“It is you that I love!” said Calyste to his mother, blushing, and almost shamefaced; “you who live for me alone, whom I would fain make happy.”
“But you are not in your usual frame of mind, my child,” said the Baroness, looking at her son. “What has happened?”
“Camille loves me,” said he; “and I no longer love her.”
The Baroness drew him towards her and kissed him on the forehead, and in the deep silence of the gloomy old tapestried room he could hear the rapid beating of his mother’s heart. The Irishwoman was jealous of Camille, and had suspected the truth. While awaiting her son night after night she had studied that woman’s passion; led by the light of persistent meditation, she had entered into Camille’s heart; and without being able to account for it, she had understood that in that unwedded soul there was a sort of motherly affection. Calyste’s story horrified this simple and guiless mother.
“Well,” said she, after a pause, “love Madame de Rochefide; she will cause me no sorrow.”
Béatrix was not free; she could not upset any of the plans they had made for Calyste’s happiness, at least so Fanny thought; she saw in her a sort of daughter-in-law to love, and not a rival mother to contend with.
“But Béatrix will never love me!” cried Calyste.
“Perhaps,” replied the Baroness, with a knowing air. “Did you not say that she is to be alone tomorrow?”
“Yes.”
“Well, my child,” said the mother, coloring, “jealousy lurks in all our hearts, but I did not know that I should ever find it at the bottom of my own, for I did not think that anyone would try to rob me of my Calyste’s affection!” She sighed. “I fancied,” she went on, “that marriage would be to you what it was to me. What lights you have thrown on my mind during these two months! What colors are reflected on your very natural passion, my poor darling!—Well, still seem to love your Mademoiselle des Touches; the Marquise will be jealous of her, and will be yours.”
“Oh, my sweet mother, Camille would never have told me that!” cried Calyste, taking his mother by the waist, and kissing her in the neck.
“You make me very wicked, you bad child,” said she, quite happy at seeing the beaming face hope gave to her son, who gaily went up the winding stairs.
Next morning Calyste desired Gasselin to stand on the road from Guérande to Saint-Nazaire, and watch for Mademoiselle des Touches’ carriage; then, as it went past, he was to count the persons in it.
Gasselin returned just as the family had sat down together at breakfast.
“What can have happened?” said Mademoiselle du Guénic; “Gasselin is running as if Guérande were burning.”
“He must have caught the rat,” said Mariotte, who was bringing in the coffee, milk, and toast.
“He is coming from the town and not from the garden,” replied the blind woman.
“But the rat’s hole is behind the wall to the front by the street,” said Mariotte.
“Monsieur le Chevalier, there were five of them; four inside and the coachman.”
“Two ladies on the back seat?” asked Calyste.
“And two gentlemen in front,” replied Gasselin.
“Saddle my father’s horse, ride after them; be at Saint-Nazaire by the time the boat starts for Paimboeuf; and if the two men go on board, come back and tell me as fast as you can gallop.”
Gasselin went.
“Why, nephew, you have the very devil in you!” exclaimed old aunt Zéphirine.
“Let him please himself, sister,” cried the Baron. “He was as gloomy as an owl, and now he is as merry as a lark.”
“Perhaps you told him that our dear Charlotte was coming,” said the old lady, turning to her sister-in-law.
“No,” replied the Baroness.
“I thought he might wish to go to meet her,” said Mademoiselle du Guénic slyly.
“If Charlotte is to stay three months with her aunt, he has time enough to see her in,” replied the Baroness.
“Why, sister, what has occurred since yesterday?” asked the old lady. “You were so delighted to think that Mademoiselle de Pen-Hoël was going this morning to fetch her niece.”
“Jacquelin wants me to marry Charlotte to snatch me from perdition, aunt,” said Calyste, laughing, and giving his mother a look of intelligence. “I was on the Mall this morning when Mademoiselle de Pen-Hoël was talking to Monsieur du Halga; she did not reflect that it would be far worse perdition for me to be married at my age.”
“It is written above,” cried the old aunt, interrupting Calyste, “that I am to die neither happy nor at peace. I should have liked to see our family continued, and some of our lands redeemed—but nothing of the kind! Can you, my fine nephew, put anything in the scale to outweigh such duties as these?”
“Why,” said the Baron, “can Mademoiselle des Touches hinder Calyste from marrying in due course? I must go to see her.”
“I can assure you, father, that Félicité will never be an obstacle in the way of my marriage.”
“I cannot make head or tail of it!” said the blind woman, who knew nothing of her nephew’s sudden passion for the Marquise de Rochefide.
The mother kept her son’s secret; in such matters silence is instinctive in all women. The old aunt sank into deep meditation, listening with all her might, spying every voice, every sound, to guess the mystery they were keeping from her.
Gasselin soon returned, and told his young master that he had not needed to go so far as Saint-Nazaire to learn that Mademoiselle des Touches and the lady would return alone; he had heard it in the town, from Bernus, the carrier, who had taken charge of the gentlemen’s baggage.
“They will come back alone?” said Calyste. “Bring out my horse.”
Gasselin supposed from his young master’s voice that there was something serious on hand; he saddled both the horses, loaded the pistols without saying anything, and
