“He could not allow his mother to go alone to le Rouvre,” said the kind priest gently.
“We will talk no more of it, my dear Monsieur Chaperon. I will write to him this evening to give him his liberty. I am glad to be obliged to close the windows of my sitting-room.”
She then told him about the anonymous letters, saying that she would offer no encouragement to this unknown suitor.
“Ah! it is an anonymous letter that has prompted Madame de Portenduère’s expedition to le Rouvre!” exclaimed the curé. “You are, no doubt, the object of some malignant persecution.”
“But why? Neither Savinien nor I have injured anyone, and we are doing no harm to anyone here.”
“Well, well, my child. We will take advantage of this tornado which has broken up our little party to arrange our poor old friend’s books; they are still piled in disorder. Bongrand and I will set them straight, for we had thought of hunting through them. Put your trust in God; but remember, too, that in the Justice and myself you have two devoted friends.”
“And that is much,” she said, walking to the end of the little alley with the priest, and craning her neck like a bird looking out of its nest, still hoping to see Savinien.
At this instant Minoret and Goupil, coming home from a walk in the country, stopped as they were passing, and the heir-at-law said to Ursule:
“What is the matter, cousin?—for we are still cousins, are we not? You look altered.”
Goupil cast such ardent eyes on Ursule that she was frightened. She ran in without replying.
“She is a wild bird,” said Minoret to the curé.
“Mademoiselle Mirouët is quite right not to talk to men on her doorstep; she is too young …”
“Oh!” said Goupil; “you must be well aware that she does not lack lovers!”
The curé bowed hastily, and hurried off to the Rue des Bourgeois.
“Well,” said the lawyer’s clerk to Minoret, “the fat is burning. She is as pale as death already; within a fortnight she will have left the town. You will see.”
“It is better to have you for a friend than for an enemy,” said Minoret, struck by the horrible smile which gave to Goupil’s face the diabolical expression which Joseph Bridau gave to Goethe’s Mephistopheles.
“I believe you!” replied Goupil. “If she will not marry me, I will make her die of grief.”
“Do so, boy, and I will give you money enough to start in business in Paris. Then you can marry a rich wife—”
“Poor girl!—why, what harm has she done you?” asked the clerk in some surprise.
“I am sick of her,” said Minoret roughly.
“Only wait till Monday, and you shall see how I will make her squirm,” replied Goupil, studying the postmaster’s countenance.
Next morning La Bougival went to see Savinien, and as she gave him a note, she said, “I don’t know what the dear child has written you about; but she looks like a corpse this morning.”
Who, on reading this letter to Savinien, can fail to picture the sufferings Ursule must have endured during the past night?
“My Dear Savinien—Your mother wishes you to marry Mademoiselle du Rouvre, I am told; and perhaps she is right. You see yourself between a life almost of poverty and a position of wealth, between the wife of your heart and a woman of fashion, between obedience to your mother and obedience to your own choice—for I still believe that I am your choice. Savinien, since you must decide, I wish that you should do so in perfect freedom. I give you back your word—given not to me, but to yourself, at a moment which I can never forget, and which, like all the days that have passed since then, was angelically pure and sweet. That memory will be enough for me to live on. If you should persist in adhering to your vows, a dark and dreadful thought would always trouble my happiness. In the midst of our privations, which you now take so lightly, you might afterwards reflect that, if you had but followed the rules of the world, things might have been very different with you. If you were the man to utter such a thought, it would be my death-warrant in bitter anguish; and if you did not say it, I should be suspicious of the slightest cloud on your brow. Dear Savinien, I have always cared for you more than for anything on earth. I might do so; for my godfather, though jealous of you, said to me, ‘Love him, my child! you will certainly be his, and he yours some day.’ When I went to Paris I loved you without hope, and that love was enough for me. I do not know whether I can revert to that state of mind, but I will try. What are we to each other at this moment! A brother and sister. Let us remain so. Marry the happy girl, whose joy it will be to restore to your name the lustre due it, which I, according to your mother, must tarnish. You shall never hear me mentioned. The world will applaud you; I,
