her with an expressionless face, put on to keep back the

tears.

“Listen, my child,” she said,--and when she called me “child” I drew

myself up--“you must always obey your father.”

Obey! the word was odious to me. “Why, I always listen to him,” I said.

Father fixed me with his piercing eyes that hurt as if I felt the

points of their rays. He seemed to hesitate; no doubt he did hesitate

between his desire to explain and the sense of its uselessness.

Recovering his natural--and by that very fact, authoritative--voice, he

simply gave me a proof of confidence.

“We were talking of you just now,” he said.

“Yes, of you,” repeated mother, somewhat anxiously.

Then came a sort of interrogatory:

“What do you think of being when you are grown?” asked father. “You

think about it sometimes, don’t you? What sort of life would you

prefer? You have your own tastes and preferences. Have you chosen your

vocation, like your brothers?”

My vocation! Just what I expected! Vocations were often talked about at

our house, and how every one ought faithfully to fulfil his own. During

my illness, and in the early days of my convalescence, before my walks

with grandfather, I had often thought, and even announced, that when

I was grown up I would be a doctor, too. I could not imagine a finer

career. I had talked in the kitchen with the peasants who came for the

doctor, their faces all drawn with pain, and on the staircase I had met

the train of patients who came for consultation with dolorous faces,

and went away cheered. Though I had ceased to talk about it it was

understood at our house that I was to be my father’s successor.

“I don’t know,” I replied, turning away.

“Ah!” he exclaimed, in a surprised and disappointed tone. “I thought

you wanted to be a doctor.”

“Oh, no!” I replied, suddenly making up my mind in a spirit of

opposition.

He said nothing more of this hope which had been dear to him, but went

on:

“Oh, well, you have plenty of time to choose. Lawyer, perhaps? There

are noble causes to defend. Or architect? Building houses, restoring

old ones, constructing schools and churches--we have no good architects

about here; there is a vacancy for one.”

Thus by turns he extolled the various professions which might keep me

in my native town. As he spoke the dastardly thought came to me of

separating myself entirely from the house, of achieving the conquest

of my own liberty. I sought about in my mind for a calling which would

oblige me to leave home. In our part of the country there were no mines

nor any metallurgical establishments.

“I want to be an engineer,” I said.

I had but just made the discovery, and knew but vaguely the nature of

the profession. There had been some talk about it in the family for

Stephen.

“Really?” said my father, without pursuing the subject. “We will talk

about it another time.”

“Only,” I said, hanging my head and averting my eyes, somewhat

surprised to find how one thing followed another, “only I should need

another preparation than that of this school.”

“Your school isn’t sufficient?”

“Oh, the teachers are good fellows,” I replied contemptuously, “but as

for lessons, they are far from brilliant.”

Father said “ah!” and was silent. Raising my eyes I saw how surprised

he was, and that was as joyful to me as a victory. Perhaps there was

also in his countenance another expression than one of surprise. I was

giving him an opportunity to get rid of me, as I was pleased to think

was his wish; why did he not make the most of it? He turned to mother,

who seemed grieved.

“This requires reflection,” he said.

How could one, at such an early age, find pleasure in tormenting

those who loved him? Perhaps the picture in my Bible representing the

return of the Prodigal Son had taught me the inexhaustible resources

of paternal love. My father seemed to me so strong that I could have

no fear of hurting him. All through life it is those upon whom one

most depends whom one uses and misuses without mercy, not so much

as thinking that they may be weary, since they never complain. And

counting on their energy and health one always persuades oneself that

there will be plenty of time to make it up to them, in case of need.

And yet I had discerned my father’s sorrow as I stood at the door, and

the altered tone of his voice had revealed to me its depth. I am asking

myself now if that very confession of sorrow, far from touching me did

not lessen him in my eyes, accustomed as I had been to consider him an

invincible hero--whether it did not change for me that picture of him

which he had imprinted upon me from my earliest intelligence.

The long vacation did not bring its usual gaiety and diversions, that

year. Mélanie’s departure for the convent, and that of Stephen, young

as he was, for the Seminary had been finally decided upon. They were

merely waiting for the month of October; then father would take his

daughter to Paris and at the same time would place me in the school

where my two elder brothers had finished their preparatory studies--for

I had gained my point--and mother would go to Lyons with Stephen. This

knowledge cast over our games and our gatherings a shade of sadness,

which those concerned tried in vain to clear away. Aunt Deen, who was

growing a little heavier, climbed the stairs more slowly, blew her nose

noisily, prayed very loud and with a certain impetuosity which must

have shaken the saints in Paradise, and murmured Thy will be done in

a tone that could hardly pass for one of submission. Grandfather shut

himself up in his tower, playing his violin with hands that trembled,

adding other notes than those of the score, went out for his walk

at nightfall without a word to any one, and seemed to be living in

ignorance and indifference concerning all that was going on in the

family. When he met me he would simply make the remark, accompanied

with his little laugh,

“Ah, there you are!” while he never spoke to either of my brothers or

sisters as he passed them. But his laugh did not ring true; my ear was

quick to perceive that our separation weighed upon him. I would gladly

have rushed to him if he had not had an air of thinking lightly of all

the vexations in the world. The shadow of my father was always between

us. I had had no orders to avoid him; our alienation was by tacit

consent. We had never dared to confess to any complicity. One day,

however, he added:

“So, you are going to Paris?”

“Yes, grandfather, when schools open.”

“You are in luck. One feels more free in Paris than anywhere else. You

will see.”

Was he jesting again? For me Paris meant boarding school, prison. And

besides, had he not often told me that large cities are baneful, that

real happiness was to be found only in the fields? But grandfather

cared little enough for logic.

My approaching departure--that departure which I had proudly demanded,

and which inspired within me a secret repulsion against which I

hardened myself, made but small stir in the house--a fact that greatly

irritated my self-love--being lost in that of Mélanie and my brothers,

as a small boat is lost in the wake of a great vessel. Bernard, who

had graduated from Saint-Cyr with a high grade that put him in the

marine infantry, would go to Toulon, whence he would shortly embark for

Tonkin. Now his first word, on his return home had been--I heard him

say it to Aunt Deen, who had hastened, breathless, to open the door,

“You can’t imagine the pleasure with which I ring this bell.”

Then why did he ask to go to China? Mélanie and Stephen, too, exchanged

mystifying confidences.

“Do you really want to go?” Stephen asked his sister. “We are so happy

here. As for me, there are days when I am not sure.”

Mélanie, with illumined eyes, replied:

“I must, indeed, since God calls me,” adding, almost gaily,

“But I shall carry a lot of handkerchiefs, a dozen at least, for I feel

sure that I shall cry all the tears that are in me.”

Why, oh why, then, that craze to go away when they said they were

so happy at home? And I, too, why was I suffering in advance at the

thought of leaving the house, since I had discovered that I was

misunderstood and forlorn, and since I was determined to go?

One evening toward the end of August our friend Abbé Heurtevant came to

see us, with a lenten face, so long and dolorous that we all expected

to hear of some catastrophe. Mother hastily spoke for us all.

“Monsieur l’Abbé, for the love of God what has happened?”

“Ah, madame, Monseigneur is dead!”

I was the only one, except grandfather, who supposed him to be speaking

of his ecclesiastical superior. But all the others understood, and

bewailed the death of the Count de Chambord, who was known to have had

an affection of the stomach for several days, or rather, as our abbé

declared, to have been poisoned by strawberries. Aunt Deen burst out in

tumultuous despair, my sisters endeavouring to console her, and father

uttered a short obituary address which to me seemed lacking in heart.

“It is a misfortune for France, which he would have governed wisely.

Monseigneur the Count of Paris succeeds him: the two princes had become

reconciled, and that was the crown of a noble life. But what is the

matter with you, Abbé?”

The abbé appeared to be even more inconsolable than Aunt Deen.

Grandfather, who since the affair of the electoral lists had said less

and less concerning his political opinions, could not control his

tongue on this occasion:

“Why, don’t you see that his prophecies are choking him? He is thinking

of the Abbey of Orval and of Sister Rose-Colombe. No hope now of

hoisting his ‘young prince’ to the throne. There he is, dead from

eating too much fruit. And the new Pretender isn’t much younger than

the old one.”

“Father, I beg!” protested father.

The abbé, crushed and crumpled in the depths of an easy chair, suddenly

started up, drew up the long lines of his body till one might have

thought he had climbed upon something in order to orate, and in a

thundering voice made confession of his faith:

“The King is dead. Long live the King! And the lilies will bloom again!”

“They will bloom again,” repeated Aunt Deen, with conviction.