Marie and Felix were waiting for me. … Marie older and more wrinkled, Felix, more stooping and shaking his head more than ever. …
“Ah! Monsieur Jean! … Monsieur Jean! …” And forthwith taking possession of my valise, Marie said:
“You ought to be pretty hungry by this time, Monsieur Jean! … I have some soup for you, the kind you used to like, and then I have put a nice chicken on the spit.”
“Thank you!” I said. “I shall not dine.”
I would have liked to embrace both of them, to open my arms for them, to cry upon their old, parched faces. … And instead! my voice was harsh, trenchant. I uttered “I shall not dine” in the manner of a threat. They looked at me somewhat frightened, but never stopped repeating:
“Ah! Monsieur Jean! … It has been such a long time! … Ah! Monsieur Jean! … What a handsome young man you are! …”
Then Marie, thinking that she would gain my interest thereby, began telling me the news of the place:
“That poor Monsieur the curé is dead, you know. The new one in his place don’t seem to be getting ahead at all, he is too young and anxious. … Baptiste has been crushed to death by a tree.”
I interrupted her:
“All right, all right, Marie. … You’ll tell me about it tomorrow.”
She took me to my bedroom and asked:
“Shall I bring you a bowl of milk, Monsieur Jean?”
“If you please!”
And closing the door, I flung myself on the lounge and sobbed for a long, long time.
The next day I got up at dawn. … The Priory had not changed much: there was only more grass in the alleys, more moss on the steps, and a few trees were dead. Again I saw the gate, the scurfy lawn, the puny looking sorbs, the aged chestnut trees. Again I saw the basin where the little kitten had been shot, the curtain of fir trees which hid the commons from view, the abandoned study; I saw the park, its twisted trees and stone benches that looked like ancient tombs. … In the kitchen garden Felix was digging a border bed for flowers. … Ah! poor man, how battered his frame was!
He showed me a hawthorn and said:
“That is where you used to come with your poor deceased father to lie in wait for the blackbirds. … Do you remember, Monsieur Jean?”
“Yes, yes, Felix!”
“And also the thrush?”
“Yes, yes, Felix!”
I walked away. I could not bear the sight of this old man any longer, this man who thought he was going to live to the end of his days at the Priory and whom I was about to drive out … and where was he to go? … He had served us faithfully, he was almost one of our family, poor, unable to gain a livelihood otherwise. And I was going to chase him out! … Ah! How could I bring myself to do that?
At breakfast Marie seemed nervous. She walked around my chair, unusually excited.
“Beg pardon!” she said to me at last, “I must clear up all my doubts about this matter. … Is it true that you are selling the Priory? …”
“Yes, Marie.”
The old woman opened wide her eyes, stupefied, and, placing her hands on the table, repeated:
“You are selling the Priory?”
“Yes, Marie.”
“The Priory where all your family was born? … The Priory where your father and your mother died? … The Priory, Holy Jesus!”
“Yes, Marie.”
She recoiled as if frightened.
“Then you are a wicked son, Monsieur Jean!”
I made no reply. Marie left the dining room and did not speak to me anymore.
Two days later, my business having been attended to, the deed signed, I left. … My money was hardly enough to last me a month. … I was done for! Overwhelming debts, ignoble debts was all that was left to me! … Ah! if the train could only carry me on and on, always further on, never to arrive anywhere! … It was only in Paris that I reminded myself that I had not even gone to kneel down at the grave of my father and mother.
Juliette received me tenderly. She embraced me passionately.
“Ah! dear, dear! … I thought you would never come back! … Five days, just think of it! … Next time if you have to go again I want to go with you.”
She appeared so affectionate, so truly moved, her caresses gave me such confidence, and then the burden on my soul was so heavy, that I did not hesitate to tell her everything. I took her in my arms and put her on my lap.
“Listen to me, my Juliette,” I said to her, “listen to me! … I am lost … ruined … ruined … do you hear, ruined! … We have only four thousand francs left! …”
“Poor boy!” Juliette sighed while placing her head on my shoulder, “poor boy! …”
I burst out sobbing, and cried out:
“You understand now that I must leave you. … And I am going to die if I do!”
“Come now, you are silly to talk that way. … Do you believe I could live without you, my dear? … Come now, don’t cry, don’t grieve so much. …”
She dried the tears from my eyes and continued in her voice which grew sweeter with every word.
“First of all we have four thousand francs. … We can live four months on that. … During these four months you’ll work. … Let us see if you can’t write a good novel in four months! … But don’t cry, because if you cry, I won’t tell you a great secret … a great, great secret. … Do you know what your little wifie did, who little suspected that herself—do you know? … Well, for three days she went to the riding school, she took lessons in horsemanship—and next year when she is well trained, Franconi will engage her. … Do you know what a woman rider in a fashionable riding school makes. … Two thousand, three thousand francs a month! … You see now, there isn’t much to grieve over, my poor little boy!”
All nonsense, all folly seemed logical to me. I clung to it desperately as a shipwrecked sailor clings to the insecure wreckage tossed by the waves. Provided it kept me afloat for an instant, I
