IT was more than a year after, that, one sunny August day, the Abbé de
Ronceray alighted from the diligence as it stopped before the great
stone gate of a white-walled convent in Provence. The air was soft, as
Provence air is, and the sky was of a deep, deep blue, against which
the masses of purplish woods showed darkly. The road was white and
clean, and over everything grew roses of a rich red and a richer white
and the palest pink,--all rioting in the beauty of the summer time.
The abbé had aged a little in that year, but his eyes were as kind as
ever, and his carriage as soldierlike. He walked slowly down the avenue
lined with tall Lombardy poplars, standing in ranks, like soldiers,
toward the low, rambling convent building. There was a sweet stillness
over everything,--that peculiar quiet and absence of alarms which
characterizes places from which the tumultuous world is excluded. The
abbé’s thoughts were decidedly optimistic. The country had quieted down
under the rule of the Corsican, and the abbé had no doubt, like all
the rest of the Bourbon followers, that, after Napoleon’s day, France
would again call for her rightful king, and he pleased himself mightily
with the notion. Meanwhile, it was pleasanter living in France, even
under the Corsican’s rule, than anywhere on earth,--for exile is hard
upon your true Frenchman. He had served his term of duty with the Comte
d’Artois, and had been heartily glad when he was excused from further
attendance, for a time at least, and some other patient abbé had taken
his place.
As he neared the open door in the middle of the sunny, whitewashed
convent walls, he began to be a little eager respecting the person he
was to see.
“Who would have thought Lady Betty Stair would ever be a religious! She
seemed born to be of a court--her little feet seemed made for white
satin slippers only, and dancing was more natural to her than walking.
Ah, those Highland dances she used to do so like a sprite--and De
Bourmont--”
The abbé shook his head and sighed. That chance word he let fall that
night at Holyrood lay heavy on his conscience. He had made a long
journey to confess it, and when told he had committed no sin, only an
unfortunate inadvertence, his conscience was not altogether eased. For
many years he had harbored no suspicion of the identity of the man
who came to him that October evening in 1789, and in darkness and in
whispers confessed having run Angus Macdonald through the body, when
called to account for some slight to the Scotchman’s young sister.
Of late, though, he was haunted by the thought that it was Bastien.
Lady Betty Stair evidently knew who it was, but her cry, “My heart
is broken!” seemed grotesquely out of place concerning Bastien, whom
she notoriously hated. Being well skilled in the human heart, the abbé
had seen how things were in the old days between De Bourmont and Lady
Betty Stair; but, like everybody else, he was astounded when Lady Betty
quietly left Holyrood, a few days after De Bourmont’s departure, and
the next heard of her, she had entered the novitiate of the Sisters of
Mercy. Scarcely less of a change had come over De Bourmont,--he, once
the most careless, debonair young spirit in the world,--now, a silent,
serious, determined soldier, without a hope or an aspiration beyond
his duty. It was all very puzzling, and the abbé had not cleared it up
when he pulled the convent bell and heard it clang through the building
in the quiet of the August afternoon. The abbé, bowing low to the
portress, asked to see the superior, and was shown into the convent
parlor to await her. It was so calm, so peaceful--and there were so
many roses! They even climbed through the window, and their laughing
faces peered over the stone sill. Presently the superior entered, and
she and the abbé, having known each other long before the troubles,
were delighted to meet once more; and to show her appreciation of the
honor of the visit she took him into the convent garden, where a lay
sister served seed cake and mulberry wine to him. The abbé crumbled his
cake and made a heroic effort to drink the wine; but it was too much
for his politeness and his charity combined. However, the superior,
intent on hearing of all their mutual friends, did not remark this.
After a while the abbé said:--
“I desire, after paying my respects to you, dear mother, to see Sister
Claire, who is also an old friend of mine, despite the difference
in our ages. She was in attendance upon their Royal Highnesses at
Holyrood, and she was then Lady Betty Stair.”
“Ah, Sister Claire! Well, Monsieur l’Abbé, I can only say that the more
of those fine ladies who come to us, the better. They have already
served so hard an apprenticeship to the rule of the world, that ours
seems simple enough to them. They find the hardest life of a religious
easy by comparison with what society exacted of them. They always turn
out our bravest sisters; they fear nothing.”
The abbé nodded his head with pleased approval at this.
“True, very true. It was not of the world that it was said, ‘For My
yoke is easy, and My burden is light.’”
“And Sister Claire is no exception to the rest. She is so
courageous--ready to do anything, to go anywhere--depend upon it,
Monsieur l’Abbé, there is something in blood, after all.”
The mother superior said this as if it were a highly original remark,
and the abbé smiled,--he felt sure, whatever Lady Betty Stair
professed to be, she was that with all her heart. And in a little while
the mother superior arose to send Sister Claire to him, and presently
he heard a quick, light step tripping down the flagged walk under the
lilac-trees behind him. It gave him a weird sensation; he felt as if he
were in the long gallery at Holyrood, and Lady Betty Stair was tripping
toward him in little high-heeled red slippers, and she would appear
before him in a moment in a gay little white gown, and make him a low
courtesy as in the old days; and he did not come out of his day dream
until he saw Sister Claire standing close by him, her face framed in
white, and her graceful figure not wholly concealed by the habit of the
Sisters of Mercy.
The abbé’s first idea was, that Lady Betty had grown taller and more
beautiful than he could ever have dreamed. In place of her charming
prettiness was a lofty and touching beauty. Her old spirit was not
gone,--there was the same gleam in her eyes, the same color in her
cheeks, but glorified by the dignity of self-sacrifice. She was so
glad to see the abbé that she squeezed his hand tightly in her two
small palms; and then sat down by him on the bench. Both of them were
a little shaken, and a diamond drop or two hung upon Sister Claire’s
lashes.
“How kind you were to come!” she cried; and the abbé noticed, even in
her voice, the magic change. It had always been sweet, but now it was
thrilling. And he felt sure, in one minute, that whatever might have
been the storms through which she had passed, now, at least, she was at
peace.
“Tell me about yourself, my child,” he asked.
“There is not much to tell--only, that I have to-day obtained the
desire of my heart. I have always longed to help our dear, brave
soldiers in the field, and I was so afraid I would be made to teach,
or to nurse the rich when they are ill, or something really hard. But
to-day it is settled--I am to be with an ambulance--not in charge--for
I have no experience yet--but I am to do what I have longed to
do. I think my fighting blood must make me yearn to help our poor
soldiers,--and God has been so good to me in letting me do it.”
“I congratulate you, my child. Nothing is nobler or more useful. You
will perhaps find many old acquaintances among the officers, who will
be of help to you.”
“I shall make them all help me,” she cried, nodding her head very
much as of old. Then she began to ask after the Royal Highnesses both
of them had served, and after many other persons they both knew. She
could give him news of Madame Mirabel, who was well and happy in being
still allowed to follow exiled royalty; and Monsieur Bastien, she
said, smiling, had married the widow of a rich contractor. The abbé’s
tongue was well under control, but his countenance remained expressive.
Something in his look told Sister Claire that the subject of Bastien
was unpleasing; and then she asked, quite calmly and naturally, “And
Monsieur de Bourmont, what has become of him?”
The abbé started a little, but, seeing her quite composed, though a
little pale, answered her in the most matter-of-fact way imaginable.
“A major of artillery. He frankly avowed his royalist principles to
General Bonaparte, who assured him it should not stand in the way of
his promotion, and it has not. But you would scarcely know him now, he
is so changed.”
“How, Monsieur l’Abbé?” asked Sister Claire, turning still paler, but
not losing her calmness.
“Grave, quiet, taciturn. You remember what a gay dare-devil he was
once? He looks many years older, and in a little more than a year he
has grown as gray as I am. He is, however, a useful and brilliant
officer.”
“A useful and brilliant officer!” repeated Sister Claire, dreamily.
“Then he ought to be content. None of those who live in the world can
hope to be more than that.”
Then there was a little pause. The abbé felt a slight awkwardness in
speaking of De Bourmont before her who had once been the Lady Betty
Stair. And then a new courage leaped into Sister Claire’s glowing eyes,
and she said, after a moment:--
“Monsieur l’Abbé, I wish to tell you something about Monsieur de
Bourmont, which you may at some time convey to him, and it may give
him comfort. You will understand that I ask you to regard what I tell
you as a sacred confidence. You remember, no doubt, the terrible
circumstances of the death of my only brother, Angus Macdonald, of the
Scottish Guard?”
“Quite well, my child. It was well impressed upon my memory.”
Sister Claire, for the first time, faltered a little, and when she
resumed, her voice was tremulous.
“I never associated Monsieur de Bourmont with that tragedy of
my youth until--until just before I left Holyrood Palace. But I
found out--quite by accident--one of those terrible accidents of
life--that--that--Monsieur de Bourmont killed my brother.” Sister
Claire stopped, sighed, and passed her hand over her pale face.
“But Monsieur de Bourmont did not kill your brother,” replied the abbé,
quietly.