Read Ebook: The Duke's Daughter; and The Fugitives; vol. 3/3 by Oliphant Mrs Margaret

Font size: 10 px 15 px 20 px 25 px 30 px 35 px

Background color: BlackWhiteGrayLight GrayDark GrayDim Gray

Text color: BlackWhiteGrayLight GrayDark GrayDim Gray

Apply/Save settings

Ebook has 299 lines and 44709 words, and 6 pages

"Madame is too good," said the old man; "she would say a good word for the devil, if there is such a person, and if he were a customer at the Lion d'Or."

"The clergy are no customers of mine, nor do I hold with them any more than you do," Madame Dupr? began, with rising colour, when the Englishman poured oil on the waves.

"In my country," he said, "the clergy are not a separate class as in yours. They marry and live like other men; but no one in England speaks of them as you do here in France. They do a great deal of good among us. They take care of the poor."

"Pah! a married priest!" cried Madame Dupr?, with an expression of disgust. "I am no bigot, but I could not put up with that."

"And as for what monsieur says about the poor," cried M. Goudron, "there ought not to be any poor. A man who wants help, who cannot keep himself alive, there is no place for him in the world."

At this a little murmur rose, and one of the silent spectators spoke. "We are all poor," he said; "and when there is a bad harvest, or a bad winter, or illness in the house, how are we to live without the help of a kind hand?"

"Ah, it is you, Paul le Roux; every one knows why you speak. There is solidarity between the enemies of mankind,--the priest and the aristocrat; they have but one end. It is for this they wander about the village to take persons at a disadvantage who may happen to be badly off. You do not see how their charity is an impudence. What! give you their crumbs, and their fragments! 'Take what falls from my table, I am better than thou.' It is an insult--such an insult," old Goudron said suddenly, with the grin that divided his face in two, "as I never would venture to offer to any neighbours of mine."

At this there was a general laugh. "P?re Goudron," said some one from the window, "will never fail in respect to his neighbours in that way."

"Never!" cried the old man, with his malignant grin.

"Oh, thanks," cried Helen, much confused and not knowing what to do. She would have liked to kiss the little girl who felt for her, but she was too shy to do this. "It amused me very much," she said with a little sigh--perhaps she had scarcely thought that her amusement was sad till Blanchette suggested it. "I think I saw you dancing with Baptiste."

"Yes; but you are too young to be married," Helen said.

"Does mademoiselle think so? Baptiste is almost twenty. Provided that he draws a good number, that is all we have to hope for. Will mademoiselle say a little prayer for us when the moment comes? Ursule has promised a candle to St Hubert if all goes well. Ursule has no wishes for herself. She is a saint upon earth. All that she asks from heaven is for me."

"But she is only a very little older than you are. Why should she have no wishes for herself?"

"Mademoiselle, she has a vocation," said Blanchette with awe; the candle shone back, doubled and reflected in those twin mirrors, from her eyes. The gravity on her face brought out all its sweetness--a little face, all alive with love, and hope, and reverential admiration, and faith. Helen felt her own passiveness all the more from the contrast. She felt half ashamed of her ignorance, and of standing, as she did, outside of all this world so full of life.

"What is a vocation?" she said.

"Surely, surely he will!" Helen said fervently.

It is curious with what ease we adapt ourselves to the completest change in the very foundations of life; a little difference is vexatious and irritating, while a revolution which carries us away from our own identity, substituting a new routine, an entirely altered existence, is comparatively easy. Mr Goulburn, whose affairs had been of the vastest, who had been in the full turmoil of life, in the midst of society and excitement, held at the highest strain, and running the most tremendous risks, fell into the life of the village with an ease which bewildered himself. He could not comprehend the soothing influences of the calm and good order, the silence and dulness which all at once enveloped him like a cloud. Even Montdard was farther off from Latour than any part of the civilised world is from London. Amid the woods of the Haute Bourgogne it was more difficult to realise what went on ten leagues off, than it was in England to understand how all the great affairs of the world were going. He had bought that clump of pine-trees in a momentary sympathy with the excitement of the country, and with a notion brought from the old life which he had abandoned, that it was a good thing to have something to occupy him. But he was not so keen even about his fir-trees as he had expected to be. The leisurely habits of the country got possession of him. He walked to the woods and looked at them, then came home to breakfast, then amused himself with calculating the profit to be made of them, and all that could be done.

As for little Janey, she was as happy as the day was long, with little Marie from the cottage next door, and Petit-Jean. Her French bubbled up like a little fountain, all mingled with laughter. It was so funny to talk like the little French children, Janey thought; and no doubt they too could talk English like her if they would take the trouble. Helen, too, settled down as if she had been to the manner born. She, who had scarcely ever threaded a needle for herself, mended the rents in Janey's frocks, and took pleasure in it. She learned from Blanchette how to knit, and began to make warm stockings for her little sister. She taught Janey her letters every morning. She had a great deal to do, to supplement Margot's exertions with the featherbrush, and arrange everything as well as she could, the meals and all the details of the house. And by-and-by Helen began to forget the strange way in which this change had been accomplished. She forgot that midnight flight, the dismal journey, the fugitives' career from place to place. She could scarcely have told any one what it was that had brought them to Latour. Had they meant to come to Latour when they left England? Helen could not tell. She was embarrassed, bewildered by the question, though it was she who put it to herself. She had lived a life so retired and quiet at home, that she had nobody to regret except Miss Temple, who had married Mr Ashton; but this marriage had happened nearly a year ago, and Helen had spent all the summer alone. The time we spend alone goes so slowly. She had lived like a young hermit in the great house; even Janey she had only seen when Nurse thought proper. She had nothing to do, nothing to live by, nobody to think of. She had been awoke all at once from that feeble dream of existence by the thunder-clap of the sudden flight. And now she found herself like one who has fallen from a great height, or recovered from a severe illness, or been picked up out of the sea--living, and thankful to be living, accustoming herself to this surprising reality of existence, so true after so much that was not true. Helen's intellect had not very many requirements, and such as it had could be supplied by that perennial fountain of dreams which makes up for so much that is lacking in youth. She had no books to read, but she told herself a long and endless fable through all the silent hours, so much the more enthralling that she was always in it, the doer, or the cause of the doing, present in all its succeeding scenes.

She was a Protestant, which, though no one knew what it was, was certainly not a Christian, and therefore had no particular right to be cared for by God. Still Blanchette did not object to this supernatural shield for Helen. She only shook her head as they left the door. These uncovenanted mercies, though always to be hoped for, are risky; whereas in the case of Ursule, there could be no doubt, on all sides, of the perfect security of the guarantees. Janey was delighted to feel the crisp and dazzling snow under her little feet; she ran and danced upon it, stamping on the hard shining surface. "It is like a big, big cake," said Janey, "and me the little lady on it. Don't you know, Helen, the little lady with the stick?"

It was a Twelfth-Day cake of which Janey was thinking, and Helen could not help recollecting the very cake which had kept a tender place in her little sister's thoughts. It was one which had figured at the school treat organised by Miss Temple, before she went away and married.

"Do you remember the little lady, Janey?"

"She turned round and round," said the child; "she had a stick and pointed. Let me get a stick and point too."

What a different scene came before Helen's eyes! the schoolroom at Fareham all decked with holly, the great white cake sparkling like the snow, the eager children drawing their characters,--and in the midst of the party a splendid, shy little person wrapped in furs, who was the giver of the feast, and to whom everybody looked with so much desire that she should be pleased. She thought she could hear the horses pawing with impatience at the door, and see little Janey flushed with excitement, wrapped in the softest satin-quilted mantle, carried out by the biggest of footmen to the most luxurious of carriages. Helen laughed softly to herself--was it a dream? She thought of it as Cinderella might have thought of her ball had there been no young prince in it, nothing to make the episode of special importance. Was it really true? And it was at this moment, while Janey was pirouetting round and round with the wand in her hand, and when Helen had just laughed to herself at the strange recollection of the past, which was so unlike the present--that the two Demoiselles de Vieux-bois came suddenly round the corner and met them. There was a little pause on both sides. An "Oh!" of startled expectation came to Helen's Britannic lips, and the two young Frenchwomen swerved for a moment, then stopped and held a hurried consultation. Then one of them advanced with pretty hesitation, a blush and a smile.

"Pardon, mademoiselle," she said; then added in very passable English, "we have wished to call, but our mamma has been sick, and we were doubtful to come alone. Perhaps you will let us make friends now?"

"Oh, I shall be so glad!" cried Helen, putting out her hands shyly, with a sudden flash of light and colour coming to her face. They had thought the English miss, like all English misses, pale and cold.

"I told you so," said the one to the other. "I am C?cile de Vieux-bois, and my sister is Th?r?se. We have wanted so much to speak to you. You are English, and we have such dear friends in England."

"Et peut-?tre toi aussi," said C?cile, half reproachfully, in an undertone.

Helen's face grew scarlet. She had never been brought face to face before with this terrible difficulty. Her name had been of no importance in Latour. If her father called himself by one name or another, she knew nothing of it. Mademoiselle was enough for everything.

"Please do not say Miss at all," she said, the tears coming to her eyes. "I am Helen, and she is little Janey. Will you call us so?"

The two French girls looked at each other with a little surprise--perhaps they did not like to be supposed ignorant on this point; or perhaps the fervour of Helen's protest struck them, though they could not tell what it meant. But they were too well bred to make any further difficulty. "Do you like our poor little Latour?" said C?cile. "It is so strange to us to see any new faces here. We shall be so happy to have you all the long winter--that is, if you are going to stay."

It was C?cile who spoke the best English. The younger one was playing with Janey, and chattering in a mixture of languages which amused and suited them both. C?cile and Helen walked on demurely side by side.

"We shall stay if--if papa likes it," she said.

"I assure you," said Helen, "I am not alarmed at all about papa. We are not so well off as we were, and he wishes to be quiet, that is all. I think he likes Latour, and I like it. Yes, I think we shall stay all the winter. Perhaps we shall stay always. Janey will not remember any other place."

"But you--were you not sorry to leave your home?"

"Sorry?" said Helen, meditating. "I ought to have been. I do not quite know, it was so strange. Before I knew that we had left home we were here, or, at all events, at Sainte-Barbe," she said, with a smile.

"I was thinking of it when I saw you," said Helen. "Little Janey said the snow was like a great white cake--like the cake we had on Twelfth Night, and that made me think. I thought I saw the room all dressed with holly--we do that in England at Christmas; and all the children from all the parish--they came from miles round--and the great huge cake. The children all came and curtseyed to us when they had their slice of cake, and stared at Janey. She looked like a little fairy princess," said Helen, with a smile and a sigh. Her new acquaintance looked at her very closely, then gave a glance at the child, who was very simply dressed, not like a princess at all.

"The people loved you very much?" said C?cile; "they do so in England; they do not hate you as aristocrats. I shall be very glad of that. Why should they hate us in France? We try to do what good we can, but there is always suspicion. They think we have no right to differ from them. But how can we help it? It is so, it is not our doing. They have not that feeling in England. They loved you, the people? Oh, how happy I shall be!"

"They were always very nice," said Helen. "Loved--I don't know that they loved us. We do not say that word in England except when--except when it is very strong indeed;--but they were always very nice. Though Miss Temple used to say papa was too good--a great deal too liberal, giving them too much--almost everything they wanted."

"My governess," said Helen--"my very dear friend; she went away from me and married. I never had a mother, nor Janey either," she said, in a low tone.

"But it was very good, very kind of monsieur your father to be so good to the poor."

"I thought so too; but Miss Temple said it was wrong to give so much," said Helen, simply. She did not understand the wonder that was rising in the mind of her new acquaintance. What Helen innocently revealed seemed to C?cile the condition of a grand seigneur in the old days when a grand seigneur was a prince in rural France. And it was very extraordinary to think of a great English nobleman or gentleman--words of which she partially understood the meaning--living in Latour! She looked at Helen again, examining her very closely; and C?cile knew that her dress, which was the dress she had brought from Fareham, was costly and fine, though so simple. They had wondered, gazed at the English family in church, and wherever they met them. But it was still more extraordinary now. The only thing was that they were English. That accounts for so much! for every kind of eccentricity, C?cile thought.

"You promised to call me Helen." Helen had forgotten her own horror about the name, and said this with a mischievous sense of amusement, her pleasure in her new friend and in the prospect thus offered to her opening up all the closed doors in her heart. She laughed as she spoke. It had gone out of her mind that for the moment she had no name.

"It seems too familiar," said C?cile, gravely, "for the first time; but if it is so that in England one does not say Miss--but they do say it, or why should the word exist?--I will willingly call you Helen. Do you thus pronounce the 'h'? In France we say ?l?ne."

"We are to say Helen," said C?cile, with her air of dignity. They had reached M. Goudron's house as she spoke, where he was standing with an old shawl wrapped about his shoulders. He was not susceptible about his personal appearance. But the sight of Helen's companions made a change in his looks. He grinned, but he scowled as well. His countenance became diabolical between hatred and mockery. Th?r?se caught her sister by the arm.

Little Janey had no restraints of politeness upon her. She pulled at the end of his eccentric old tartan shawl. "C'est parce que vous ?tes si m?chant," she cried. "C'est parce que you are a fright--a horrible, nasty, old man. I hate you too," cried Janey--"vous ?tes m?chant, m?chant! Personne vous aime; vous ?tes an old, old, wicked! a horror! a fright! all wrapped in a shawl like an old vieille fille; nobody loves you--they all hate you," she cried.

After this a new life began for Helen. C?cile and Th?r?se de Vieux-bois were much more highly educated than she was; they were far more fluent in conversation; they knew a great deal more than Helen. She, poor, solitary child, in her luxurious rural palace, had read nothing but novels; whereas they had read scarcely any novels at all, but a great many better things, and still continued their studies with a conscientiousness and energy at which she gazed with wonder. Nothing could have been more different from their carefully guarded and sedulously instructed life than the secluded existence of the millionaire's daughter, broken sometimes by the noisy brilliancy of a great dinner-party, at which, perhaps, she and her governess were the only ladies present, or by the arrival of the huge box of light literature which her father substituted when she was seventeen for the cakes and toys, and dainties of all kinds, with which he had overwhelmed her at an earlier age. This was Mr Goulburn's idea of what was best for girls--cakes and sweetmeats, then novels, with as many balls and amusements as could be procured. He had intended that Helen should be fully supplied with these later pleasures; but he had not succeeded, as has been said, in introducing her to the county, and all his plans for town had been mysteriously cut short.

"Oh! perhaps he will not read very much either. Gentlemen never do; they read the 'Times' and the 'Field'--and; have I said anything wrong?"

"Is his name John?" said Helen, with rising interest.

"Oh, much, much more distinguished," said Th?r?se.

"He had not any title at first," C?cile continued. "They say that in England that, too, is more distinguished. I thought I should be called Mistress. It is droll."

"We do not say Mistress in England," said Helen. "Is he in the law, or in the Church, or a merchant, or only a gentleman? Papa was a very great, great merchant," she continued, her cheeks colouring warmly. Though she was very quiet and gentle, yet in some things Helen had her pride too.

Share on: WhatsApp @Hash Facebook Tweet