LOUISON AND MARGUERITE.
Dame Doudel held a letter in her hand. “It is from my sister Tillery,”
she said. “Just as usual, she wants you. As if there was no person in
the world but herself.”
“I should like to go. Dame Tillery is always kind, always glad when I
come,” said Marguerite, flushing with pleasure. All at once a thought
chilled this sweet enthusiasm. If she went to Versailles then, perhaps
_he_ might come in her absence, and never take the trouble of calling
again.
Dame Doudel saw the change in Marguerite’s countenance without
comprehending it.
“Do not be troubled, little one,” she said. “You shall go, if it
disappoints you so much. My sister has no children of her own, and I
would not stand in the way of any good fortune that might come to you
for all the world. So brighten up! brighten up! and get your work done.
She will not be here to-day or to-morrow—you have plenty of time.”
Still Marguerite’s pretty face was clouded, and her bosom swelled with a
sigh, soft and quick as the bland air that shook the snow-white curtains
at her window. Two days! Perhaps she might see him in that time. Surely,
if he cared about coming again, there would be time enough. “Now fill
your basket, Marguerite, and come with me to the market. If you are to
have holidays with my sister, we must work hard now.”
Marguerite sighed. Her own share in the business had grown very dull
since so many courtiers had been driven from the kingdom. There could be
scarcely a market for flowers, when the people of the nation were
starving for bread. Still she said nothing, but gathering up the
garlands and bouquets that lay heaped on the table, prepared to go out.
These two females, as they came out of their humble domicil, formed a
strong but by no means unpleasant contrast. Dame Doudel, with her thin
features, sharp, black eyes, and prompt action, was the very embodiment
of those national traits which have rendered the women of France among
the most brilliant and practical in the world. Marguerite, with her
sweet, young face shaded by a straw gipsy tied under the chin with a
knot of blue ribbon, and the outlines of her slender person scarcely
concealed by the thin mantle of white muslin that floated over her
dress, seemed pure and innocent as the flowers she carried on her arm.
Even in that busy and riotous season, when all France was in a state of
agitation, people turned in the street to look at this pretty creature
as she stepped daintily along, tapping the pavement with her high-heeled
shoes, and looking down with loving fellowship on her flowers, as if
each bud were akin to her.
When Dame Doudel and her protegée reached the market, a little tumult
arose among the women, most of whom recognized Marguerite as the person
who had with one word so effectually represented their cause to the king
on that memorable day at Versailles.
“It is the child our Mirabeau brought to us when he said that the market
mast be represented by a girl pretty and innocent; for nothing less can
speak well for its devotion to France. From that day we have made her
the child of the market. We are all her mothers. When the king made her
a promise, it was for us. When he kissed her forehead, it was a seal of
good faith to us. The king is good! The king is good! If he breaks faith
with us, it is because of the Austrian.”
With these words, accompanied with ardent caresses, the women of the
market swarmed around the girl as if each one had some proprietorship in
her innocence and beauty. They loaded her with fruit; they added to her
lovely burden of flowers, and embraced her as if she had been a goddess.
Marguerite received the homage with faint blushes, almost crying as she
thought how little she had done to deserve so much affection. In vain
she strove to convince them that she felt like an impostor. They would
not permit even herself to diminish one virtue in their idol; would not
believe that anything less than perfection could rest in the being whom
Mirabeau had chosen to represent them before the king.
At last Marguerite shrunk away from all these demonstrations, and
bursting into tears, cried out,
“Do not praise me! Do not love me so much! I did nothing! I used no
argument; nay, I was worse than a coward, and could only cry out for
bread, bread for our famished people. Then a panic seized me, and I
fainted at the king’s feet!”
“Yes, yes! but he lifted you in his arms; he kissed your forehead while
the Austrian was looking on. His heart would always go out to the people
if she would let it. What was the need of words. He saw our wants in
your face; he heard them in that one word—_bread_!”
Marguerite was standing by Dame Doudel’s stall, around which the women
of the market had assembled, forgetting their traffic, and filled with
enthusiasm. Their praises went to the young girl’s heart. With a love of
royalty deep-seated in her nature, she felt her present position among
these ardent women as a fraud which she had no right to maintain.
Dame Doudel, while she rejoiced in the scene, watched her protegée
closely, fearing that some imprudent word might extinguish the
enthusiasm which was exalting her into something scarcely less than a
goddess. All at once, Marguerite burst into a passion of tears, and
retreating from the crowd of her admirers, caught Dame Doudel by the
dress.
“Oh! tell them—tell them that I love the king, the queen, and everything
that belongs to them! Tell these good women they are breaking my heart
with praises that I do not deserve, never can deserve!”
“Hush, child! Hush, I command you!” cried the dame, breathless with
terror. “What is it to them? Who asks you not to love the king—we all
love him!”
“What—what does she say? Who is it among us that has made her cry—tell
us that!”
“It is nothing. She is a tender-hearted little thing, and weeps with
joy. Cannot you see that yourselves? Hush, my darling! let me speak for
you. I know these women; they wish no evil to the king. Hush! hush!”
Still Marguerite’s tender conscience was not pacified. She was timid,
but by no means a coward. Those women evidently believed her heart and
soul one of themselves, while she shrunk from all sympathy with them.
How could she make them understand this without wounding her
benefactress.
“Let me speak! Oh! let me tell them!” she pleaded, clinging to the
frightened dame. “It need harm no one but myself.”
“I cannot. I have already told them you were one of us. Would you prove
me a liar, and have me hooted out of the market?”
“No, no! I did not think of that.”
“Then be quiet.”
“I will—I will. Only tell them that I deserve nothing.”
“Very well; but look up. Wipe your eyes, and try to smile.”
Marguerite tried her best to obey. She wiped her eyes with a fold of her
muslin mantle, and made a pitiful attempt to brighten her face; but just
before her, or rather above her, as she looked up, stood a young woman
mounted on one of the stalls, who was regarding her with the keen
scrutiny of an enemy. Marguerite gave a faint cry, and clung to Dame
Doudel in sudden terror.
“Do not speak—let them all go; but take me away—take me away from that
woman!”
The words died on those white lips, leaving them parted till the teeth
shone through. The great, blue eyes of the girl widened and glowed with
kindling horror. She knew that the woman who stood there, so fiendish in
her beauty, was, in fact, a murderer. A sick faintness settled down upon
her, and she sunk to a market-stool perfectly insensible.
Then the voice of Louison Brisot broke forth in clear, ringing tones,
that fell from her lips hot with the seething anger of a jealous woman.
“My friends—women of France, tell me, if you can, who it is that you are
worshiping?” she demanded, looking around upon the crowd which was now
increased by a rabble from the streets. “Have you grown weak enough to
pay homage to a child like that? What could she do for France? See how
she sinks down and withers like a dead lily, at the first sound of my
voice. Is it of such material that freedom is moulded? Is she a creature
to represent the liberty of a nation? Why the first trumpet blast would
frighten the life from her body. What has she done that you gather
around her so!”
“She is goodness itself—a child of the people, innocent as an angel. It
was she who stood before the king that day at Versailles!” cried a dozen
voices. “Why should you come here, Louison Brisot, to assail her? What
can one like you know of a blameless child like her?”
“But who is she—I demand that? Who is she?” cried Louison, trembling
with rage; for this was the first time her opinions had been questioned
among the women of the market.
A broad-chested, keen-eyed woman, seated among the vegetables on her own
stall, with both arms bare to the elbow, folded over her bosom, answered
this question promptly,
“She is the friend of Mirabeau. He chose her to speak for us before the
king. What more do you want, Louison Brisot!”
“The friend of Mirabeau! Let me look on her face!”
Louison Brisot sprang from the stall, where she had been accustomed to
harangue the women, and forced a passage to the spot where Marguerite
lay insensible, half supported by the arms of Dame Doudel.
“Let me look on her face, I say. Mirabeau has no friends that are not
mine.”
The deathly pallor on Marguerite’s face was white and cold as it had
been when Doudel fell at her feet on that awful day when the Bastille
was taken. Had she seen the young creature blooming, and with smiles
upon her lips, it is doubtful if she would have known her again. As it
was, a triumphant smile lighted her face when she turned upon the crowd.
“This is an aristocrat, and no friend of Count Mirabeau’s.”
The market women laughed, some with good-natured, mellow laughter,
others bitterly, and casting menacing glances at Louison.
“As if we did not know,” said the woman, who had from the first,
answered Louison so boldly. “I, myself, went with her before the king.
Count Mirabeau put her especially under my care—the lamb! Who will have
the face to gainsay me in that? Not you, Louison Brisot, who never saw
her.”
“But I have seen her,” almost shrieked Louison; “and as I tell you, she
was trying to save one of the king’s guard at the Bastille.”
“And why not?” called out the portly dame who had spoken before. “Who
among us was not at the taking of the Bastille? I was, and she went with
me.”
Louison’s outstretched arms fell to her side. She was not convinced; but
this evidence coming from the market, baffled her. She looked around on
the crowd of faces uplifted toward her, some were angry, some drawn with
sneers; but most were laughing at her defeat, in careless good-humor.
The stout woman who had, in fact, been one of a committee to wait on the
king that day at Versailles, swung herself down from the stall on which
she sat, and began to arrange her vegetables in high good-humor.
Another, as she held up a splendid fish for the inspection of a
customer, asked Louison if she thought that fine fellow was an
aristocrat, too; and shook her sides with laughter when a sharp glance,
but no answer, came in reply. In less than ten minutes the excited
throng around Dame Doudel’s stall had dispersed, and the whole market
was given up to business, made a little brisker by the time that had
been lost.