of ten, poor fellow. And I held and soothed him, so that he might die in peace; yes, I held him in my arms, I whom he called his mother and who was but a few years older than himself. He wept, and I myself could not restrain my tears; you can see I am weeping still-' Her utterance was choked with sobs; she had to pause. 'Before his death he murmured several times the name which he had given himself: 'Poor boy, poor boy!' Ah, how just the designation! poor boys they are indeed, some of them so young and all so brave, whom your hateful war maims and mangles and causes to suffer so before they are laid away at last in their narrow bed!'
Never a day passed now but Henriette came in at night in this anguished state, caused by some new death, and the suffering of others had the effect of bringing them together even more closely still during the sorrowful hours that they spent, secluded from all the world, in the silent, tranquil chamber. And yet those hours were full of sweetness, too, for affection, a feeling which they believed to be a brother's and sister's love, had sprung up in those two hearts which little by little had come to know each other's worth. To him, with his observant, thoughtful nature, their long intimacy had proved an elevating influence, while she, noting his unfailing kindness of heart and evenness of temper, had ceased to remember that he was one of the lowly of the earth and had been a tiller of the soil before he became a soldier. Their understanding was perfect; they made a very good couple, as Silvine said with her grave smile. There was never the least embarrassment between them; when she dressed his leg the calm serenity that dwelt in the eyes of both was undisturbed. Always attired in black, in her widow's garments, it seemed almost as if she had ceased to be a woman.
But during those long afternoons when Jean was left to himself he could not help giving way to speculation. The sentiment he experienced for his friend was one of boundless gratitude, a sort of religious reverence, which would have made him repel the idea of love as if it were a sort of sacrilege. And yet he told himself that had he had a wife like her, so gentle, so loving, so helpful, his life would have been an earthly paradise. His great misfortune, his unhappy marriage, the evil years he had spent at Rognes, his wife's tragic end, all the sad past, arose before him with a softened feeling of regret, with an undefined hope for the future, but without distinct purpose to try another effort to master happiness. He closed his eyes and dropped off into a doze, and then he had a confused vision of being at Remilly, married again and owner of a bit of land, sufficient to support a family of honest folks whose wants were not extravagant. But it was all a dream, lighter than thistle-down; he knew it could never, never be. He believed his heart to be capable of no emotion stronger than friendship, he loved Henriette as he did solely because he was Maurice's brother. And then that vague dream of marriage had come to be in some measure a comfort to him, one of those fancies of the imagination that we know is never to be realized and with which we fondle ourselves in our hours of melancholy.
For her part, such thoughts had never for a moment presented themselves to Henriette's mind. Since the day of the horrible tragedy at Bazeilles her bruised heart had lain numb and lifeless in her bosom, and if consolation in the shape of a new affection had found its way thither, it could not be otherwise than without her knowledge; the latent movement of the seed deep-buried in the earth, which bursts its sheath and germinates, unseen of human eye. She failed even to perceive the pleasure it afforded her to remain for hours at a time by Jean's bedside, reading to him those newspapers that never brought them tidings save of evil. Never had her pulses beat more rapidly at the touch of his hand, never had she dwelt in dreamy rapture on the vision of the future with a longing to be loved once more. And yet it was in that chamber alone that she found comfort and oblivion. When she was there, busying herself with noiseless diligence for her patient's well-being, she was at peace; it seemed to her that soon her brother would return and all would be well, they would all lead a life of happiness together and never more be parted. And it appeared to her so natural that things should end thus that she talked of their relations without the slightest feeling of embarrassment, without once thinking to question her heart more closely, unaware that she had already made the chaste surrender of it.
But as she was on the point of leaving for the hospital one afternoon she looked into the kitchen as she passed and saw there a Prussian captain and two other officers, and the icy terror that filled her at the sight, then, for the first time, opened her eyes to the deep affection she had conceived for Jean. It was plain that the men had heard of the wounded man's presence at the farm and were come to claim him; he was to be torn from them and led away captive to the dungeon of some dark fortress deep in Germany. She listened tremblingly, her heart beating tumultuously.
The captain, a big, stout man, who spoke French with scarce a trace of foreign accent, was rating old Fouchard soundly.
'Things can't go on in this way; you are not dealing squarely by us. I came myself to give you warning, once for all, that if the thing happens again I shall take other steps to remedy it; and I promise you the consequences will not be agreeable.'
Though entirely master of all his faculties the old scamp assumed an air of consternation, pretending not to understand, his mouth agape, his arms describing frantic circles on the air.
'How is that, sir, how is that?'
'Oh, come, there's no use attempting to pull the wool over my eyes; you know perfectly well that the three beeves you sold me on Sunday last were rotten-yes, diseased, and rotten through and through; they must have been where there was infection, for they poisoned my men; there are two of them in such a bad way that they may be dead by this time for all I know.'
Fouchard's manner was expressive of virtuous indignation. 'What, my cattle diseased! why, there's no better meat in all the country; a sick woman might feed on it to build her up!' And he whined and sniveled, thumping himself on the chest and calling God to witness he was an honest man; he would cut off his right hand rather than sell bad meat. For more than thirty years he had been known throughout the neighborhood, and not a living soul could say he had ever been wronged in weight or quality. 'They were as sound as a dollar, sir, and if your men had the belly-ache it was because they ate too much-unless some villain hocussed the pot-'
And so he ran on, with such a flux of words and absurd theories that finally the captain, his patience exhausted, cut him short.
'Enough! You have had your warning; see you profit by it! And there is another matter: we have our suspicions that all you people of this village give aid and comfort to the francs-tireurs of the wood of Dieulet, who killed another of our sentries day before yesterday. Mind what I say; be careful!'
When the Prussians were gone Father Fouchard shrugged his shoulders with a contemptuous sneer. Why, yes, of course he sold them carcasses that had never been near the slaughter house; that was all they would ever get to eat from him. If a peasant had a cow die on his hands of the rinderpest, or if he found a dead ox lying in the ditch, was not the carrion good enough for those dirty Prussians? To say nothing of the pleasure there was in getting a big price out of them for tainted meat at which a dog would turn up his nose. He turned and winked slyly at Henriette, who was glad to have her fears dispelled, muttering triumphantly:
'Say, little girl, what do you think now of the wicked people who go about circulating the story that I am not a patriot? Why don't they do as I do, eh? sell the blackguards carrion and put their money in their pocket. Not a patriot! why, good Heavens! I shall have killed more of them with my diseased cattle than many a soldier with his chassepot!'
When the story reached Jean's ears, however, he was greatly disturbed. If the German authorities suspected that the people of Remilly were harboring the francs-tireurs from Dieulet wood they might at any time come and beat up his quarters and unearth him from his retreat. The idea that he should be the means of compromising his hosts or bringing trouble to Henriette was unendurable to him. Yielding to the young woman's entreaties, however, he consented to delay his departure yet for a few days, for his wound was very slow in healing and he was not strong enough to go away and join one of the regiments in the field, either in the North or on the Loire.
From that time forward, up to the middle of December, the stress of their anxiety and mental suffering exceeded even what had gone before. The cold was grown to be so intense that the stove no longer sufficed to heat the great, barn-like room. When they looked from their window on the crust of snow that covered the frozen earth they thought of Maurice, entombed down yonder in distant Paris, that was now become a city of death and desolation, from which they scarcely ever received reliable intelligence. Ever the same questions were on their lips: what was he doing, why did he not let them hear from him? They dared not voice their dreadful doubts and fears; perhaps he was ill, or wounded; perhaps even he was dead. The scanty and vague tidings that continued to reach them occasionally through the newspapers were not calculated to reassure them. After numerous lying reports of successful sorties, circulated one day only to be contradicted the next, there was a rumor of a great victory gained by General Ducrot at Champigny on the 2d of December; but they speedily learned that on the following day the general, abandoning the positions he had won, had been forced to recross the Marne and send his troops into
