Abandoned by the living, Elise turned to the dead, whose quiet peace
seemed to her so sweet. She reached the graveyard well before the first
rays of the dawn had lightened the eastern sky. It was still night, but
in the half light of the moon there seemed about her mysterious beings
of uncertain form and colors pale and unreal.
In climbing the dune Elise had often looked out toward the open sea to
the spot where a murmuring and a silvery whitening of the waves marked
the shoals. It was there that her father lay with the others under the
treacherous wave. But exactly where? The shoals were large.
At the thought of petitioning the administration and taking the other
necessary steps, Elise was greatly troubled, so afraid was she of the
officials. She had never entered a maritime bureau, and knew, only by
hearsay, that the men whom she would meet treated the poor harshly.
What should she say to them? That she had seen her father in bodily
presence in the night, and that she had been bidden to find his body
and to lay it to rest in earth; that she was not rich enough to meet
the expense, and that she had come to beg them to send divers in order
to snatch him from the engulfing sands.
But they would demand the exact spot where he lay, and her father had
not told it. They could not dig up all the Vergoyer. Surely that was
what they would say. If her father wished to be found, he must tell
where he was.
Elise wore herself out devising unfeasible plans. A fancy seized her
to run to the wharf, to seize the first boat she came to, and to sail
alone to the Vergoyer. There she would invoke her father to make his
presence known. She had heard that a little flame would dance on the
water at the spot where a body lay. But at the thought of seeing this
palpitating soul she was seized with tremors.
How wretched she was! She was, perhaps, the only one in the village who
had no relatives. All the other girls, in trouble such as hers, would
have had a grandfather, or an uncle, to help them. There was no one
to help her but Cousin Florimond, who detested her, and Silvere, her
betrothed, who loved her, but was away.
Unable to depend on any one, she had gone to the churchyard to see
Barbet, and to pray on the grave of her mother, where she hoped to find
solace for her sorrows.
She felt her hand tremble in lifting the latch of the little gate, and
was frightened at the stillness. The tide was out, and the sea was at
peace. Nothing stirred. There was not a sound of life.
Barbet had ceased barking. Elise had come in answer to his call, and
now that she was there he was silent in distrust--he also, as if he
were waiting to see what impious creature dared, at this hour, to
enter this field of shadows to disturb the sanctity of their memory.
She hesitated a long while. She stood with her fingers on the latch,
and did not dare to look through the bars of the gate into this
graveyard, where, under the trembling moonlight, the wooden crosses
seemed to be joining in a dance of death.
If Barbet would only howl, would only bark once.
“Barbet! Barbet!”
A howl answered her, but more unearthly than the night, more mysterious
than this spirit-filled space about her. Oh! There were ghosts
everywhere!
Yielding to a wild desire to escape these supernatural beings, Elise
turned and fled. She ran breathlessly toward the fields. There she was
sure at least of meeting things which were really alive; trees whose
leaves rustled in the breeze, beasts sleeping an earthly sleep in the
fields where they fed.
She ran on, terror-stricken, leaping fences and streams, imagining
herself pursued. She seemed to hear a footstep behind her, and ran
more madly still through the damp meadow-grasses, knee-high, happy at
feeling and touching objects that were real, at breathing the strong
odors that were born of life. She threw herself into the midst of a
herd of cows who, waking with a start, rose to their knees, and dropped
their heads to face an attack, and, the danger passed, sunk down again
heavily, dropping off at once into the dreamless sleep of an animal.
[Illustration: SHE QUICKENED HER PACE, PRESSING HER HEAVING CHEST WITH
BOTH HANDS.
Chap. 12.]
Elise recovered her calmness in this contact with nature. She had
never imagined it so cheering and so friendly. She had despised the
country, for there all is so pretty, one cannot move without finding a
place of shelter or protection. How different this from the sea, where
one sails for days and nights without seeing aught but infinite space.
How sweet the odor of the ripe wheat and the hops still green, the
reflection of the moon in the pools, the deep shadows of the trees. How
willingly would she lie down there in the long grass.
But behind her there followed in hot pursuit something whose form she
could not divine. The cows seemed to look queerly at her as she passed
them. She did not dare to turn, she would die of fear if she should
look behind and see what she feared. She quickened her pace, pressing
her heaving chest with both hands. She feared to stop, lest she should
find herself face to face with this ghostly pursuing phantom.
She hoped for daylight to dissipate her fears, but the first light of
morning had not yet shown when she sank down breathless and spent, in
the midst of a field. There she lay unconscious, and, worn out by all
she had gone through, fell into a heavy sleep.
* * * * *
The sun was high when she awoke, confused, and with every fibre
relaxed by the healthful rest which had followed the hours of fever.
Her eyes, still heavy, sought the sun’s brightness, and her pale lips
opened to breathe the pure morning air. She inhaled sweet odors. Then,
as she stretched her arms to shake off her lassitude, she drew back
suddenly with a start, for her hand was licked by a rough, wet tongue.
Involuntarily she turned about, and, recollection coming suddenly, was
seized again with fright and buried her face in her hands.
But around her, as if that moment he had thrown off all allegiance to
his dead master, Barbet was dancing gleefully. He poked his nose into
her hands, into her face, her neck, and in a kind of intoxication of
affection and of joyful fidelity, barked and whined softly, as if he
meant to swear everlasting devotion. He seemed to say to poor Elise
that she ought not to fear or despair, since she had a friend, a friend
older than she, but strong and desirous to serve her.
It was not Barbet’s ghost, but Barbet himself, with real shaggy hair
and real barks. It was not a dream. Happy in the reality, Elise seated
herself, quieted by this unexpected help, and hugging him in her arms,
talked to him: first, of the years that were gone, and how he had taken
care of her, and afterward the little Firmin, who would doubtless soon
return, self-reliant as ever. And Barbet rubbed his big head against
the heaving breast of his chosen friend. He looked at her with a
steady, friendly glance, but she in her overflowing happiness kissed
his face; his eyes, that knew so well how to read in the great book of
nature; his nose, whose subtle keenness found out the meaning of so
many hidden secrets.
“Barbet, old Barbet. It was you who followed me. Why did you not let me
know it was you?”
Yes, Barbet had followed her. She alone had power to make him forget
his dead master. There was many a one in the village who would have
been glad to receive him, as a rare legacy, as a traditional curiosity.
The day when his master died they had dragged him from the coffin, and
shut him up in the coast-guard station of which he had been the pride
so many years. Rather than submit to a new service he would have let
himself die of famine. He had escaped, and made his way to the grave,
where over the newly turned earth he had bewailed his lost friend.
There again they had gone after him. Nowhere will men willingly lose
objects in which they take pride. Barbet was celebrated on the whole
coast from Dieppe to Boulogne. Could they lose the glory of their
village? But faithful to the captain’s memory, he had resisted all
attempts which had been made to draw him away. They had given up their
attempts at last. They had not dared to take him away by force, and on
the tomb of the master whom he did not wish to outlive, he was waiting
for death, when he had scented Elise.
His old friend, this kind Elise, had come there in a time of trouble.
He saw her climb the dune alone, without protection or sympathy. Then
he remembered how the captain had loved her, how she had been kind to
the lonely man when alone and ill in his old age.
Barbet decided that if his master could speak he would bid him love
Elise, and return her a watchful affection and vigilant protection for
her cares for him. He had decided to live for her, to whom his master
would certainly have left him, if death had not come so suddenly.
When she had called him, he had answered the cry of her heart with
an emotion strong and deep, but she had not understood and had fled
in fright. He had leaped over the wall and had followed her softly,
wishing not to add to her terror. And now, through his master’s death,
they were to be friends for life.
* * * * *
“You are all dirty, old Barbet,” said Elise suddenly between two tears,
“we shall have to make our toilet together.” And she led the dog to the
nearest pool.