No doubt, they were asking each other whether I belonged to the town, and then they consulted the two in front of them, who stared at me in turn. The close attention they paid me annoyed me, and to put an end to it, I went up to them, and after bowing, said:
“I beg your pardon, gentlemen, for interrupting your conversation, but seeing a civil funeral, I have followed it, although I did not know the deceased gentleman whom you are accompanying.”
“It is a woman,” one of them said.
I was much surprised at hearing this, and asked:
“But it is a civil funeral, is it not?”
The other gentleman, who evidently wished to tell me all about it, then said: “Yes and no. The clergy have refused to allow us the use of the church.”
On hearing that, I uttered a prolonged A‑h! of astonishment. I could not understand it at all, but my obliging neighbour continued:
“It is rather a long story. This young woman committed suicide, and that is the reason why she cannot be buried with any religious ceremony. The gentleman who is walking first, and who is crying, is her husband.”
I replied, with some hestitation:
“You surprise and interest me very much, Monsieur. Shall I be indiscreet if I ask you to tell me the facts of the case? If I am troubling you, consider these words unsaid.”
The gentleman took my arm familiarly.
“Not at all, not at all. Let us stop a little behind the others, and I will tell you, although it is a very sad story. We have plenty of time before getting to the cemetery, whose trees you see up yonder, for it is a stiff pull up this hill.”
And he began:
“This young woman, Madame Paul Hamot, was the daughter of Monsieur Fontanelle, a wealthy merchant in the neighbourhood. When she was a mere child of eleven, she had a terrible adventure; a footman violated her. She nearly died, in consequence, for she was injured by this wretch, whose brutality betrayed him. A terrible criminal case was the result, and as it was proved that for three months the poor young martyr had been the victim of that brute’s disgraceful practices, he was sentenced to penal servitude for life.
“The little girl grew up, stigmatised by her disgrace, isolated, without any companions, and grown-up people would scarcely kiss her, for they thought they would soil their lips if they touched her forehead. She became a sort of monster, a phenomenon to all the town. People said to each other in a whisper: ‘You know little Fontanelle,’ and everybody turned away in the streets when she passed. Her parents could not even get a maid to take her out for a walk, and the other servants held aloof from her, as if contact with her would poison everybody who came near her.
“It was pitiable to see the poor child on the playground where the kids amuse themselves every afternoon. She remained all alone, standing beside her maid, and looking at the other children amusing themselves. Sometimes, yielding to an irresistible desire to mix with the other children, she advanced, timidly, with nervous gestures, and mingled with a group, with furtive steps, as if conscious of her own infamy. And immediately the mothers, aunts, and nurses used to come running from every seat, taking the children entrusted to their care by the hand and dragging them brutally away.
“Little Fontanelle would remain isolated, wretched, without understanding what it meant, and then would begin to cry, heartbroken with grief, and run and hide her head in her nurse’s lap, sobbing.
“As she grew up, it was worse still. They kept the girls from her, as if she were stricken with the plague. Remember that she had nothing to learn, nothing; that she no longer had the right to the symbolical wreath of orange-flowers; that almost before she could read, she had penetrated that redoubtable mystery which mothers scarcely allow their daughters to guess, trembling as they enlighten them on the night of their marriage.
“When she went through the streets, always accompanied by a governess—as if her parents feared some fresh, terrible adventure—with her eyes cast down under the load of that mysterious disgrace which she felt was always weighing upon her, the other girls, who were not nearly so innocent as people thought, whispered and giggled as they looked at her knowingly, and immediately turned their heads absently if she happened to look at them. People scarcely greeted her; only a few men bowed to her, and the mothers pretended not to see her, while some young blackguards called her ‘Madame Baptiste,’ after the name of the footman who had outraged and ruined her.
“Nobody knew the secret torture of her mind, for she hardly ever spoke and never laughed; her parents themselves appeared uncomfortable in her presence, as if they bore her a constant grudge for some irreparable fault.
“An honest man would not willingly give his hand to a liberated convict, would he, even if that convict were his own son? And Monsieur and Madame Fontanelle looked on their daughter as they would have done on a son who had just been released from the hulks. She was pretty and pale, tall, slender, distinguished-looking, and she would have pleased me very much, Monsieur, but for that unfortunate affair.
“Well, when a new subprefect was appointed here eighteen months ago, he brought his private secretary with him. He was a queer sort of fellow, who had lived in the Latin Quarter, it appears. He saw Mademoiselle Fontanelle, and fell in love with her, and when told of what occurred, he merely said: ‘Bah! That is just a guarantee for the future, and I would rather it should have happened before I married her, than afterward. I shall sleep tranquilly with that woman.’
“He paid his addresses to her, asked for her hand, and married her, and then, not being deficient in boldness, he paid wedding-calls,
